A Quote by T. E. Lawrence

Nine-tenths of tactics are certain, and taught in books: but the irrational tenth is like the kingfisher flashing across the pool, and that is the test of generals.

T. E. Lawrence

Quote Topics

Across Books Certain Flashing Generals Irrational Like Nine Pool Tactics Taught Tenth Test

Quote Author

T. E. Lawrence
British - Soldier
August 16, 1888 - May 19, 1935

That's the way it is: life inculdes a lot of empty space. We are one-tenth living tissue, nine-tenths water; life is one-tenth Here and Now, nine-tenths a history lesson. For most of the time the Here and Now is neither now nor here.

Graham Swift

Quarkbeasts, for all their fearsome looks, are obedient to a fault. They are nine-tenths velociraptor and kitchen blender and one-tenth Labrador. It was the Labrador tenth that I valued most.

Jasper Fforde

Female friendship was one-tenth prevention and nine-tenths cleanup.

Maggie Shipstead

Nine-tenths of the people were created so you would want to be with the other tenth.

Horace Walpole

The trick to being a novelist is to act like an iceberg. Make it seem as if you're displaying only one-tenth of what you know, and the other nine-tenths isn't visible and never mind if that part is pure styrofoam!

Vikram Seth

You boast of spending a tenth part of your income in charity; may be you should spend the nine tenths so, and done with it.

Henry David Thoreau

I always say perseverance is nine-tenths of any art — not that it's much help to be nine-tenths an artist, of course.

Peter S. Beagle

Mechanized recreation already has seized nine-tenths of the woods and mountains; a decent respect for minorities should dedicate the other tenth to wilderness.

Aldo Leopold

Possession isn't nine-tenths of the law. It's nine-tenths of the problem.

John Lennon

Nine-tenths of all existing books are nonsense.

Benjamin Disraeli

I believe and find in my study of art that the real artist is nine-tenths of the time a craftsman, and it is only in that small one-tenth of the time that he rises to the elevated position of a prophet and a master.

Gutzon Borglum

I do not wonder that British youth is in revolt against the morbid doctrine that nothing matters but the equal sharing of miseries; that what used to be called the submerged tenth can only be rescued by bringing the other nine-tenths down to their le.

Winston Churchill

Nine-tenths of the appeal of pornography is due to the indecent feelings concerning sex which moralists inculcate in the young; the other tenth is physiological, and will occur in one way or another whatever the state of the law may be.