c2p-cmd/Good-Quotes-Authors huggingface dataset:
The trouble with Grace, she thought, is that she is so literal. But that was the trouble with most people, when it came down to it; there were very few who enjoyed flights of fantasy, and to have that sort of mind--one which enjoyed dry with and understood the absurd--left one in a shrinking minority.
— Alexander McCall Smith, The Careful Use of Compliments
Then must you speakOf one that loved not wisely but too well,Of one not easily jealous but, being wrought,Perplexed in the extreme; of one whose hand,Like the base Indian, threw a pearl awayRicher than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,Albeit unused to the melting mood,Drop tears as fast as the Arabian treesTheir medicinable gum. Set you down this,And say besides that in Aleppo once,Where a malignant and a turbaned TurkBeat a Venetian and traduced the state,I took by th' throat the circumcised dogAnd smote him thus.
— William Shakespeare, Othello
Love the people who love you back.
— Laura Ruby, Bad Apple
So may the New Year be a happy one to you, happy to many more whose happiness depends on you!
— Charles Dickens, The Chimes
Nothing gives a sadder sense of decay than this loss or suspension of the power to deal with unaccustomed things, and to keep up with the swiftness of the passing moment. [Speaking of self-posed isolation in old age.]
— Nathaniel Hawthorne
The fools among us are presented to be wise and the wise among us are presented to be fools.
— Santosh Kalwar
Smartass Disciple: My master, please show me how to be a wise man!Master of Stupidity: I can't. But I can show you how to do something wisely.
— Toba Beta, Master of Stupidity
Beware the irrational, however seductive. Shun the ‘transcendent’ and all who invite you to subordinate or annihilate yourself. Don’t be afraid to be thought arrogant or selfish. Picture all experts as if they were mammals. Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will provide plenty of time for silence.
— Christopher Hitchens
if a sheep eats bushes does it eat flowers too?a sheep eats whatever it findseven a flower with thorn?even a flower with thorns.then what's the good of thorns?
— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
What makes you wise is not what you learn, but what you practice. What makes you wealthy is not what you earn, but what you invest. So, invest in what to practice, and practice what to invest.
— Michael Peshkam
The only way to see everything, my dear, is to see it absolutely.
— Sherry Lynn Ferguson, Quiet Meg
Lead looked to his hand and saw sparkling chunks of glass in the cracks of the road. He saw ants running around the cracks, infinitely small. His blood ran into the cracks, creating rivers for the industrious ants to perplex over. Lead smiled at the creatures, for he understood that there is no difference between them and us in their wanderings and labor.
— Nathan Yocum
Least said,soonest mended," Toby quipped, quoting a saying Jess often used.
— Jean Little, Dancing Through the Snow
A wise warrior learns from her mistakes.
— Leigh Bardugo, Wonder Woman: Warbringer
This was a freedom essential to the health even of a character so little susceptible of morbid influences as that of Phoebe. The old house [with dry rot in its structure and perhaps also in its inhabitants]
— ...it was not good to breathe no other atmosphere that that.
Happy are those who love for they are loved by God! Alleluia! Amen!
— Melvyn M. Lusterio
Intelligence is loving what is good and Wisdom is worshiping the One True Living God (FGL)! Alleluia! Amen!
— Melvyn M. Lusterio
Happy are you who love for you are loved by God! Alleluia! Amen!
— Melvyn M. Lusterio
All things under heaven are now in God's supervision for all eternity! Alleluia! Amen!
— Melvyn M. Lusterio
All good things remain forever for it is God's plan for all eternity! Alleluia! Amen! 
— Melvyn M. Lusterio
Help means give me a hand.
— Lailah Gifty Akita
Hester glowered at her. “The biggest mistake a villain can make is to get caught up in revenge. Hansel and Gretel were two hungry kids trying to survive in the Woods. Mother thought she’d captured another pair of greedy, gluttonous brats, only to grossly underestimate them. Hansel and Gretel killed her because they had to. It wasn’t personal.” She glanced back at the old siblings. “Doesn’t mean I can stand the sight of ’em, of course. But it also doesn’t mean their story has anything to do with mine anymore.
— Soman Chainani, The Last Ever After
Perhaps we are not really sinners in the hands of an angry God, after all. Perhaps we are all more like seedlings in the hands of a wise gardener.
— Seth Adam Smith, Rip Van Winkle and the Pumpkin Lantern
A wise man lays up treasures in the Kingdom of our Father, so as to live a happy eternal life
— Sunday Adelaja
It's a fine thing to be clever, but too much cleverness usually produces the same result as ignorance.-Lady Berwick
— Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Spring
Oh, Gilbert, don't let's ever grow too old and wise... no, not too old and silly for fairyland.
— L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Windy Poplars
Wise are those who keep asking questions when everyone around them think they know the answers.
— J. Bartell, The 231 Club: My Ten Year Journey From Therapist to CIA Courier and Sanctioned Kills - A True Story
It is wise to consider a matter carefully before jumping in carelessly.
— Nabil N. Jamal
Don't be afraid to be weird for being wise.
— Craig Groeschel, Weird: Because Normal Isn't Working
I have plenty of time... if I am not wise... I could lose it like the games in which you gamble.
