Quotations

"Yeah, sex is cool, but have you tried solving the brachistochrone problem in a single night?"

— Isaac Newton, English physicist, born 1642

"We can easily manage if we will only take, each day, the burden appointed to it. But the load will be too heavy for us if we carry yesterday's burden over again today, and then add the burden of the morrow before we are required to bear it."

— John Newton, English Anglican clergyman, born 1725

"If two angels were to receive at the same moment a commission from God, one to go down and rule earth’s grandest empire, the other to go and sweep the streets of its meanest village, it would be a matter of entire indifference to each which service fell to his lot, the post of ruler or the post of scavenger; for the joy of the angels lies only in obedience to God’s will, and with equal joy they would lift a Lazarus in his rags to Abraham’s bosom, or be a chariot of fire to carry an Elijah home."

— John Newton, English Anglican clergyman, born 1725

"God sometimes does His work with gentle drizzle, not storms."

— John Newton, English Anglican clergyman, born 1725

"Let us chide our cold unfeeling hearts and pray for a coal of fire from the heavenly altar to send us home in a flame of love to him who has thus loved us."

— John Newton, English Anglican clergyman, born 1725

"Worthy persons deserve to be called so because they are not carried away by the eight winds: prosperity, decline, disgrace, honor, praise, censure, suffering, and pleasure. They are neither elated by prosperity nor grieved by decline. The heavenly gods will surely protect one who is unbending before the eight winds."

— Nichiren, Buddhist monk, born 1222

"That which you give to another will become your own sustenance; if you light a lamp for another, your own way will be lit."

— Nichiren, Buddhist monk, born 1222

"We ordinary people can see neither our own eyelashes, which are so close, nor the heavens in the distance."

— Nichiren, Buddhist monk, born 1222

"Suffer what there is to suffer, enjoy what there is to enjoy. Regard both suffering and joy as facts of life, and continue chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, no matter what happens. How could this be anything other than the boundless joy of the Law?"

— Nichiren, Buddhist monk, born 1222

"Professional golf is the only sport where, if you win 20% of the time, you're the best."

— Jack Nicklaus, American golfer, born 1940

"Forgiveness is the final form of love."

— Reinhold Niebuhr, American theologian, born 1892

"I have always wanted my buildings to be as light as possible, to touch the ground gently, to swoop and soar, and to surprise."

— Oscar Niemeyer, Brazilian architect, born 1907

"I am not attracted to straight angles or to the straight line, hard and inflexible, created by man. I am attracted to free-flowing, sensual curves. The curves that I find in the mountains of my country, in the sinuousness of its rivers, in the waves of the ocean, and on the body of the beloved woman. Curves make up the entire Universe, the curved Universe of Einstein."

— Oscar Niemeyer, Brazilian architect, born 1907

"He who has a why to live can bear almost any how."

— Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher, born 1844