It is not only useless, it is harmful, to believe in oneself until one truly knows oneself. And to know oneself means to accept our moments of insanity, of eccentricity, of childishness and blindness.
SYDNEY J. HARRISA ‘penchant for telling the truth’ can cripple a candidates chances faster than being caught in flagrante delicto with the governor’s wife.
More Sydney J. Harris Quotes
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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.
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.
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The best thing you can give children, next to good habits, are good memories.
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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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The art of living consists in knowing which impulses to obey and which must be made to obey.
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Every morning I take out my bankbook, stare at it, shudder – and turn quickly to my typewriter.
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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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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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The most important thing in an argument, next to being right, is to leave an escape hatch for your opponent, so that he can gracefully swing over to your side without too much apparent loss of face.
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Honesty consists of the unwillingness to lie to others; maturity, which is equally hard to attain, consists of the unwillingness to lie to oneself.
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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 cynic is not merely one who reads bitter lessons from the past, his is also one who is permanently disappointed in the future.
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We have not passed that subtle line between childhood and adulthood until we have stopped saying ‘It got lost,’ and say, ‘I lost it.’
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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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When we inform, we lead from strength; when we communicate, we lead from weakness-and it is precisely this confession of mortality that engages the ears, heads and hearts of those we want to enlist as allies in a common cause.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS







