A Quote by George Bernard Shaw

I have not wasted my life trifling with literary fools in taverns, as Johnson did, when he should have been shaking England with the thunder of his spirit

George Bernard Shaw

Quote Topics

Been Did England Fools His Johnson Life Literary My Life Shaking Should Should Have Should Have Been Spirit Taverns Thunder Trifling Wasted

Quote Author

George Bernard Shaw
Irish - Playwright
July 26, 1856 - November 2, 1950

What manner of men should ministers be? They should thunder in preaching, and lighten in conversation; they should be flaming in prayer, shining in life, and burning in spirit.

Charles Spurgeon

His [Turgot's] first important literary and scholastic effort was a treatise On the Existence of God. Few fragments of it remain, but we are helped to understand him when we learn that he asserted, and to the end of his life maintained, his belief in an Almighty Creator and Upholder of the Universe. It did, indeed, at a later period suit the purposes of his enemies, exasperated by his tolerant spirit and his reforming plans, to proclaim him an atheist; but that sort of charge has been the commonest of missiles against troublesome thinkers in all times.

Andrew Dickson White

Not a wasted word. This has been a main point to my literary thinking all my life.

Hunter S. Thompson

When I got him out he was near froze solid and shivering. He was shaking so hard that I wasted half a glass of whiskey trying to aim it for his mouth. Must have got enough of it into him, though, since it did seem to bring him back to life.

Abraham Lincoln

did you ever see anybody so disgusting: said lightning to thunder, "never" thunder growled thunder, "lets give him the works

William Steig

The light will disturb us when we're comfortable, and comfort us when we're disturbed. We turn to spirit for help when our foundations are shaking only to find out that it is spirit who is shaking them!

Dan Millman

I had, in college, a professor called Walter Jackson Bate, and he taught a course called The Age of Johnson. It's about Samuel Johnson and his period, 18th-century British writing. So we all got to endure Samuel Johnson, and Boswell's 'Life of Johnson' is now my favorite book. I read it all the time I can; it's great for going to sleep.

Whit Stillman

I moved to New England partly because it has a real literary past. The ghosts of Hawthorne and Melville still sit on those green hills. The worship of Mammon is also somewhat lessened there by the spirit of irony. I don't get hay fever in New England either.

John Updike

Alas! the joys that fortune brings Are trifling, and decay, And those who prize the trifling things, More trifling still than they.

Oliver Goldsmith

Literary critics, however, frequently suffer from a curious belief that every author longs to extend the boundaries of literary art, wants to explore new dimensions of the human spirit, and if he doesn't, he should be ashamed of himself.

Robertson Davies

The relic from before birth Enters one's heart one day. Be as careful as if you were holding a full vessel, Be as gentle as if you were caressing an infant. The gate of earth should be shut tight, The portals of heaven should be first opened. Wash the yellow sprouts clean, And atop the mountain is thunder shaking the earth.

Sun Bu'er

Louis 'Thunder Thumbs' Johnson was one of the greatest bass players to ever pick up the instrument, as a member of the Brothers Johnson, we shared decades of magical times working together in the studio and touring the world. From my albums 'Body Heat' and 'Mellow Madness,' to their platinum albums 'Look Out for #1,' 'Right On Time,' 'Blam' and 'Light Up the Night,' which I produced, to Michael's solo debut 'Off the Wall,' I considered Louis a core member of my production team. He was a dear and beloved friend and brother, and I will miss his presence and joy of life every day.

Quincy Jones

Tell the truth. All the time. About everything. What's the alternative to radical honesty? Waste. Wasted time, wasted money, wasted possibilities-a wasted life.

Brad Blanton

I believe that there never was a creator of a philosophical system who did not confess at the end of his life that he had wasted his time. It must be admitted that the inventors of the mechanical arts have been much more useful to men that the inventors of syllogisms. He who imagined a ship towers considerably above him who imagined innate ideas.