— Deyth Banger
Jokes are another example of stupidity... we are so wise and so clever and we do stupid stuff, how wise is that?Jokes on stage of being serious... when you aren't serious what you get is more likely somebody being in state of seriousness.
— Deyth Banger
Every life is a canvas and every interaction is a brush, therefore we’d be wise to consider how we handle the paint.
— Craig D. Lounsbrough
A wise man nourishes his soul each morning with the word of God and enriches his day with God's wisdom. Psalm 19:7.
— Felix Wantang, God's Blueprint of the Holy Bible
Hope is the opiate of the frail.
— Nasus, League of Legends
Be "Yourself" enough to have an opinion,Be "Wise" enough to recognise a difference of opinion,Be "Mature" enough to find a way for co-existence.
— Wordions
She looked terrible, but very wise.
— Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
It made Ender listen more carefully to what people meant, instead of what they said. It made him wise.
— Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game
Errors were not only meant to be committed by fools.
— Michael Bassey Johnson, Master of Maxims
You, don't hook everywhere. ‪#‎iampm‬
— Pankaj Mishra (#iampm)
I asked somebody else who is out my country about his country and what he answered what's a big suprise what the people said in my country was "STUPIDY" - Category answer!
— Deyth Banger
Clever, smart and wise people have one in common that they read quotes, they are curious for knowledge and they have big libraries!
— Deyth Banger
Sometimes the truth stares us in the face, but we just choose not to look.
— Gill Lewis, White Dolphin
To say that nothing is true is to realize that the foundations of society are fragile and that we must be the shepherds of our civilization. To say that everything is permitted is to understand that we are the architects of our actions, and that we must live with their consequences, whether glorious of tragic.
— Ezio Auditore da Firenze
Wise people make trails and paths, clever walk on them - stupid people can't decide.
— Deyth Banger
...So let's not lie ourselves, let's view the stuff how they are really are...Universe is endless... TIme is endless..., The possibilities of happening or doing something are endless, the numbers are endless...So look how far did we reach, it's incrediable view out here,... but one thing is missing isn't out this have something near, overall after all?
— Deyth Banger
The wisdom to be on the throne of one’s life must surpass the wisdom of the one being ruled, otherwise I will squander the whole of my life in the most appalling ways. By virtue of that reality, I would be wise to get out of the chair and invite God to have a seat.
— Craig D. Lounsbrough, An Intimate Collision: Encounters with Life and Jesus
I should avoid that emotion, when I laugh I always think that I'm somehow an a guy who lowers his IQ.
— Deyth Banger
Make this moment magnificent!
— Lailah Gifty Akita
How can she? She's incapable of understanding anything. Besides, do any of us understand what we are doing? If we did, would we ever do it?
— George Bernard Shaw, Pygmalion and Related Readings
Looking for positives is always wise in any situation that you may encounter.
— Steven Redhead, Life Is Simply A Game
The greatest realization is dawn of my sacred existence.
— Lailah Gifty Akita
Be wise and walk with the wise.
— Lailah Gifty Akita
Be wise enough, know when to move on.
— Lailah  Gifty  Akita
It seems to me that smart people seem to know things and wise people know how to use what they know. Smart is a big help to a man
—  wise is a big help to lots of men.
A wise man does not waste so good a commodity as lying for naught.
— Mark Twain
As my father used to say: “There are two sure ways to lose a friend, one is to borrow, the other to lend.” - Kvothe the Bloodless (The Name of The Wind)
— Patrick Rothfuss
we are all half fool, half wise , there is no wisdom without foolishness and no pride without shame .
— Elif Shafak, Honor
It's the deep breath before the plunge.
— J.R.R. Tolkien
How can the nation be mightier, without unity of its citizens?
— Lailah Gifty Akita, Pearls of  Wisdom: Great  mind
The duel may go on for long, but the self-defense often wins over the self-reproach.
— Pawan Mishra, Coinman: An Untold Conspiracy
We are living in a world where Ignorance is celebrated as wisdom and Wisdom sidelined as Ignorance.
— Rajesh Nanoo
If you want to be educated and wise, you must open your heart, expand your mind, be accepting and ready to change.
— Debasish Mridha
Portia followed after, a smirk on her face, and Syc hissed as he passed.Donegan waited till they were gone, then swung round to Gracious."He hissed at me.""He hissed at you.""Should I hiss back?""It's a bit late.""He could still hear.""Not unless you run after him.""Do you think I should?""Probably not.""I think I should.""It'd be a bit weird.""You might be right." Donegan pursed his lips, then shook his fist at the doorway."That showed him," said Gracious.Donegan nodded. "He'll think twice about hissing at me again.
— Derek Landy, Last Stand of Dead Men
...But I've felt your grief, your loss. And though your species is capable of horrors, it's capable of beauty, too. To end it now would be no better than taking your dreams away; to bring death robs your species of the chance to heal.
— Amie Kaufman, This Shattered World
Library: The Temple of the Wise!
— Mehmet Murat ildan
Better to be able to love than to be loveable.
— Amanda Mosher, Better to be able to love than to be loveable
Even the wisest and the best of us can be foolish occasionally.
— Dean Koontz, Deeply Odd
It takes a year to be collectively known as "intelligent" but it takes a lifetime to be distinguished as "wise
— Eugenio III R. Letada
Let there be spaces in your togetherness.And let the wind of the heavens dance between you.
— Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
Vacation time is something we all accrue, but only the wisest of us recognize its importance.
— Andrea Goeglein
Time cannot be saved, it can only be spent, and if not spent wisely and well, it is wasted.
— Henrietta C. Mears
Many people die long before their departure date, Through ignorance of living a life they never wanted to be apart of but are to scared to change.
— Nikki Rowe
The most difficult thing in the world is to know how to do a thing and to watch someone else do it wrong without comment
— Theodore H. White
Advantages never comes free. You have to create it the way you want it!
— Ashish Patel
The knowledge we need, we are predisposed to seeking, intuitively.A fool does not know, what to do with importance, how to gauge importance, but they readily seek influence.The corrupt didn't find the expanse of life giving thought, because their self is their center; the stagnant find it hard to revolve.The wise do not subscribe to the fodder that feeds the herd, because they are not predisposed to being swept along in banal minutiae.
— Justin K. McFarlane Beau
The boy gathers materials for a temple, and then when he is thirty, concludes to build a woodshed
— Henry David Thoreau
You never too old to Become wiser !T.B
— Tawana Beecham
Wise words are like seeds. The more you scatter them, the more they will grow into infinite gardens of knowledge.
— Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem
Schooling gives you knowledge, but education makes you wise.
— Debasish Mridha
To be knowledgeable, learn new things every day; to be wise, unlearn things that you learn with wit and love.
— Debasish Mridha
In medical science, as in daily life, it was unwise to jump to conclusions
— Albert Camus
Choosing the best option might show our smartness but Choosing the Right option would show our Goodness.,There, indeed, is a difference between being WISE and being NICE, andits now, it's our turn to decide-if it is smart enough to choose a right cup..! &If it is wise, being nice..!
— Ajay Chandan
Life. In all it's mundane majesty.
— J.R. Ward, Lover Enshrined
The wise pause
—  the foolish react.
Wine is to women as duct tape is to men - it fixes everything
— - comic strip mama
Money can buy you knowledge, but not the wisdom to use it wisely.
— Carew Papritz, The Legacy Letters: his Wife, his Children, his Final Gift
Life would be simpler if only we were all unicorns.
— Olley White, Fighting Dirty Too
You cannot be both in love and a wise person.
— M.F. Moonzajer, A moment with God ; Poetry
A bird & a fish can fall in love, but where do they make a home?
— Dolly Parton
And, to be true, an enemy's lair is an enemy's lair, no matter how comfortable or fancy it might appear.
— Steven J. Carroll, A Prince of Earth
A man feared that he might find an assassin
— Another that he might find a victim.One was more wise than the other.
Sharing is the first stage to the evolution of the intellectual.
— Aswin Devarajan
It is not necessary to be an 'Intelligent', It's wise to have the 'Internet
— Sumit Kumar Mallik
Think Wisely and act which leads to triumphant moment.
— Raajesh Pillai
A wise woman wishes to be no one's enemy
—  a wise woman refuses to be anyone's victim.
Only fools imply compliments. The wise man comes right out with it, point-blank. Imply criticism--unless the criticized isn't within earshot.
— William Faulkner, Soldiers' Pay
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so sure of themselves and wiser people so full of doubts.
— Bertrand Russell
Smart is what you learn from others. Wise is what you learn from yourself.
— Sandra Swartz
This book is written with an open mind and it should be read with the same
— Adrian Sandvaer, Bright Moments -  A Journey In The Human Mind
Love survives in us precisely because it isn't wise.
— Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram
If wise are allowed to think
— they do...but few dont speak!!In the case Of fools...Even if you dont allow them to think..They will Speak!
What you did tonight was clever,” Wit said. “You turned an attack into a promise. The wisest of men know that to render an insult powerless, you often need only to embrace it.
— Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
Intelligence is knowing the right answer. Wisdom is knowing when to say it.
— Tim Fargo
You think it's all obvious and straightforward, this world. But really, it's all in who is doing the looking.
— Sarah Dessen, The Moon and More
When you are in the company of lunatics, behave like a lunatic. When you are in the company of intelligentsias, speak with brilliance...that is how a chameleon behaves, the territory changes it, and it adapts to the changes.
— Michael Bassey Johnson
He exuded wisdom-even the wisest...were pale, flickering candles next to the nourishing solar illumination of [his] insights.
— Aprilynne Pike, Spells
Who in the universe halts when the enemy tells them to?
— Sherwood Smith, Crown Duel
All the quiet corners of the world are the great temples for the wise and for the wisdom!
— Mehmet Murat ildan
A dog to vomit does turn,A fool to folly but return,The wise err and learn,Gaining from each burn.
— Munindra Misra, PT. Kanhaiya Lal Misra - My Father
There are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well.The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all human characters, and the little dependence that can be placed on the appearance of merit sense
— Jane Austen
We are all vainer of our luck than of our merits.
— Rex Stout, The Rubber Band
It's one of my inventions-a shampoo," Athena explained. "Anyway, I didn't know it would do"-she gestured toward the snakes-"that.
— Joan Holub, Athena the Brain
Some are born old maids, some achieve old maidenhood, and some have old maidenhood thrust upon them ," parodied Miss Lavendar whimsically.
— L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Avonlea
We all look. The lucky find. The wise accept.
