Quotes

[Perceval]

I can relate to this one!

"Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy."

- William Butler Yeats

[Denis]

This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.

Except of course, when we apply the 'law of three', which may call for the person that knows themselves to be false to another in order to pursue their aim.

Of course, everything depends on the context, just as Gurdjieff said: Sincerity with everyone is a weakness.

Regarding the aim, here's one that I like:

"I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek".

Martin Luther King Jr.

[kenlee]

Why did I react in the way I did before? B/c bngenoh's posts obviously triggered this program in me and another one of my 'sacred cows' has surfaced from my unconscious mind... I think.

This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.

- William Shakespeare, "Hamlet"

Well, as you say a program was triggered in you. So if your running a program then your interpretation of Hamlets quote will be no less mechanical and unconscious then your running programs. To 'thine own self be true' could simply be another form of mechanical conditioning and nothing more. You might want to read about Gurdjieff's adventures in his book Meetings With Remarkable Men and what he did when he painted sparrows with aniline dyes and then selling them them as 'American canaries' in order to continue the pursuit of a (conscious) higher aim. Also, sincerity with everyone (which is nothing more then a program) is a weakness and could even be downright dangerous in the near future. This is discussed in Ouspensky's book In Search Of The Miraculous and on this forum too.

[Buddy]

I still feel that it is disrespectful towards the author's legacy.

FWIW, just in case this is really only about Shakespeare's 'legacy' (my bold):

Daniel Chandler has a website named 'Semiotics for Beginners'. In the section Paradigmatic Analysis, one can find a brief demonstration of 'Romeo and Juliet' that shows binary opposition patterns in a framework just like the Hermetisists use(d). Use of paired 'contrasts' can create similarly polarizing effects as well when paired up with these 'opposites'. Shakespeare's literary works depend on this framework to achieve desired effects. Accordingly, to Semiotics, language plays a crucial role in 'constructing reality' so it would, and does, play just as crucial a role in understanding it, OSIT.

'Male' and 'female' are not 'opposites', and yet cultural myths routinely encourage us to treat them as such. Guy Cook offers a simple example of how images of masculinity and femininity can be generated through a series of binary oppositions in a literary text (Cook 1992, 115). He instances two consecutive speeches from the beginning of a scene in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet:


JULIET:  Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day; 
   It was the nightingale, and not the lark, 
   That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear; 
   Nightly she sings on yond pomegranate tree. 
   Believe me, love, it was the nightingale. 
ROMEO:  It was the lark, the herald of the morn, 
   No nightingale. Look, love, what envious streaks 
   Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east; 
   Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
   Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops. 
   I must be gone and live or stay and die.
 
     
   (Romeo and Juliet III, v) 

Cook notes the following gendered oppositions:

Female:  Juliet, question, stays, night, garden, nightingale, death, sleeping, hollow 
Male:  Romeo, answer, goes, day, mountain, tops, lark, life, waking, candles 

Such oppositions tend to retreat to transparency in reading or watching the play. The gendered character of the echoes and parallels is consequently quite surprising when the text is submitted to this kind of analysis. And yet these oppositions do not seem to be purely analytical constructions. Indeed, we may also note that Juliet emphasizes sound whilst Romeo relies on vision (yet another stereotypically gendered association). Through the endless repetition of such subtle patterns - in countless variations - mythologies such as that of heterosexual romance are generated and sustained.

Source: _http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem05.html

[Daenerys]

FWIW, just in case this is really only about Shakespeare's 'legacy' (my bold): 

.
Buddy, I am confused. This was never about Shakespeare as far I can see. Did I miss something? I am having trouble understanding your whole post in relation to the recent activity in the thread. Unless, maybe you are just going off of the dialog on this page and not taking in the prior conversation? Even then, I am having trouble piecing that together here. But, assuming that was it, I still am not following the bold reference, as I do not see how it fits the context of Denis's issue of quotes in general. I tried. I'm just lost. 


Also, as I went back through the thread to find the Shakespeare connection  to bngenoh's post that I see started all of this, I looked up that poem to see if by a remote chance that Shakespeare wrote it, as Buddys post confused me.

My kind of people these Celts

I think Tokeins quote is a very powerful one, which is very well recognised - and the emotions it evokes strike a cord with many people

My point is- those quotes are taken out of context. The Celtic poem is relevant to the times in which it was written, and by changing the quote (irrespective of the fact that bngenoh first added the original and named the source) in order to fit in the contemporary world, without asking anyone (the author/s of the quote or their descendants in the event that the author is no longer among the living) for permission, someone can get the idea to do it to all the past writings (actually, I'm pretty sure there are people out there who are already doing it)- and if that happens, we will have a lot of trouble to truly learn something from our past. How could we know our past, if we start rewriting and editing out the parts of past writing/s that we do not like? That is why I feel that acting in that manner is disrespectful towards the author's work/legacy.

The poem was written by neither.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_not_stand_at_my_grave_and_weep

Do not stand at my grave and weep is a poem written in 1932 by Mary Elizabeth Frye. Although the origin of the poem was disputed until later in her life, Mary Frye's authorship was confirmed in 1998 after research by Abigail Van Buren, a newspaper columnist

In light of the idea of getting permission from the author of a quote, I find this amusing.  

[Buddy]

Buddy, I am confused. This was never about Shakespeare as far I can see. Did I miss something?

