A Quote by Iain Pears

For men are held above their fellows by the gossamer of reputation, which is so soft and fragile a breath can blow it away.

Iain Pears

Quote Topics

Above Away Blow Breath Fellows Fragile Held Men Reputation Soft Which

Quote Author

Iain Pears
English - Novelist
Born: 1955

Reputation is seeming; character is being. Reputation is manufactured; character is grown. Reputation is your photograph; There is a vast difference between character and reputation. Reputation is what men think we are; character is what God knows us to be. Reputation is seeming; character is being. Reputation is the breath of men; character is the inbreathing of the eternal God. One may for a time have a good reputation and a bad character, or the reverse ; but not for long.

Robert Stuart MacArthur

Gonna be a twister to blow everything down That ain't got the faith to stand its ground Blow away the dreams that tear you apart Blow away the dreams that break your heart Blow away the lies that leave you nothing but lost and brokenhearted.

Bruce Springsteen

A kestrel can and does hover in the dead calm of summer days, when there is not the faintest breath of wind. He will, and does, hover in the still, soft atmosphere of early autumn, when the gossamer falls in showers, coming straight down as if it were raining silk.

Richard Jefferies

Love is the weapon which Omnipotence reserved to conquer rebel man when all the rest had failed. Reason he parries; fear he answers blow for blow; future interest he meets with present pleasure; but love, that sun against whose melting beams the winter cannot stand--that soft subliming slumber which wrestles down the giant, there is not one human being in a million, nor a thousand men in all earth's huge quintillion, whose clay heart is hardened against love.

Martin Farquhar Tupper

Here is a law which is above the King and which even he must not break. This reaffirmation of a supreme law and its expression in a general charter is the great work of Magna Carta; and this alone justifies the respect in which men have held it

Winston Churchill

Keep what is worth keeping and with the breath of kindness blow the rest away.

Dinah Maria Murlock Craik

Orthodox Christians have the habit of claiming all great men, all men who have held important positions, men of reputation, men of wealth. As soon as the funeral is over clergymen begin to relate imaginary conversations with the deceased, and in a very little while the great man is changed to a Christian - possibly to a saint.

Robert Green Ingersoll

There was her face, like a summer peach, beautiful and warm, and the light of the candles reflected in her dark eyes. [He] held his breath. The entire world waited and held its breath.

Ray Bradbury

I admit that I sometimes climbed on other fellows' backs. But I used to watch the flight of the ball perhaps more than the other fellow did. Perfect timing, a deep breath and a natural spring then helped me to get above them.

Roy Cazaly

If you could breathe a breath so strong you could blow out the wolf. Like you blow out the copo. Like you blow out the fire from the candela. The wolf is made the way the world is made. You cannot touch the world. You cannot hold it in your hand for it is made of breath only.

Cormac McCarthy

There are 146 countries above us where the men have longer lifespans, and the biggest blow is that even with four wives who don't fast for them, the Arab men outlive our good old Indian dudes.

Twinkle Khanna

And like a wind shall I one day blow amongst them and with my spirit take away their soul's breath: thus my future wills it.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Our enemies are Medes and Persians, men who for centuries have lived soft and luxurious lives; we of Macedon for generations past have been trained in the hard school of danger and war. Above all, we are free men, and they are slaves.

Arrian

I held a moment in my hand, brilliant as a star, fragile as a flower, a tiny sliver of one hour. I dripped it carelessly, Ah! I didn't know, I held opportunity.

Hazel Ying Lee

Men have hitherto treated women like birds which have strayed down to them from the heights; as something more delicate, more fragile, more savage, stranger, sweeter, soulful--but as something which has to be caged up so that it shall not fly away.

Friedrich Nietzsche

The gossamer web of life, spun on the loom of sunlight from the breath of an infant Earth, is nature's crowning achievement on this planet.