— Nora Roberts
The dark hills, with the darker spruces marching over them, looked grim on early falling nights, but Ingleside bloomed with firelight and laughter, though the winds come in from the Atlantic singing of mournful things. "Why isn't the wind happy, Mummy?" asked Walter one night. "Because it is remembering all the sorrow of the world since it began," answered Anne.
— L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Ingleside
When we learn how to become resilient, we learn how to embrace the beautifully broad spectrum of the human experience.
— Jaeda DeWalt
The problem is that we always look for the missing piece of the puzzle instead of finding a place for the one in our hand...
— Alina Radoi
The well bred contradict other people. the wise contradict themselves.
— Oscar Wilde
Don't let sex make you a mother before love makes you a wife.
— Kemi Edonmi
Bring the past, but only if you can build from it.
— Dominico Scarlatti
HONOR ways did not won the WAR
— رامي عمار
may be wiser to everything to see and understand what it left behind
— cG9sYXJhZGl0aWE=
Wise people are only wise because they have lived many lives before.
— Leydi Morfa, Lilly's Flame
If you are a sparrow, don’t attack the eagle; be wise! If you are an eagle, don’t attack the sparrow; be just!
— Mehmet Murat ildan
Truth exists for the wise, beauty for the feeling heart.
— Friedrich Schiller
Some People Are Wise, And Some Are Otherwise.
— Unknown 9
There is a time to speak up, and a time to be silent. A time to read and a time to write. A time to learn and a time to teach. A time to listen and time to be heard. A time to lose and a time to gain. And for all of these things the time in now
— Unsure of origin
When the ignorant have become numerous or powerful enough, they have been referred to by a special name. This names is 'the Wise'.
— Idries Shah, Reflections
Surely this is what death would be like: nothingness, oblivion, as the world continued to turn, heedless of her absence.
— Meredith Duran, At Your Pleasure
To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.
— Friedrich Nietzsche
You are so busy being YOU that you have no idea how utterly unprecedented you are.
— John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
I myself am made entirely of flaws, stitched together with good intentions.
— Augusten Burroughs, Magical Thinking
Remember to always be yourself. Unless you suck.
— Joss Whedon
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.
— Friedrich Nietzsche
In order to be irreplaceacle, one must always be different.
— Coco Chanel
I am not eccentric. It's just that I am more alive than most people. I am an unpopular electric eel set in a pond of catfish.
— Edith Sitwell
The things that make me different are the things that make me.
— A.A. Milne
Don't you ever let a soul in the world tell you that you can't be exactly who you are.
— Lady Gaga
Where's your will to be weird?
— Jim Morrison
It never got weird enough for me.
— Hunter S. Thompson
I think everybody's weird. We should all celebrate our individuality and not be embarrassed or ashamed of it.
— Johnny Depp
There is not one big cosmic meaning for all; there is only the meaning we each give to our life, an individual meaning, an individual plot, like an individual novel, a book for each person.
— Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 1: 1931-1934
I don't believe in fashion. I believe in costume. Life is too short to be same person every day.
— Stephanie Perkins, Lola and the Boy Next Door
Think outside the box, collapse the box, and take a fucking sharp knife to it.
— Banksy, Wall and Piece
your handwriting. the way you walk. which china pattern you choose. it's all giving you away. everything you do shows your hand. everything is a self portrait. everything is a diary.
— Chuck Palahniuk, Diary
I worship individuals for their highest possibilities as individuals and I loathe humanity for its failure to live up to these possibilities.
— Ayn Rand
If I speak of myself in different ways, that is because I look at myself in different ways.
— Michel de Montaigne, The Complete Essays
Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can offer with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation, but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
It's so hard to express yourself.' I understand this.'I want to express myself.'The same is true for me.' I'm looking for my voice.' It's in your mouth.' I want to do something I'm not ashamed of.'Something you are proud of, yes?' Not even. I just don't want to be ashamed.
— Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated
If I start giving people what they like I'll turn into one of them and I don't want to be one of them I want to be one of me.
— Craig Ferguson
There's a rebel lying deep in my soul. Anytime anybody tells me the trend is such and such, I go the opposite direction. I hate the idea of trends. I hate imitation; I have a reverence for individuality.
— Clint Eastwood, Wild Open Spaces: Why We Love Westerns
I am not plain, or average or - God forbid - vanilla. I am peanut butter rocky road with multicolored sprinkles, hot fudge and a cherry on top.
— Wendy Mass, Every Soul a Star
The worst curse to befall anyone is stagnation, a banal existence, the quiet desperation that comes out of a need for conformity. 
— Deepak Chopra, The Return of Merlin
Why would I want to fit in?
— Carrie Jones, Need
I'd rather be a freak than a clone.
— Joanne Harris
As much as I live I shall not imitate them or hate myself for being different to them
— Orhan Pamuk, Snow
Everyone marries the Duke of Westminster. There are a lot of duchesses, but only one Coco Chanel.
— Coco Chanel
You laugh at me because I'm different, I laugh at you because you're all the same.
— Jonathan  Davis
Autists are the ultimate square pegs, and the problem with pounding a square peg into a round hole is not that the hammering is hard work. It's that you're destroying the peg.
