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"There is something improbably about the silence in the [subway] carriage, considering how naturally gregarious we are as a species. Still, how much kinder it is for the commuters to pretend to be absorbed in other things, rather than revealing the extent to which they are covertly evaluating, judging, condemning and desiring each other. A few venture a glance here and there, as furtively as birds pecking grain. But only if the train crashed would anyone know for sure who else had been in the carriage, what small parts of the nation's economy had been innocuously seated across the aisle just before the impact: employees of hotels, government ministries, plastic-surgery clinics, fruit nurseries and greetings-card companies."
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"Most peoples are prisoners of other people's thoughts."
Author Name
Personal Development

"We...advance toward a state of society in which not only each man but every impulse in each man claims carte blanche."
Author Name
Personal Development

"Women who don't like the rules change the rules."
Author Name
Personal Development

"People are very busy; they are so busy that when they walk in the crowds they see no one, no one but themselves; they hear no voice, no voice but their own voice!"
Author Name
Personal Development

"Probably the people on the street know better than the people at home."
Author Name
Personal Development

"In a materialistic society, the dead body of a rich man's dog is regarded as a corpse; that of a poor man, a carcass."
Author Name
Personal Development

"People on corporate conveyor belts, like animals in slaughter-chutes are all part of the same big massacre of joy."
Author Name
Personal Development

"Poverty is like a crumb that sits at a table, and starves itself to death."
Author Name
Personal Development

"The action or inaction of any government does not negate the Personal Responsibility of the citizens."
Author Name
Personal Development

"If you have any hate in your heart, you will not be able to create a society that is just."
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Personal Development
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"What is fascinating about marriage is why anyone wants to get married."
Marriage

"We are certainly influenced by role models, and if we are surrounded by images of beautiful rich people, we will start to think that to be beautiful and rich is very important - just as in the Middle Ages, people were surrounded by images of religious piety."
People

"If we were entirely sane, if madness did not have a serious grip on one side of us, other people's tragedies would hold a great deal less interest for us."
Psychology

"There is something improbably about the silence in the [subway] carriage, considering how naturally gregarious we are as a species. Still, how much kinder it is for the commuters to pretend to be absorbed in other things, rather than revealing the extent to which they are covertly evaluating, judging, condemning and desiring each other. A few venture a glance here and there, as furtively as birds pecking grain. But only if the train crashed would anyone know for sure who else had been in the carriage, what small parts of the nation's economy had been innocuously seated across the aisle just before the impact: employees of hotels, government ministries, plastic-surgery clinics, fruit nurseries and greetings-card companies."
Society

"Maturity' really means: being very unsurprised by, and calm around, pain and disappointment."
Wisdom

"Bitterness: anger that forgot where it came from."
Emotion

"For the rest of history, for most of us, our bright promise will always fall short of being actualised; it will never earn us bountiful sums of money or beget exemplary objects or organisations....Most of us stand poised at the edge of brilliance, haunted by the knowledge of our proximity, yet still demonstrably on the wrong side of the line, our dealings with reality undermined by a range of minor yet critical psychological flaws (a little too much optimism, an unprocessed rebelliousness, a fatal impatience or sentimentality). We are like an exquisite high-speed aircraft which for lack of a tiny part is left stranded beside the runway, rendered slower than a tractor or a bicycle."
Reality

"The quickest way to stop noticing something, may be to buy it-just as the quickest way to stop appreciating someone may be to marry him or her."
Awareness

"Humboldt's early biographer, F.A. Schwarzenberg, subtitled his life of Humboldt What May Be Accomplished in a Lifetime. He summarised the areas of his subject's extraordinary curiosity as follows: '1) The knowledge of the Earth and its inhabitants. 2) The discovery of the higher laws of nature, which govern the universe, men, animals, plants, minerals. 3) The discovery of new forms of life. 4) The discovery of territories hitherto but imperfectly known, and their various productions. 5)The acquaintance with new species of the human race--- their manners, their language and the historical traces of their culture.' What may be accomplished in a lifetime---and seldom or never is."
Discovery

"Loneliness makes us more capable of true intimacy if ever better opportunities do come along. We might be isolated for now, but we'll be capable of far closer, more interesting bonds with anyone we do eventually locate."
Relationship
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