A Quote by J. M. Coetzee

As during the time of kings it would have been naive to think that the king's firstborn son would be the fittest to rule, so in our time it is naive to think that the democratically elected ruler will be the fittest. The rule of succession is not a formula for identifying the best ruler, it is a formula for conferring legitimacy on someone or other and thus forestalling civil conflict.

J. M. Coetzee

Quote Topics

Been Best Civil Conflict Elected Fittest Formula Identifying King Kings Legitimacy Naive Other Our Our Time Rule Ruler Someone Son Succession Think Thus Time Will Would Would Be

Quote Author

J. M. Coetzee
South African - Novelist
Born: February 9, 1940

We love Formula One and think Formula One's great. But we think Formula E is different. We would be making a big mistake if we tried to compete with Formula One and be similar to Formula One, we have to be radically different to Formula One to have a chance of survival. I don't mean survival by beating Formula One but co-existing complimentary to Formula One.

Richard Branson

I know that a lot of people like to say "formula." I think that as soon as you start to have a formula imputed to your work, you're in danger of becoming formulaic. So the one formula I have as a rule is falling in love with the material.

Jeff Wachtel

Naive' is not a word I associate with the Southern Rule. Superstitious, perhaps, traditional, yes, maddeningly set in their way, certainly but not naive." "I meant you are naive. They must have a hidden motive." "This is why I have no politics," said Darvin. "I can't think in those terms.

Ken MacLeod

I think a lot of brands reach a point where they say, 'We kind of have a formula - we've got it made.' Our formula is there's no formula.

James Jebbia

The survival of the fittest is the ageless law of nature, but the fittest are rarely the strong. The fittest are those endowed with the qualifications for adaptation, the ability to accept the inevitable and conform to the unavoidable, to harmonize with existing or changing conditions.

Dave Smalley

Some people think it's naive to think we can make love our new bottom line. What I believe is naive is thinking human civilization as we know it will survive another two hundred years if we do not.

Marianne Williamson

Carnegie believed in the survival of the fittest. He believed in Social Darwinism. He believed that you had to give an opportunity to the fittest, who were going to survive, to the fittest to rise themselves as high as they could.

David Nasaw

Just carrying a ruler with you in your pocket should be forbidden, at least on a moral basis. The ruler is the symbol of the new illiteracy. The ruler is the symptom of the new disease, disintegration of our civilisation.

Friedensreich Hundertwasser

Welcome to Fight Club. The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is: you DO NOT talk about Fight Club! Third rule of Fight Club: if someone yells “stop!”, goes limp, or taps out, the fight is over. Fourth rule: only two guys to a fight. Fifth rule: one fight at a time, fellas. Sixth rule: the fights are bare knuckle. No shirt, no shoes, no weapons. Seventh rule: fights will go on as long as they have to. And the eighth and final rule: if this is your first time at Fight Club, you have to fight.

Chuck Palahniuk

Wittgenstein's ruler: Unless you have confidence in the ruler's reliability, if you use a ruler to measure a table you may also be using the table to measure the ruler.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I think it's high time that we had a woman president. But I don't want to elect someone just because she's a woman; I want the best candidate to be elected. I think that any woman who is elected to the highest office in the land would clearly have positive role model effects for other young women.

Linda McMahon

I think that's a very good point they're bringing into Formula One at the moment, to get rid of all the electronics. And I think that's what a Formula One driver needs. That's why they are a Formula One driver. They need to drive themselves.

Jos Verstappen

I think that some people still think that the formula other than gospel still is not strong enough to get that crossover appeal to people enough that they would play it all the time, or nonchurch people would accept it, but I disagree.

Andrae Crouch

From a prestige standpoint, the U.S. needs to host Formula 1. And I think Formula 1, they know they need the U.S. as well. So many companies that are global are based in the United States support Formula 1.