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Every morning I take out my bankbook, stare at it, shudder – and turn quickly to my typewriter.

Sydney J. Harris

Marriages we regard as the happiest are those in which each of the partners believes he or she got the best of it.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Believe Best Love Partner
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 truest test of independent judgment is being able to dislike someone who admires us, and to admire someone who dislikes us.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Dislike Someone Independence Independent
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
People decline invitations when they are “indisposed” physically, and I wish they would do likewise when they feel indisposed emotionally. A person has no more right to attend a party with a head full of venom than with a throat full of virus.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Imposed Party People Physically Wish
There is no such thing as an “atrocity” in warfare that is greater than the atrocity of warfare itself.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Atrocities Greater Warfare
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
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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Fear Ourselves Person Someone Younger
Most of us go almost all the way through life as complete strangers to ourselves – so how can we know anyone else?
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Anyone Else Most Stranger
Never let your fears be the boundaries of your dreams. Happiness is a direction, not a place.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Boundaries Dream Dreams Follow
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
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
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
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
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.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Couple Couples Divorce Quarrel Separate
The art of living consists in knowing which impulses to obey and which must be made to obey.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Art Knowing Made
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. HARRIS

Believe Insanity Mean
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
We evaluate others with a Godlike justice, but we want them to evaluate us with a Godlike compassion.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Compassion Judging Justice
The best thing you can give children, next to good habits, are good memories.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Children Memories Mom
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
What is much harder to handle is the sense that you have to live up to the mark someone else has set for you. The grades become too important, the competition too frantic, the fear of disappointing those who believe in you turns into an overwhelming nightmare.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Believe Boys Parent
The greatest enemy of progress is not stagnation, but false progress.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Enemy Progress Stagnation
We truly possess only what we are able to renounce; otherwise, we are simply possessed by our possessions.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Able Possession Renounce
Knowledge fills a large brain; it merely inflates a small one.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Brain Knowledge One Small
Almost every man looks more so in a belted trench coat.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Coats Looks Men
Elitism is the slur directed at merit by mediocrity.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Acceptance Mediocrity Merit

Every morning I take out my bankbook, stare at it, shudder – and turn quickly to my typewriter.

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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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