— Paul  Collins
If you are different from the rest of the flock, they bite you
— Vincent O'Sullivan, The Next Room
I act with complete certainty. But this certainty is my own.
— Ludwig Wittgenstein, On Certainty
A man is known by the books he reads.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
Do the other kids make fun of you? For how you talk?''Sometimes.''So why don't you do something about it? You could learn to talk differently, you know.'But this is my voice. How would you be able to tell when I was talking?
— Lauren Oliver, Before I Fall
I hate the thought of her being forced into a box that doesn't fit her. Of having her wings cut off, her sight blinded, her hearing muted, her voice stilled.
— Charles de Lint, Dreams Underfoot
Eleanor looked up, surprised; the little girl was sliding back in her chair, sullenly refusing her milk, while her father frowned and her brother giggled and her mother said calmly, 'She wants her cup of stars.'Indeed yes, Eleanor thought; indeed, so do I; a cup of stars, of course.'Her little cup,' the mother was explaining, smiling apologetically at the waitress, who was thunderstruck at the thought that the mill's good country milk was not rich enough for the little girl. 'It has stars in the bottom, and she always drinks her milk from it at home. She calls it her cup of stars because she can see the stars while she drinks her milk.' The waitress nodded, unconvinced, and the mother told the little girl, 'You'll have your milk from your cup of stars tonight when we get home. But just for now, just to be a very good little girl, will you take a little milk from this glass?'Don't do it, Eleanor told the little girl; insist on your cup of stars; once they have trapped you into being like everyone else you will never see your cup of stars again; don't do it; and the little girl glanced at her, and smiled a little subtle, dimpling, wholly comprehending smile, and shook her head stubbornly at the glass. Brave girl, Eleanor thought; wise, brave girl.
— Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House
I'm an oddity of one, my strangeness too complicated to explain or share.
— Libba Bray, A Great and Terrible Beauty
If you're quiet, you're not living. You've got to be noisy and colorful and lively.
— Mel Brooks
Any fool can do something cool and look cool, but it takes skill to make something uncool cool again.
— Criss Jami, Killosophy
Whatever does not pretend at all has style enough.
— Booth Tarkington, The Magnificent Ambersons
Have you ever played chess, Kitty?”I eyed her. What did a board game have to do with this? “Not really.”“You and I should play sometime. I think you would like it,” she said. “It’s a game of strategy, mostly. The strong pieces are in the back row, while the weak pieces—the pawns—are all in the front, ready to take the brunt of the attack. Because of their limited movement and vulnerability, most people underestimate them and only use them to protect the more powerful pieces. But when I play, I protect my pawns.”“Why?” I said, not entirely sure where this conversation was going. “If they’re weak, then what’s the point?”“They may be weak when the game begins, but their potential is remarkable. Most of the time, they’ll be taken by the other side and held captive until the end of the game. But if you’re careful—if you keep your eyes open and pay attention to what your opponent is doing, if you protect your pawns and they reach the other side of the board, do you know what happens then?”I shook my head, and she smiled.“Your pawn becomes a queen.” She touched my cheek, her fingers cold as ice. “Because they kept moving forward and triumphed against impossible odds, they become the most powerful piece in the game. Never forget that, all right? Never forget the potential one solitary pawn has to change the entire game.
— Aimee Carter, Pawn
The Naming of Cats is a difficult matter,It isn't just one of your holiday games;You may think at first I'm as mad as a hatterWhen I tell you, a cat must have THREE DIFFERENT NAMES.First of all, there's the name that the family use daily,Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James,Such as Victor or Jonathan, or George or Bill Bailey -All of them sensible everyday names.There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter,Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames:Such as Plato, Admetus, Electra, Demeter -But all of them sensible everyday names.But I tell you, a cat needs a name that's particular,A name that's peculiar, and more dignified,Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular,Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride?Of names of this kind, I can give you a quorum,Such as Munkustrap, Quaxo, or Coricopat,Such as Bombalurina, or else Jellylorum -Names that never belong to more than one cat.But above and beyond there's still one name left over,And that is the name that you never will guess;The name that no human research can discover -But THE CAT HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess.When you notice a cat in profound meditation,The reason, I tell you, is always the same:His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplationOf the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name:His ineffable effableEffanineffableDeep and inscrutable singular Name.
— T.S. Eliot, Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats
It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations -- past and present -- are often incomprehensible to outsiders, but the individual's hungers, anxieties, dreams, and preoccupations have remained unchanged through the millenia.
— Eric Hoffer
Joining a sub-culture, any sub-culture, for whatever reason, is as I see it never a legitimate self-expression. It is always a result of sheep mentality; a wish to belong somewhere.
— Varg Vikernes
People say of me, 'She's peculiar.' They do not understand me. If they did they would say so oftener and with emphasis.
— Mary MacLane, The Story of Mary Maclane & Other Writings
I just never let anything bother me, man. I know myself really well. Nobody's opinion of me can shake my opinion of myself.
— Ruben Studdard
Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else.
— Margaret Mead
We are much too much inclined in these days to divide people into permanent categories, forgetting that a category only exists for its special purpose and must be forgotten as soon as that purpose is served.
— Dorothy L. Sayers, Are Women Human? Astute and Witty Essays on the Role of Women in Society
My lines all curve. I tend to connect the wrong dots.
