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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

Take away grievances from some people and you remove their reasons for living; most of us are nourished by hope, but a considerable minority get psychic nutrition from their resentments, and would waste away purposelessly without them.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Minorities People Psychics
Every rule in the book can be broken, except one – be who you are, and become all you were meant to be.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Book Broken Effectiveness
And most of the failures in parent-child relationships, from my observation, begin when the child begins to acquire a mind and a will of its own, to make independent decisions and to question the omnipotence or the wisdom of the parent.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Children Independent
The greatest enemy of progress is not stagnation, but false progress.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Enemy Progress Stagnation
People who think they’re generous to a fault usually think that’s their only fault.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Generosity People Thinking
No one should pay attention to a man delivering a lecture or a sermon on his “philosophy of life” until we know exactly how he treats his wife, his children, his neighbors, his friends, his subordinates and his enemies.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Children Men Philosophy
Why do most Americans look up to education and down upon educated people?
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Educated Looks People
You may be sure that when a man begins to call himself a realist he is preparing to do something that he is secretly ashamed of doing.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Cynical May Men
As the horsepower in modern automobiles steadily rises, the congestion of traffic steadily lowers the average possible speed of your car. This is known as Progress.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Average Car Progress
Happiness is a direction, not a place.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Being Direction Happiness Happy Place
Intolerance is the most socially acceptable form of egotism, for it permits us to assume superiority without personal boasting.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Acceptance Assuming Tolerance
Patriotism 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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Country Humility Legitimate Pride
We have not passed that subtle line between childhood and adulthood until we have stopped saying ‘It got lost,’ and say, ‘I lost it.’
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Education Parenting Responsibility
When we have “second thoughts” about something, our first thoughts don’t seem like thoughts at all – just feelings.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Feelings Firsts Justice
There are always too many Democratic congressmen, too many Republican congressmen, and never enough U.S. congressmen.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Democracy Republican Voting
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

Answers Simple Wonder

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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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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