“First with the head, then with the heart.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Always in life an idea starts small, it is only a sapling idea, but the vines will come and they will try to choke your idea so it cannot grow and it will die and you will never know you had a big idea, an idea so big it could have grown thirty meters through the dark canopy of leaves and touched the face of the sky.' He looked at me and continued. 'The vines are people who are afraid of originality, of new thinking. Most people you encounter will be vines; when you are a young plant they are very dangerous.' His piercing blue eyes looked into mine.' Always listen to yourself, Peekay. It is better to be wrong than simply to follow convention. If you are wrong, no matter, you have learned something and you grow stronger. If you are right, you have taken another step toward a fulfilling life.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“. . . besides love, independence of thought is the greatest gift an adult can give a child.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“The power of one is above all things the power to believe in yourself, ofen well beyond any latent ability you may have previously demonstrated. The mind is the athlete, the body is simply the means it uses to run faster or longer, jump higher, shoot straighter, kick better, swim harder, hit further, or box better.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Always listen to yourself... It is better to be wrong than simply to follow convention.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“I have found in life that everything, no matter how bad, comes to an end.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“I learned that in each of us there burns a flame of independence that must never be allowed to go out. That as long as it exists within us we cannot be destroyed.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“But I was still alive, and in my book, where there's life, there's hope.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Winning is a state of mind that embraces everything you do.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“First with the head, then with the heart, you'll be ahead from the start.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“When men can be made to hope, then they can be made to win.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“It is better just to get on with the business of living and minding your own business and maybe, if God likes the way you do things, he may just let you flower for a day or a night. But don't go pestering and begging and telling him all your stupid little sins, that way you will spoil his day.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“You've got to be quick on your feet in this world if you want to survive. Though once you know the rules, it is not too hard to play the game.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Never take advice from a donkey.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Let me conclude by saying in my experience the glittering prizes in life come more to those who persevere despite setback and disappointment than they do to the exceptionally gifted who, with the confidence of the talents bestowed upon them, often pursue the tasks leading to success with less determination.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“sometimes in life doing what we shouldn't do is the emergency”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Pride is holding your head up high when everyone around you has theirs bowed. Courage is what makes you do it.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Sometimes, very occasionally, you do your best boxing with your mouth.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“. . . God is too busy making the sun come up and go down and watching so the moon floats just right in the sky to be concerned with color . . . only man wants always God should be there to condemn this one and save that one. Always it is man who wants to make heaven and hell. God is too busy training the bees to make honey and every morning opening up all the new flowers for business.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“The man assumes the role of the loner, the thinker and the searching spirit who calls the privileged and the powerful to task. The power of one was the courage to remain separate, th think through the truth and not be beguiled by convention or the plausible arguments of those who expect to maintain power, whatever the cost.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“In teaching me independence of thought, they had given me the greatest gift an adult can give to a child besides love, and they had given me that also.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Racism does not diminish with brains, it's a disease, a sickness, it may incubate in ignorance but it doesn't necessarily disappear with the gaining of wisdom!”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“You can't go feeding your hate on the past, it's not natural.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“As is so often the case with a legend, every incident has two possible interpretations, the plausible and the one that is molded to suit the making of the myth. Man is a romantic at heart and will always put aside dull, plodding reason for the excitement of an enigma. As Doc had pointed out, mystery, not logic, is what gives us hope and keeps us believing in a force greater than our own insignificance.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Inside all people there is love, also the need to take care of the other man who is his brother. Inside everyone is a savage, but there is also happening tenderness and compassion.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“what is a german? to say a man is a german, what is that? does it tell you if he is a good man? or a bad man? no, my friend, it tells you nothing about a man to say he is german. a man must think what he is inside. what he is on the outside, how can this matter?”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“It's nothing to be ashamed of. There comes a time in everything when you don't know something.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“It's good to be a little frightened. It's good to respect your opponent. It keeps you sharp. In the fight game, the head rules the heart. But in the end the heart is the boss.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
“Good conversational debate is an end in itself, and talking for the love of conversation is what makes us human.”
― Bryce Courtenay, quote from The Power of One
Bryce Courtenay
Born place: in Johannesburg, South Africa
Born date August 14, 1933
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“In the first place, it would efface from everybody’s
conscience the distinction between justice and injustice.
No society can exist unless the laws are respected to a cer-
tain degree, but the safest way to make them respected is
to make them respectable. When law and morality are in
contradiction to each other, the citizen finds himself in
the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense, or of
losing his respect for the law—two evils of equal magni-
tude, between which it would be difficult to choose.”
― Frédéric Bastiat, quote from The Law
“By definition, it is not possible to everyone to be above the average.”
― James C. Collins, quote from Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't
“But first, become aware of the choices that you are making in every moment. The more you become aware of your choices, the more you will make choices that are spontaneously correct — both for you and for those around you.”
― Deepak Chopra, quote from The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success: A Practical Guide to the Fulfillment of Your Dreams
“universe.” Tan’elKoth’s tone remained dry and precise, but his face grew ever more grim. “Chambaraya is, one might say, a smaller knot of mind within the Worldmind: what the elves call T’nnalldion. Through Faith, the Bog can get its corporate fingers into that knot, unbind it, and tie it again in their own image.” Avery shook her head blankly, uncomprehending. Tan’elKoth’s expression was bleak as an open grave. “They’ll make of it a world like this one.” “Is that all?” Avery asked, frowning. “You make it sound like a catastrophe.” “It will be an Armageddon unimaginable; it will be genocide on a scale of which Stalin could not have dreamed.” “Wiping out magick doesn’t seem like such a bad thing.” “Businessman,” Tan’elKoth said patiently, “you don’t understand. Magick has not been wiped out on Earth; it is a function of Flow, which is the energy of existence itself. But its state can be altered. And it has been. Once, Earth was home to fully as many magickal creatures as was Overworld: dragons and sea serpents and mermaids, rocs and djann and primals and stonebenders and all. But creatures such as these require higher levels of certain frequencies of Flow than does humanity; as the pattern of Earth degraded, these creatures not only died, but their very bones gave up their integrity. They vanished into the background Flow of your universe.” “You’re saying magick works on Earth?” Avery said skeptically. “Magick works, as you say, everywhere. But the manner in which magick works on Earth is a local aberration; the physics of this planet and its spatial surrounds have been altered to conditions that favor the ascendance of humanity.” “And what’s wrong with that?” “I did not say it was wrong. I do not debate morality. In my zeal to protect my Children, I once favored such a fate for my own world. But it is unnatural. It is both the cause and the result of the ugly twisting of human nature that we see around”
― Matthew Woodring Stover, quote from Blade of Tyshalle
“Do not let me hear
Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly,
Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession,
Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God.
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Four Quartets
A Portrait of the Ar...
Legend
The Witches
The Hound of the Bas...
V for Vendetta
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