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Making out an invitation list for a party brings out the worst in everyone. It is then that our most ruthless estimates of the people we know come into play.

Sydney J. Harris

When I hear somebody sigh, ‘Life is hard,’ I am always tempted to ask, ‘Compared to what?’
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Funny Inspirational Life
A loser says that’s the way it’s always been done. A winner says there ought to be a better way.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Always Done Loser Way
Every morning I take out my bankbook, stare at it, shudder – and turn quickly to my typewriter.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Morning Staring Typewriters
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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Being Departure Goat Satisfied Yourself
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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Hands Philosophical Religious
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
Enemies, as well as lovers, come to resemble each other over a period of time.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Enemy Lovers Time Love
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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Advice Generally Men Mind
Why do most Americans look up to education and down upon educated people?
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Educated Looks People
Those who imagine that the world is against them have generally conspired to make it true.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Imagination Imagine World
The loner may be respected, but he is always resented by his colleagues, for he seems to be passing a critical judgment on them, when he may be simply making a limiting statement about himself.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Loner May Solitude
The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Education Mirror Purpose Whole Window
Usually, if we hate, it is the shadow of the person that we hate, rather than the substance.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Attitude Hate Shadow
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
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
Nobody really knows how smart or talented he is until he finds the incentives to use himself to the fullest. God has given us more than we know what to do with.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Commodity Nobody Precious Really Talented
Nobody can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Ideas Men Thinking
Any philosophy that can be put in a nutshell belongs there.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Discovery Ethics Philosophy
Making out an invitation list for a party brings out the worst in everyone. It is then that our most ruthless estimates of the people we know come into play.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Estimated Party People Play Worst
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 world has always been betrayed by decent men with bad ideals.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Betrayed Men World
Many people feel “guilty” about things they shouldn’t feel guilty about, in order to shut out feelings of guilt about things they should feel guilty about.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Feelings Order People
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
The public examination of homosexuality in our contemporary life is still so coated with distasteful moral connotations that even a reviewer is bound to wonder uneasily why he was selected to evaluate a book on the subject.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Children Coated Examination Father Review Team
Atheism, on the other hand, is as unyielding and dogmatic about religious belief as true believers are about heathens. It tries to use reason to demolish a structure that is not built upon reason.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Belief Dogmatic Reason Structure
The main discomfort in being a middle-of-the-roader is that you get sideswiped by partisans going in both directions.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Discomfort Middle Partisan
Real loneliness consists not in being alone, but in being with the wrong person, in the suffocating darkness of a room in which no deep communication is possible.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Communication Loneliness Real

Making out an invitation list for a party brings out the worst in everyone. It is then that our most ruthless estimates of the people we know come into play.

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Making out an invitation list for a party brings out the worst in everyone. It is then that our most ruthless estimates of the people we know come into play.

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Popular Authors

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