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It’s surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you’re not comfortable within yourself, you can’t be comfortable with others.

Sydney J. Harris

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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Light Next Optimist Tunnels
A cynic is not merely one who reads bitter lessons from the past, his is also one who is permanently disappointed in the future.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Fear Lessons Past
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

Hard People Play Work
Honesty consists of the unwillingness to lie to others; maturity, which is equally hard to attain, consists of the unwillingness to lie to oneself.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Attain Honesty Lying Maturity Truth
Man’s unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Men Unique War
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 primary purpose of a liberal education is to make one’s mind a pleasant place in which to spend one’s leisure.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

College Education Mind
A ‘penchant for telling the truth’ can cripple a candidates chances faster than being caught in flagrante delicto with the governor’s wife.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Chance Telling Truth Wife
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
The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Education Mirror Purpose Whole Window
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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Art Choices Squares
Ignorance per se is not nearly as dangerous as ignorance of ignorance.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Dangerous Ignorance Nearly
Love makes everything lovely; hate concentrates itself on the object of its hatred.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Convcentarted Everything Hatred Love Object
Every morning I take out my bankbook, stare at it, shudder – and turn quickly to my typewriter.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Morning Staring Typewriters
Nothing is as easy to make as a promise this winter to do something next summer; this is how commencement speakers are caught.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Keeping Promises Summer Winter
The founder of every creed from Jesus Christ to Karl Marx, would be appalled to return to earth and see what has been made of that creed, not by its enemies, but by its most devoted adherents.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Appalled Christ Enemy Jesus

It’s surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you’re not comfortable within yourself, you can’t be comfortable with others.

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It’s surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you’re not comfortable within yourself, you can’t be comfortable with others.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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