— David Levithan, Boy Meets Boy
I get glimpses of the horror of normalcy. Each of these innocents on the street is engulfed by a terror of their own ordinariness. They would do anything to be unique.
— Katherine Dunn, Geek Love
Taking into account the public's regrettable lack of taste, it is incumbent upon you not to fit in.
— Janeane Garofalo, Feel This Book: An Essential Guide to Self-Empowerment, Spiritual Supremacy, and Sexual Satisfaction
The really valuable thing in the pageant of human life seems to me not the political state, but the creative, sentient individual, the personality; it alone creates the noble and the sublime, while the herd as such remains dull in thought and dull in feeling.
— Albert Einstein, Ideas and Opinions
No need for everyone to look the same. The secret is to wear what suits you best!
— Chica Umino, Honey and Clover, Vol. 4
Once a man strays out of the common herd, he's more likely to meet wolves in the thickets than angels.
— Walter de la Mare, The Return
Nobody is so weird others can't identify with them.
— Rebecca Miller
There's always one more way to do things and that's your way, and you have a right to try it at least once.
— Waylon Jennings
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.
— Robert Frost, Birches
Any preoccupation with ideas of what is right or wrong in conduct shows an arrested intellectual development.
— Oscar Wilde
His thoughts inhabit a different plane from those of ordinary men
—  the simplest interpretation of that is to call him crazy.
I just always want to be different - THE EXCEPTION - and this weekend knocked me right back to reality.And the reality is - I AM TRULY BLESSED ..
— Jon-Robert Holden, Blessed Footsteps: Memoirs of JR Holden
The love of life begins with the love of one person.
— Marty Rubin
Every path but your own is the path of fate. Keep on your own track, then.
— Henry David Thoreau, Walden
Individuality or Unity? I say there's room for both.
— Brian Celio
when you are surrounded by sheep then it is easy to become one yourself.
— Stephen Richards
Watch out for the average--they're usually hiding something big.
— James St. James, Party Monster: A Fabulous But True Tale of Murder in Clubland
But these few are the salt of the earth; without them, human life would become a stagnant pool. Not only is it they who introduce good things which did not before exist, it is they who keep the life in those which already existed.
— John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
She was considered timid and morose. Only in the country, her skin tanned by the sun and her belly full of ripe fruit, running through the fields with Pedro Tercero, was she smiling and happy. Her mother said that that was the real Blanca, and that the other one, the one back in the city, was a Blanca in hibernation.
— Isabel Allende, The House of the Spirits
He thought: How difficult it is to explain yourself to yourself. Sometimes there only is, and no knowing.
— Aidan Chambers, Postcards from No Man's Land
I would like to have nothing to do with you for hours on end and then come back and find you, come back with things I’ve thought and found all on my own— on my own, not through you.
— Helen Oyeyemi, Mr. Fox
Believe it or not, some of us have piercings and tattoos and dye our hair because we think it looks pretty, not for any deep sociological reason. This isn't an act of protest against cultural or social repression. It's not a grand, deliberately defiant gesture against capitalists or feminists or any other social group. It's not even the fashion equivalent to sticking two fingers up at the world. The boring truth of it, Gabriel, is that I don't dress like this to hurt my parents or draw attention to myself or make a statement. I just do it because I think it looks nice. Disappointed?
— Alex Bell, The Ninth Circle
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
— Henry David Thoreau, Walden
I would never stoop so low as to be fashionable.
— Dolly Parton
There's nothing good about being ordinary. People don't respect you for it. People run after people who are different, who have confidence in their own taste, who don't run with the herd. There is nothing gained by giving in to the pressures of group vulgarity.
— Erica Jong, Fear of Flying
I want a simple, ordinary life . . . like humans enjoy.
— Deborah Harkness, A Discovery of Witches
In addition to conformity as a way to relieve the anxiety springing from separateness, another factor of contemporary life must be considered: the role of the work routine and the pleasure routine. Man becomes a 'nine to fiver', he is part of the labour force, or the bureaucratic force of clerks and managers. He has little initiative, his tasks are prescribed by the organisation of the work; there is even little difference between those high up on the ladder and those on the bottom. They all perform tasks prescribed by the whole structure of the organisation, at a prescribed speed, and in a prescribed manner. Even the feelings are prescribed: cheerfulness, tolerance, reliability, ambition, and an ability to get along with everybody without friction. Fun is routinised in similar, although not quite as drastic ways. Books are selected by the book clubs, movies by the film and theatre owners and the advertising slogans paid for by them; the rest is also uniform: the Sunday ride in the car, the television session, the card game, the social parties. From birth to death, from Monday to Monday, from morning to evening - all activities are routinised, and prefabricated. How should a man caught up in this net of routine not forget that he is a man, a unique individual, one who is given only this one chance of living, with hopes and disappointments, with sorrow and fear, with the longing for love and the dread of the nothing and separateness?
— Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving
The Master said of Gong Yechang, “He is marriageable. Although he was once imprisoned and branded as a criminal, he was in fact innocent of any crime.” The Master gave him his daughter in marriage.(Analects 5.1)
— Confucius
If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, what am I? And if not now, when?
— Rabbi Hillel
You can't shame a shameless man, you can only remind him of the awesome shit he's done.
