Tuesday 28 February 2017

And so to bed...

I finish each night with a quote on Facebook, and for those who have missed them, here are some recent picks. My rules for choosing them are that they must be short, but not one-liners, and must say something inspiring and joyful, or reflecting the sorrow and pain of the world.

Mainly I choose them because I like them, and I hope you, gentle reader, will like them too. On the blog I've also taken the opportunity to add a few extra pictures of the writers themselves as I think it is rather nice to see the authors as well as their quotes.












And so to bed... quote for tonight is from Pope Francis:

No family drops down from heaven perfectly formed; families need constantly to grow and mature in the ability to love.

The family circle is not only open to life by generating it within itself, but also by going forth and spreading life by caring for others and seeking their happiness.


















And so to bed... quote for tonight is from G.K. Chesterton:

There is one metaphor of which the moderns are very fond; they are always saying, "You can't put the clock back." The simple and obvious answer is "You can." A clock, being a piece of human construction, can be restored by the human finger to any figure or hour. In the same way society, being a piece of human construction, can be reconstructed upon any plan that has ever existed.












And so to bed... quote for tonight is from Marcus Aurelius:

Do not act as if you had ten thousand years to throw away. Death stands at your elbow. Be good for something while you live and it is in your power.


















And so to bed... quote for tonight is from Carl Sandburg:

I AM the mist, the impalpable mist,
Back of the thing you seek.
My arms are long,
Long as the reach of time and space.
Some toil and toil, believing,
Looking now and again on my face,
Catching a vital, olden glory.
But no one passes me,
I tangle and snare them all.
I am the cause of the Sphinx,
The voiceless, baffled, patient Sphinx.
I was at the first of things,
I will be at the last.
I am the primal mist
And no man passes me;
My long impalpable arms
Bar them all.











And so to bed... quote for tonight is from Karl Popper:

The history of science, like the history of all human ideas, is a history of irresponsible dreams, of obstinacy, and of error. But science is one of the very few human activities—perhaps the only one — in which errors are systematically criticized and fairly often, in time, corrected. This is why we can say that, in science, we often learn from our mistakes, and why we can speak clearly and sensibly about making progress there.















And so to bed... quote for today is from A.A. Milne:

Christopher Robin is saying his prayers,
"God bless Mummy, I know that's right,
And wasn't it fun in the bath tonight,
The cold's so cold and the hot's so hot.
God bless Daddy, I quite forgot.
Thank you God, for a lovely day,
And what was the other I wanted to say?
I said, 'Bless Daddy', so what could it be?
Now I remember: God bless me".















And so to bed... quote for tonight is from G.K. Chesterton:

Busy editors cannot be expected to put on their posters, "Mr. Wilkinson Still Safe," or "Mr. Jones, of Worthing, Not Dead Yet." They cannot announce the happiness of mankind at all. They cannot describe all the forks that are not stolen, or all the marriages that are not judiciously dissolved. Hence the complex picture they give of life is of necessity fallacious; they can only represent what is unusual. However democratic they may be, they are only concerned with the minority.











And so to bed... quote for tonight is from George Macdonald:

I have only one foot, but thousands of toes;
My one foot stands, but never goes.
I have many arms, and they’re mighty all;
And hundreds of fingers, large and small.
From the ends of my fingers my beauty grows.
I breathe with my hair, and I drink with my toes.
I grow bigger and bigger about the waist,
And yet I am always very tight laced.
None e’er saw me eat—I’ve no mouth to bite;
Yet I eat all day in the full sunlight.
In the summer with song I shake and quiver,
But in winter I fast and groan and shiver.















And so to bed... quote for tonight comes from Tennyson:

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.

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