Men make counterfeit money; in many more cases, money makes counterfeit men.
SYDNEY J. HARRISPatriotism is proud of a country’s virtues and eager to correct its deficiencies; it also acknowledges the legitimate patriotism of other countries, with their own specific virtues.
More Sydney J. Harris Quotes
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There’s no point in burying a hatchet if you’re going to put up a marker on the site.
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Middle Age is that perplexing time of life when we hear two voices calling us, one saying, ‘Why not?’ and the other, ‘Why bother?’
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Life is, if anything, the art of combination. Of discrimination. Of freely picking one’s own personal pattern out of a hundred choices. Not letting it be picked for you-either by the Establishment, or by the Rebels. Conformity of Hip is no better than Conformity of Square.
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Agnosticism is a perfectly respectable and tenable philosophical position; it is not dogmatic and makes no pronouncements about the ultimate truths of the universe. It remains open to evidence and persuasion; lacking faith, it nevertheless does not deride faith.
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People who think they’re generous to a fault usually think that’s their only fault.
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A loser says that’s the way it’s always been done. A winner says there ought to be a better way.
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If a small thing has the power to make you angry, does that not indicate something about your size?
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The main discomfort in being a middle-of-the-roader is that you get sideswiped by partisans going in both directions.
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The time to relax is when you don’t have time for it.
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The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.
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Any philosophy that can be put in a nutshell belongs there.
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We can often endure an extra pound of pain far more easily than we can suffer the withdrawal of an ounce of accustomed pleasure.
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Marriages we regard as the happiest are those in which each of the partners believes he or she got the best of it.
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Ignorance per se is not nearly as dangerous as ignorance of ignorance.
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It’s odd, and a little unsettling, to reflect upon the fact that English is the only major language in which “I” is capitalized; in many other languages “You” is capitalized and the “i” is lower case.” —
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We may hate a person because he reminds us of someone we feared and disliked when younger; or because we see in him some gross caricature of what we find repugnant in ourself; or because he symbolizes an attitude that seems to threaten us.
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Nobody can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.
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Between the semi-educated, who offer simplistic answers to complex questions, and the overeducated, who offer complicated answers to simple questions, it is a wonder that any questions get satisfactorily answered at all.
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Skepticism is not an end in itself; it is a tool for the discovery of truths.
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The greatest enemy of progress is not stagnation, but false progress.
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By the time a man asks you for advice, he has generally made up his mind what he wants to do, and is looking for confirmation rather than counseling.
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Being yourself is not remaining what you were, or being satisfied with what you are. It is the point of departure and far from the goal.
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The pessimist sees only the tunnel; the optimist sees the light at the end of the tunnel; the realist sees the tunnel and the light – and the next tunnel.
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Many married couples separate because they quarrel incessantly, but just as many separate because they were never honest enough or courageous enough to quarrel when they should have.
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Many people know how to work hard; many others know how to play well; but the rarest talent in the world is the ability to introduce elements of playfulness into work, and to put some constructive labor into our leisure.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS -
This is a lesson mankind has not yet learned. We identify, and stratify, and treat persons largely on the basis of their accidental (physical) characteristics, which have no deeper meaning.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS