If You Have So Many Disagreeable Ideas, Why Write About Them? 

In response to either a personal email or something I wrote in this blog (as you know, I have no memory these days), AS sent me the following four quotes about writers and writing, saying “The one by Kingsley Amis was my favorite. And it made me think of you.”

I took that as a compliment. Here they are:

* “One reason the human race has such a low opinion of itself is that it gets so much of its wisdom from writers.” – Wilfrid Sheed

* “There are no dull subjects. There are only dull writers.” – H.L. Mencken

* “If you can’t annoy somebody, there’s little point in writing.” – Kingsley Amis

* “If I didn’t have writing, I’d be running down the street hurling grenades in people’s faces.” – Paul Fussell

AS’s list reminded me of another quote by Mencken that I like and wholeheartedly subscribe to:

* “The two main ideas that run through all of my writing, whether it be literary criticism or political polemic are these: I am strong in favor of liberty and I hate fraud.”

From AS: “Some fodder for your war on liberals”

AS is an old friend, independent thinker, and liberal-to-moderate on most issues, which makes these quips doubly appreciated. I thought it was particularly interesting that the great comedic philosophers Lenny Bruce and Dick Gregory are included.

“A liberal is a man who leaves a room when a fight begins.” – Heywood Broun

“The liberals can understand everything but people who don’t understand them.” – Lenny Bruce

“Liberal: a power worshiper without power.” – George Orwell

“A liberal is a person whose interests aren’t at stake at the moment.” – Willis Player

“A liberal is a man too broadminded to take his own side in a quarrel.” – Robert Frost

“Hell hath no fury like a liberal scorned.” – Dick Gregory

“Comedy is simply a funny way of being serious.” – Peter Ustinov

James Clear on Finding Happiness 

“You will never find one answer to what makes you happy. There are many answers, and they change based on your current state. People need to relax, but if all you do is sit on the beach, it gets old. People find meaning in work, but if all you do is work, it gets exhausting. People benefit from exercise, but if all you do is exercise, it gets unhealthy. Happiness will always be fleeting because your needs change over time. The question is: What do you need right now?”

“Wrong decisions are part of life. Being able to make them work anyway is one of the abilities of those who are successful.” – Warren Buffett

“I would rather…” 

The April 26 issue of Letters of Note presented a list of memorable quotations that began with, “I would rather…”

These are my favorites:

“I would rather fight a guy who had a knife and no talent with same than a guy with a good left hook.” (Ernest Hemingway, letter to Waldo Peirce, Oct. 1, 1928)

“I would rather tickle the cock of the English public than lick its arse, which is what even this small and comparatively unimportant piece of unjust censorship would have me do.” (Dylan Thomas, letter to John Davenport, Aug. 31, 1938, re a list of “objectionable” words that he was told had to be removed from the English edition of his short stories)

“I would rather be your captive than another woman’s king.” (Paul Laurence Dunbar, letter to Alice Ruth Moore, March 7, 1897)

“I would rather be a playwright than anything, mainly because playwrights are allowed to smoke backstage.” (Kurt Vonnegut, letter to José and Maria Pilar Donoso, Aug. 5, 1985)

“I would rather fail than sit idle.” (Vincent van Gogh, letter to his brother Theo, July 14, 1885)

Finding Meaning in Life 

A five-minute search on the internet will give you hundreds of quotations about the meaning of life. Here are ten I recently came across that I liked enough to share with you.

1. “The purpose of life is a life of purpose.” (Robert Byrne)

2. “To give life a meaning one must have a purpose larger than one’s self, and more enduring than one’s life.” (Will Durant)

3. “The only failure a man ought to fear is failure in cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.” (George Eliot)

4. “The living self has one purpose only: to come into its own fullness of being, as a tree comes into full blossom, or a bird into spring beauty, or a tiger into luster.” (D.H. Lawrence)

5. “More than anything else, what keeps a person going in the midst of adversity is having a sense of purpose.” (John C. Maxwell)

6. “The soul which has no fixed purpose in life is lost.” (Michel de Montaigne)

7. “Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose – a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.” (Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

8. “There is nothing quite as potent as a focused life, one lived on purpose.” (Rick Warren)

9. “Integrity and firmness of purpose are all I can promise. These, be the voyage long or short, shall never forsake me.” (George Washington)

10. “Until thought is linked with purpose there is no intelligent accomplishment.” (James Allen)

James Clear on Feeling Resistance 

“If you feel resistance before you begin, it’s usually procrastination and you need to get started. If you feel resistance after you begin, it’s usually feedback and you need to make adjustments.”

Bill Bonner on the Two Important Ways Government Spends Our Money 

“There are only two key issues in government – how it raises and spends its money… and against whom it goes to war. Everything else is a footnote. But on the two important issues, American voters have almost no say. Foreign policy is determined by the Foreign Policy Establishment, working hand in glove with the rest of the firepower industry’s shills and toadies – the press, the universities, Congress, and the bureaucracy.” – Bill Bonner, Bonner Private Research, March 8, 2024

Entropy: The Hidden Force that Complicates Life

“Entropy applies to every part of our lives. It is inescapable, and even if we try to ignore it, the result is a collapse of some sort. Understanding entropy leads to a radical change in the way we see the world. Ignorance of it is responsible for many of our biggest mistakes and failures. We cannot expect anything to stay the way we leave it. To maintain our health, relationships, careers, skills, knowledge, societies, and possessions requires never-ending effort and vigilance. Disorder is not a mistake; it is our default. Order is always artificial and temporary.”

Source: the BrainFood website