Yeah, I made an assumption and didn't go back far enough. At the point where the Hamlet quote came in, maybe my "how we have Shakespeare to thank for some of our faulty 'romantic memes' program kicked in and I didn't fully realize what the real concern was. I hope I don't do this too often because when I do I make an *ss outta myself. I apologize.

[Soluna]

Regarding quotes in general - I think the very fact that they are being quoted is because they have inspired people. I also think, that in some cases, changes to the words in a quote are made to perhaps clarify to another the inspiration gleaned, or feeling evoked in the 'editor' by the original author.




Here are some quotes from a book I read some years ago by Richard Morgan - he writes Science Fiction (the name at the bottom of the quote is a character within the story).

I hope no one is offended by the language. I typed these up after I read the book as I found these quotes (I think the character was a leader of some resistance movement or rebellion) so I am not 100% if they are correct. I did find them interesting =)

"Face the facts. Then act on them. It's the only mantra I know, the only doctrine I have to offer you, and it's harder than you think, because I swear humans are hardwired to do anything but. Face the facts. Don't pray, don't wish, don't buy into centuries-old dogma and dead rhetoric. Don't give in to your conditioning or your visions or your -flicked--up sense of.. whatever. Face the facts. Then act."

QUELLCRIST FALCONER
Speech before the Assault on Millsport

"The difference between virtuality and life is very simple. In a construct you know everything is being run by an all-powerful machine. Reality doesn't offer this assurance, so it's very easy to develop the mistaken impression that you're in control."

QUELLCRIST FALCONER
Ethics on the Precipice

"In any agenda, political or otherwise, there is a cost to be borne. Always ask what it is, and who will be paying. If you don't, then the agenda-makers will pick up the scent of your silence like swamp panthers on the scent of blood, and the next thing you know, the person expected to bear the cost will be you. And you may not have what it takes to pay."

QUELLCRIST FALCONER
Things I Should Have Learnt By Now VolII

[Denis]

Why did I react in the way I did before? B/c bngenoh's posts obviously triggered this program in me and another one of my 'sacred cows' has surfaced from my unconscious mind... I think.

This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.

- William Shakespeare, "Hamlet"

Well, as you say a program was triggered in you. So if your running a program then your interpretation of Hamlets quote will be no less mechanical and unconscious then your running programs. To 'thine own self be true' could simply be another form of mechanical conditioning and nothing more.

Hello kenlee,

My interpretation of Hamlet's quote was "to make my actions reflect my words" or IOW to be the living word- this is the only way I can be credible to anyone and of course TRUE to myself.

You might want to read about Gurdjieff's adventures in his book Meetings With Remarkable Men and what he did when he painted sparrows with aniline dyes and then selling them them as 'American canaries' in order to continue the pursuit of a (conscious) higher aim. Also, sincerity with everyone (which is nothing more then a program) is a weakness and could even be downright dangerous in the near future. This is discussed in Ouspensky's book In Search Of The Miraculous and on this forum too.

I understand that sincerity with everyone is a weakness. Lets say for instance that my family is hiding in an underground storehouse during the times of war and I didn't manage to escape in time b/c the foreign army occupiers have already broken into the house. Since they want to find out my family's whereabouts (they want to find them in order to find out domestic army's/freedom fighters' plans), naturally, they start interrogating me. Since I love my family with my whole being and I don't want them to get hurt, I would never tell the truth to them, in fact I would lie about my family's location, just to ensure that they are safe & sound. In short, being sincere with foreign army invaders in this case would be completely insane and heartless from me.

"Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."

Mahatma Gandhi

 

[Jerry]

There is no end to education. It is not that you read a book, pass an examination, and finish with education. The whole of life, from the moment you are born to the moment you die, is a process of learning.

What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means, watch it, learn about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not how to escape from it.

You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems and suffer and understand, for all that is life.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

[ROEL]

As long as your desire is pleasure,
and you cherish your desire,
carry on playing like a child:
you are not man enough for this.

Hakim Sanai

[hallowed]

from Friedrich Nietzsche:

" The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends "
   

[voyageur]

Was in a local store and spotted this today.

[cassandra]

Excellent, voyageur. If that were on a t-shirt, I would definitely buy it and wear it a lot. Maybe a good suggestion for Revolt.

[voyageur]

Noticed this quote that Dr. Mercola cited on his website related to medicine and our present state of affairs. What caught my attention was the incredible accuracy of this statement considering when it was written. Not having a life study under the 'Declaration of Independence', here is what one signing author said:

Unless we put medical freedom into the Constitution the time will come when medicine will organize itself into an undercover dictatorship. To restrict the art of healing to doctors and deny equal privileges to others will constitute the Bastille of medical science. All such laws are un-American moral and despotic.

1776, Dr. Benjamin Rush

[SeekinTruth]

Noticed this quote that Dr. Mercola cited on his website related to medicine and our present state of affairs. What caught my attention was the incredible accuracy of this statement considering when it was written. Not having a life study under the 'Declaration of Independence', here is what one signing author said:

Unless we put medical freedom into the Constitution the time will come when medicine will organize itself into an undercover dictatorship. To restrict the art of healing to doctors and deny equal privileges to others will constitute the Bastille of medical science. All such laws are un-American moral and despotic.

1776, Dr. Benjamin Rush

Yeah, that is very prescient. But, on the other hand, many things in the constitution are totally moot by now.