— Captain Perverto
Our culture promotes individuality, while the Amish are deeply entrenched in community. To us, if someone stands out, it's no big deal because diversity is respected and expected. To the Amish, there's no room for deviation from the norm. It's important to fit in, because that similarity of identity is what defines the society. If you don't fit in, the consequences are psychological tragic, you stand alone when all you've ever known is being part of the group.
— Jodi Picoult, Plain Truth
I must shape my own coat according to my cloth, but it will not be after the fashion of this world, God willing, but fit for me.
— Arbella Stuart, The Letters of Lady Arbella Stuart
The internet: always proving that you're not quite as special as you suspected.
— Robin Sloan, Sourdough
Only someone wishing to disappear would ever strive to 'fit in'.
— Shaun Hick
We're unique in ways that can't be imagined, but you'll never know until you rid yourself of comparison.
— Tyconis D. Allison Ty
Proudly buck the trend. Dare to be different.
— Fennel Hudson, Traditional Angling - Fennel's Journal - No. 6
Be batty, be traditional, and be proud.
— Fennel Hudson, Traditional Angling - Fennel's Journal - No. 6
We need some controversy every now and then. Without it, we would never know where we stand as individuals: with the crowd or by yourself.
— K. Weikel, The Elite
...at some indiscernible moment he sees all of us clearly — every face distinct, like immiscible droplets of water, all of us individuals constituting an interconnected sea of beings.
— David Michael Miller, The Becomer
There are many fishes in the sea and then there are a few beautiful swishy mermaids. Me?! No I'm not the fish not even the mermaid, I don't belong to the sea. I am the Ocean! At a horizon far far away I'm a whirlpool of storm rising and chasing, twirling and dancing to my own tunes and at another all calm serene still and silent, I am the ocean! limitless boundless infinite and as beautiful as I may seem from the outside, I have life within!
— Himanjali Singh
There are many fishes in the sea and then there are a few beautiful swishy mermaids. Me?! No, I'm not the fish not even the mermaid, I don't belong to the sea. I am the Ocean! At a horizon far far away I'm a whirlpool of a storm rising and chasing, twirling and dancing to my own tunes and at another all calm serene still and silent, I am the ocean! limitless boundless infinite and as beautiful as I may seem from the outside, I have life within!
— Himanjali Singh
Then perhaps we should carve a world one day where the strength lies in who you are, rather than in what they expect you to be.
— Rin Chupeco, The Bone Witch
I propose a conspiracy of orphans. We exchange winks. We reject hierarchies. All hierarchies. We take the shit of the world for granted and we exchange stories about how we nevertheless get by. We are impertinent. More than half the stars in the universe are orphan-stars belonging to no constellation. And they give off more light than all the constellation stars.
— John Berger, Confabulations
This is the age of the individual and there is no reason to believe that this focus of mankind is likely to change in the foreseeable future. Hence, the mission is to put individualism inside a wide context and to give it meaning and a sense of direction; to empower it – but authentically this time.
— Shai Tubali, The Mystical Enlightenment of Friedrich Nietzsche: On the Death of God and the God Within
We are same energies expressing in different forms!
— Ramana Pemmaraju
So you realized that there were always women in tears, or a red-headed man, or something else to spoil your effects?""Yes, naturally.
— Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea
Life can be generous, but leaves us with a trilemma: How can we reconcile three diverse features: ‘I’, 'me' and the 'others'. Since the “I” entails what I want; the “me” what others expect of me and the “others” what others themselves want. The bridges between "individuality", “surroundings” and "otherness" can be abysmal and very often waiting to be restored. (“I am on my own side, but I can listen “ )
— Erik Pevernagie
You're an original, an individual, a masterpiece. Celebrate that; don't let your uniqueness make you shy. Don't be someone other than the wonder you are. Every star is important to the sky.
— Douglas Pagels, 100 Things to Always Remember...and One Thing to Never Forget: Words to Live by and Wishes to Share
Given that the Taliban is a Pashtun movement, the tendency of the Pashtun man to emphasize his individuality through disagreement rather than agreement will come to the fore after the disappearance of the already 'loose' authority of Mullah Omar.
— Khaled Ahmed, Sleepwalking to Surrender: Dealing with Terrorism in Pakistan
To some people independent though is heresy and critical thought blasphemy
— rassool jibraeel snyman
The best life is a simple harmony between who you are and where you're going.
— Garry Fitchett
Exercising your talents, passion, sense of judgment, and making a difference while doing something you love is the essence of life.
— Garry Fitchett, Life Is a Bicycle: A Living Philosophy to Finding Your Authenticity
Being in tune to one's Will and working accordingly shears the malaise of inauthenticity.
— Garry Fitchett, Life Is a Bicycle: A Living Philosophy to Finding Your Authenticity
The 20th Century proved that there is nothing more dangerous to the health of ethnic minority communities than big government.
— A.E. Samaan
If the chick is not able to break the shell of his egg, he will die without being born. We are - chick. The world - is our egg. If we do not break the shell of the world, then we will die without being born
— Hermann Hesse, Demian. Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend
The very point that you are not likened by somebody in proof of your authenticity and uniqueness.
