#nation

And so these refined parents rejected their five-year-old girl to all kinds of torture. They beat her, kicked her, flogged her, for no reason that they themselves knew of. The child’s whole body was covered in bruises. Eventually they devised a new refinement. Under the pretext that the child dirtied her bed (as though a five-year-old deep in her angelic sleep could be punished for that), they forced her to eat excrement, smearing it all over her face. And it was the mother that did it! And that woman would lock her daughter up in the outhouse until morning and she did so even on the coldest nights, when it was freezing. Just imagine the woman being able to sleep with the child’s cries coming from that outhouse! Imagine that little creature, unable to even understand what is happening to her, beating her sore little chest with her tiny fist, weeping hot, unresentful, meek tears, and begging ‘gentle Jesus’ to help her… ...let’s assume that you were called upon to build the edifice of human destiny so that men would finally be happy and would find peace and tranquility. If you knew that, only to attain this, you would have to torture just one single creature, let’s say the little girl who beat her chest so desperately in the outhouse, and that on her unavenged tears you could build that edifice, would you agree to do it? ↗

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

#imagination

If much in the world were mystery the limits of that world were not, for it was without measure or bound and there were contained within it creatures more horrible yet and men of other colors and beings which no man has looked upon and yet not alien none of it more than were their own hearts alien in them, whatever wilderness contained there and whatever beasts. ↗

— Cormac McCarthy

#atavism #race #men

He hesitated till the last moment, but finally dropped them in the box, saying, "I shall win!"--the cry of a gambler, the cry of the great general, the compulsive cry that has ruined more men than it has ever saved. ↗

— Honoré de Balzac

#pride #self-assuredness #truism #men

My eyes went straight to a soft woman who sat facing the wrong way at the bar top. Soft, because I knew if I were to touch her skin, it would feel like a peach, the kind of woman you could almost smell from inside the building. Instead of facing Andy, she had her back to him, keeping an eye on the door. That must be her. Her hair was exquisite. She was really the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. A golden crown of braids and curls complimented her sun-kissed skin. Her dress draped perfectly over her body, and in that moment, I needed her more than I needed air. ↗

— Chelsie Shakespeare

#love #reincarnation #soul-mates #beauty

If there are damned souls in Hell, it is because men blind themselves. ↗

— E.A. Bucchianeri

#blindness #blindness-of-man #damnation #damned #faust

I rise today to discuss the National Intelligence Reform bill. I commend my colleagues in both Houses for their hard work in coming to an agreement. As with any conference, each voice is heard, but none can dominate and compromise must be achieved. ↗

— Ted Stevens

#agreement #any #bill #both #colleagues

The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance. The wise grows it under his feet. ↗

— James Oppenheim

#determination #happiness #motivation #motivational

Desire is the key to motivation, but it’s determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal - a commitment to excellence - that will enable you to attain the success you seek. ↗

— Mario Andretti

#desire #determination #motivation #success #motivational

Motivation is the fuel, necessary to keep the human engine running. ↗

— Zig Ziglar

#initiative #motivation #motivational

You don't have to get it perfect, you just have to get it going. Babies don't walk the first time they try, but eventually they get it right ↗

— Jack Canfield

#motivational #motivational