One Woman’s View

Delegating a column

By JANE E. VAJNAR

Contributing writer

Now and then I treat my readers to a column written by better authors than I am. Since I read my own books with a highlighter (the library frowns on that practice) and often save quotes I run across here and there, it is not hard to come up with enough quotes to maintain interest, I hope. Since I will be out of circulation for a while, this seems like a good time to resort to my quotation file.

“Properly we should read for power. Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one’s hand.” — Ezra Pound

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” — Thomas Edison

“Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.” — William S. Burroughs

“There are many who are living far below their possibilities because they are continually handing over their individualities to others. Do you want to be a power in the world? Then be yourself. Be true to the highest within your soul and then allow yourself to be governed by no customs or conventionalities or arbitrary man-made rules that are not founded on principle.” — Ralph Waldo Trine

“When one door closes, another door always opens — but those long hallways in-between are a real drag.” — Barbara Johnson

“Sorrow is a wall between two gardens.” — Kahlil Gibran

“I (that is, God) am not who you think I am, Mackenzie. I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It’s not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it.” — William P. Young

“To proclaim a true and absolute soul freedom to all the people of the land impartially so that no person be forced to pray, nor pray otherwise than as his soul believeth and consenteth.” — Roger Williams

“All the ills of democracy can be cured by more democracy.” — Alfred E. Smith

“We act as through comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us happy is something to be enthusiastic about.” — Charles Kingsley

“It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.” — Barbara Johnson

“The world is moving so fast these days that the man who says it can’t be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it.” — Harry Emerson Fosdick

“A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.” — William James

“The principle advantage of a democracy is a general election in the character of the people.” — James Fenimore Cooper

“I indulge in no mere figure of speech when I say that our nation, the immoral spirit of our domain, lives in us — in our hearts, and minds, and consciences … The land we live in seems to be strong and active, but how fares the land that lives in us? Are we sure we are doing all we ought to keep it in vigor and health?” — Grover Cleveland

“Those who insist on keeping an orderly home will never know the thrilling sense of glee at finding something they thought was lost forever.” — Barbara Johsnon

“My idea of an agreeable person is a person who agrees with me.” — Benjamin Disraeli

“I know God will not give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish that he didn’t trust me so much.” — Mother Teresa

“Our democracy in this country had its roots in religious belief, and we had to acknowledge soon after its birth that differences in religious belief are inherent in the spirit of true democracy.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

“The value of marriage is not that adults produce children, but that children produce adults.” — Peter de Vries

“Men, for the sake of getting a living, forget to live.” — Margaret Fuller

“Laughter is a tranquilizer with no side effects.” — Barbara Johnson

“Honest conviction is my courage. The Constitution is my guide.” — Andrew Johnson

“There is no greater tribute we could pay to America’s war dead than to find the road to peace.” — Richard M. Nixon

“If at first you do succeed, try not to look astonished.” — Barbara Johnson

“I consider it the best part of an education to have been born and brought up in the country.” — Amos Bronson Alcott

“A well-instructed people alone can be permanently a free people.” — James Madison

“Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army.” — Edward Everett

“Human beings can live without air for a few minutes, without water for a week, without food for six weeks … and without a new thought for a lifetime.” — Barbara Johnson

“Fall seven times; stand up eight.” — Japanese proverb