— Ramana Pemmaraju
When I was a girl . . . I imagined that life was individual, one's own affair; that the events happening in the world outside were important enough in their own way, but were personally quite irrelevant. Now, like the rest of my generation, I have had to learn again and again the terrible truth . . . that no life is really private, or isolated, or self-sufficient. People's lives were entirely their own, perhaps--and more justifiably--when the world seemed enormous, and all its comings and goings were slow and deliberate. But this is so no longer, and never will be again, since man's inventions have eliminated so much of distance and time; for better, for worse, we are now each of us part of the surge and swell of great economic and political movements, and whatever we do, as individuals or as nations, deeply affects everyone else.
— Vera Brittain, Testament of Youth
Nobody else is wearing anything even remotely like it.'Magnus cast a disparaging look around at all the fashion-challenged sailors. 'I feel sorry for them, of course, but I do not see why that observation should alter my current extremely stylish course of action.
— Cassandra Clare, What Really Happened in Peru
and beware those whoonly takeinstructions from theirGodfor they havefailed completely to live their ownlives.
— Charles Bukowski, Love Is a Dog from Hell
And why, she began to ask, did she rage against individuals? Not individuals but institutions are the enemies, and they most afflict the disciples who the most generously serve them. They insinuate their tyranny under a hundred guises and pompous names, such as Polite Society, the Family, the Church, Sound Business, the Party, the Country, the Superior White Race; and the only defense against them, Carol beheld, was unembittered laughter.
— Sinclair Lewis, Main Street
It's strange how easily we assume that others must be going in the same direction as us.
— Alberto J. Roemmers
There is another more psychological obstacle to the full development of love in the modern world, and that is the fear that many people feel of not preserving their individuality in tact. This is a foolish and rather modern terror. Individuality is not an end in itself; it is something that must enter into fructifying contact with the world, and in so doing must lose its separateness. An individuality which is kept in a glass case withers, whereas on e that is freely expended in human contacts becomes enriched.
— Bertrand Russell, Marriage and Morals
Why--?" he jerked his thumb in the direction of the young, "when they're so lovely--"She too looked at the girl, who was fastening a flower that had come undone in the front of her frock. She smiled. She said nothing. Then half consciously she echoed his question without a meaning in her echo, "Why?"He was dashed for a moment. It seemed to him that she refused to help him. And he wanted her to help him. Why should she not take the weight off his shoulders and give him what he longed for --assurance, certainty? Because she too was deformed like the rest of them? He looked down at her hands. They were strong hands; fine hands; but if it were a question, he thought, watching the fingers curl slightly, of "my" children, of "my" possession, it would be one rip down the belly; or teeth in the soft fur of the throat. We cannot help each other, he thought, we are all deformed. Yet, disagreeable as it was to him to remove her from the eminence upon which he placed her, perhaps she was right, he thought, and we who make idols of other people, who endow this man, that woman, with power to lead us, only add to the deformity, and stoop ourselves.
— Virginia Woolf, The Years
Life among clones would not be worth living, and a sane person will only rejoice that others have abilities that they do not share. That should be elementary.
— Noam Chomsky
Honestly, the point is I no more expect you to acknowledge or respect my feelings, there ends your story! HAPPY ME!
— Ramana Pemmaraju
Everyone just wants to be like that Somebody else. Ironically, that Somebody wishes to just be like everyone else. If this is achieved, however, individuality is annihilated.
— Ufuoma Apoki
If you're wonderful in any way somebody will fuck with you. Just like if you're horrible in any way they're gonna fuck with you. The world is for the average and the common. Those are the people who never hurt - they just fall asleep. The rest of us, we're The Walking Wounded.
— Kim Fowley, Lord of Garbage
What if part of God's message to the world was you, the true and real you?
— Donald Miller
Courage is being yourself in a world that almost seems to endorse conformity.
— Todd William
It is dangerous to make everybody go forward by the same road: and worse to measure others by oneself.
— Saint Ignatius (of Loyola)
So distracting, so complete is she that she is gone before many realize that she had no escort, she was along, a parade of one.
— Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl
So distracting, so complete is she that she is gone before many realize that she had no escort, she was alone, a parade of one.
— Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl
Change requires one to start now here or nowhere. Both places require one to pass through the same starting point – today, right now” from Cinderella In Focus
— H.L. Balcomb
Your power is in your individuality, in being exactly who you area.
— Jennifer Lopez
The complexity of the so-called individual that’s been praised for decades in America somehow has narrowed itself to the ‘me’. When I was a young girl we were called citizens – American citizens. We were second-class citizens, but that was the word. In the 50s and 60s they started calling us consumers. So we did – consume. Now they don’t use those words any more – it’s the American taxpayer and those are different attitudes.
— Toni Morrison
Men are different
—  sheep are all alike.
In our own way, in your own way, we are all of us a masterpiece. Everyone is unique.
— Chloe Thurlow, Katie in Love
Let us throw away our candles and our torches. Let us flood the cities with light. Let us bring a new light to men! -Equality 7-2521
— Ayn Rand
The smaller man said again, 'See the Buddha in everyone.'How different, I thought, that is from Brakhage, who says it is the artist's business to discover the particularity that distinguishes you from all others. Your virtue. Your vision that makes you separate from others. I remembered that he quoted Robert Duncan. 'Soul is not universal. It is a created-creative event.
— Sharon Doubiago, The Book of Seeing With One's Own Eyes