by Jean Cocteau from Opium: Diary of a Cure

Of all the drugs "the drug" is the most subtle. The lungs absorb its smoke instantaneously. The effect of a pipe is immediate. I am speaking of the real smokers. The amateurs feel nothing, they wait for dreams and risk being seasick, because the effectiveness of opium is the result of a pact. If we fall under its spell, we shall never be able to give it up.

To moralize to an opium addict is like saying to Tristan: "Kill Yseult. You will feel much better afterwards."

Photo: Flight, Strange Fruit (Author: Uwe Brock)

from The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted and proclaimed by General Assembly resolution, 1948

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Photo: drawing by Slink Moss

You can't always get what you want

The old Indians didn't have no books like the Bible. They didn't have no writing or no books like the white people to read and write what they believe. Indians just think and tell what they believe. But Peyote is like a Bible to us here. Peyote is our Bible. When I'm with this Herb sometimes It is like a book...like turning pages in a book. I want to know something, and I can turn to here, and here, and there...everything is in there. It is like that with Peyote. So I think white people got one kind of book and we got another kind.

by Followers of the Tipi Way from Straight with the Medicine: Narratives of Washoe

by Felix Dennis from How to get rich

What swung the balance was her fear of failure in such a "public" endeavour. Or, at least, an endeavour that felt rather public at the time. She was young. She was a woman. She was frightened that others (especially the male-dominated community of car sales firms) would laugh at her or criticise her lack of hands-on experience, even though she would have made an excellent sales manager. She was not prepared to grow carapace or to risk the fear of public humiliation and say: "To hell with them. Let's go!"

Photo: Erwin Wurm's sculpture (Author: unknown)

by William A. Alcott from The Young Woman's Guide

"Whatever is worth doing, is worth doing well", is an old but true maxim. More than even this might be affirmed. Whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing in the best possible manner. No matter how well you have done the same thing heretofore; no matter how much more perfectly you already do it than your neighbors. You are not to make the past of your own experience, or the present of your neighbor's, the measure of your conduct. The question is--How well can I perform this particular act now?

by Charles Chaplin from My Autobiography

Hollywood was also going through a change of life. Most of the silent screen stars had disappeared - only a few of us were left. Now that the talkies had taken hold, the charm and insouciance of Hollywood were gone. Overnight it had become a cold and serious industry. Sound technicians were renovating studios and building elaborate sound devices. Cameras the size of a room lumbered about the stage like juggernauts. Elaborate radio equipment was installed, involving thousands of electrical wires. Men, geared like warriors from Mars, sat with earphones while the actors performed, with microphones hovering above them like fishing rods. It was all very complicated and depressing. How could anyone be creative with all that junk around them?

This post has been included in the Movie Monday Blog Carnival and the Bookworms Blog Carnival

by Lewis Carroll from Through the Looking Glass

I sent a message to the fish:
I told them "This is what I wish."

The little fishes of the sea,
They sent an answer back to me.

The little fishes' answer was
"We cannot do it, Sir, because -"

I sent to them again to say
"It will be better to obey."

The fishes answered with a grin,
"Why, what a temper you are in!"

I told them once, I told them twice:
They would not listen to advice.

I took a kettle large and new,
Fit for the deed I had to do.

My heart went hop, my heart went thump;
I filled the kettle at the pump.

Then some one came to me and said,
"The little fishes are in bed."

by Tsunetomo Yamamoto from Hagakure, the way of the Samurai

Among the maxims on Lord Naoshige’s wall there was this one: "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly." Master lttei commented, "Matters of small concern should be treated seriously." Among one’s affairs there should not be more than two or three matters of what one could call great concern. If these are deliberated upon during ordinary times, they can be understood. Thinking about things previously and then handling them lightly when the time comes is what this is all about. To face an event anew solve it lightly is difficult if you are not resolved beforehand, and there will always be uncertainty in hitting your mark. However, if the foundation is laid previously, you can think of the saying, "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly," as your own basis for action.