Social Critic Quotes

Charity begins at home, and justice begins next door.

"I saw her, in the fire, but now. I hear her in music, in the wind, in the dead stillness of the night," returned the haunted man.

Ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies.

Vengeance and retribution require a long time; it is the rule.

I don't own a camera, so I travel with a police sketch artist.

If you love someone set them free. If they come back, set them on fire.

The dreams of childhood - it's airy fables, its graceful, beautiful, humane, impossible adornments of the world beyond; so good to be believed in once, so good to be remembered when outgrown.

'I am' is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that 'I do' is the longest sentence?

The patterns became even more vivid at Cardinal Hayes High School. That's when I began failing subjects and running away from home for days at a time.

I never eat sushi. I have trouble eating things that are merely unconscious.

The aim of talk should be like the aim of a flying arrow -- to hit the mark; but to this end there must be a mark to hit, that is, there must be a listener.

For a long time, I've distinguished between entertainer and performer and entertainer and artist. To me, an entertainer is someone who pleases others, and an artist tries to please himself.

They mention that it's a nonstop flight. Well, I must say I don't care for that sort of thing. Call me old fashioned, but I insist that my flight stop. Preferably at an airport.

I am well aware that I am the 'umblest person going. . . . My mother is likewise a very 'umble person. We live in a 'umble abode.

We all draw a little and compose a little, and none of us have any idea of time or money.

I am a personal optimist but a skeptic about all else. What may sound to some like anger is really nothing more than sympathetic contempt. I view my species with a combination of wonder and pity, and I root for its destruction. And please don't confuse my point of view with cynicism; the real cynics are the ones who tell you everything's gonna be all right.

I've never owned a telescope, but it's something I'm thinking of looking into.

If you try to fail, and succeed, which have you done?

Dreams are the bright creatures of poem and legend, who sport on earth in the night season, and melt away in the first beam of the sun, which lights grim care and stern reality on their daily pilgrimage through the world.

I have this real moron thing I do? It's called thinking.

My guiding star always is, Get hold of portable property.

Fan the sinking flame of hilarity with the wing of friendship; and pass the rosy wine.

There was not one straight floor from the foundation to the roof; the ceilings were so fantastically clouded by smoke and dust, that old women might have told fortunes in them better than in grouts of tea.

The very existence of flamethrowers proves that sometime, somewhere, someone said to themselves, "You know, I want to set those people over there on fire, but I'm just not close enough to get the job done".

When you're high, it's easy to kid yourself about how clever certain mediocre pieces of material are.

There is no such passion in human nature, as the passion for gravy among commercial gentlemen.

But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,' faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself. Business!' cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The deals of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!

I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.

He was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset

Its matter was not new to me, but was presented in a new aspect. It shook me in my habit - the habit of nine-tenths of the world - of believing that all was right about me, because I was used to it.

There are actually people who go out and re-fight these battles. You know what I say? Use real ammunition! You just might raise the intelligence level of the American gene pool!

In terms of coke, the only money I ever thought about was that dollar bill I had stuck up my nose.

-Why don't you cry again, you little wretch? -Because I'll never cry for you again.

All other swindlers upon earth are nothing to the self-swindlers, and with such pretences did I cheat myself. Surely a curious thing. That I should innocently take a bad half-crown of somebody else's manufacture, is reasonable enough; but that I should knowingly reckon the spurious coin of my own make, as good money!

It is a long time,' repeated his wife; 'and when is it not a long time? Vengeance and retribution require a long time; it is the rule.' 'It does not take a long time to strike a man with Lightning,' said Defarge. 'How long,' demanded madame, composedly, 'does it take to make and store the lightning? Tell me?

Around and around the house the leaves fall thick, but never fast, for they come circling down with a dead lightness that is sombre and slow.

If you can't get to be oncommon through going straight, you'll never get to do it through going crooked. So don't tell no more on 'em, Pip, and live well and die happy.

Eccentricities of genius.

"Why, what I may think after dinner," returns Mr. Jobling, "is one thing, my dear Guppy, and what I may think before dinner is another thing."

I believe you can joke about anything.

That's why they call it the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.

One great thing about getting old is that you can get out of all sorts of social obligations just by saying you're too tired.

Writing books isn't a drastic departure from writing for the stage.

The clouds were drifting over the moon at their giddiest speed, at one time wholly obscuring her, at another, suffering her to burst forth in full splendor and shed her light on all the objects around; anon, driving over her again, with increased velocity, and shrouding everything in darkness.

Why are a 'wise man' and a 'wiseguy' opposites?

You've built up so much speed that you HIT 70! After that it's a day-by-day thing; you HIT Wednesday!

What an immense impression Paris made upon me. It is the most extraordinary place in the world!

If it requires a uniform, it's a worthless endeavor.

I'm never critical or judgmental about whether or not a movie is any good. The way I look at it, if several hundred people got together every day for a year or so - a number of then willing to put on heavy makeup, wear clothes that weren't their own and pretend to be people other than themselves - and their whole purpose for doing all this was to entertain me, then I'm not gonna start worrying about whether or not they did a good job. The effort alone was enough to make me happy.

I stole her heart away and put ice in its place.

I have been, as the phrase is, liberally educated, and am fit for nothing.

I took a good deal o' pains with his eddication, sir; let him run in the streets when he was very young, and shift for hisself. It's the only way to make a boy sharp, sir.

Friendship? Yes Please.

... Arthur Gride, whose bleared eyes gloated only over the outward beauties, and were blind to the spirit which reigned within, evinced - a fantastic kind of warmth certainly, but not exactly that kind of warmth of feeling which the contemplation of virtue usually inspires.

I was a class clown, of the classic term for it. I would get the work done easily, and then I would try to deprive other people of their educations. I developed skills for mimicry, and I was a good showoff. I knew how to get attention, and I knew how to do it in a positive funny way.

I've been a performer for a long time and I know when people are laughing from their guts, from the inside, and when their tuxedos are laughing.

Now, some people do this for shock value. Shock is just another uptown word for surprise. Granted it has a different quality to it, but a joke is about surprising someone. I'm a great believer in context. You can joke about anything. I do like finding out where the line is drawn, deliberately crossing it and bringing some of them with me across the line, and having them be happy that I did.

…a lady of what is commonly called an uncertain temper --a phrase which being interpreted signifies a temper tolerably certain to make everybody more or less uncomfortable.

I worry about my judgment when anything I believe in or do regularly begins to be accepted by the American public.

A dangerous quality, if real; and a not less dangerous one, if feigned.