Luck Quotes - page 18
I do play with minor knocks at times. I'm not saying I'm a Braveheart compared to others, but I do just get on with it. And I do a lot of extra work, not so much gym work, I won't go in and pump iron, but I do like to do as much as I can on the training pitch. I'll practise my finishing, my passing, my dribbling and my sprints. Maybe that all contributes to that bit of luck I have staying fit. It's something my old man (his father, Frank Sr, formerly of West Ham and England) has instilled in me since I was a kid. Now, if I don't do that bit extra, I don't go into a game feeling I've prepared right.
Frank Lampard
They told me that everybody must think of his future and what is more that everybody did. Then I found that they were right: I looked round me among those who believed as they and I did, and couldn't find a single one who was willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of his belief. For a little while perhaps they were prepared to sacrifice something, but when their personal dreams of the future came into conflict with their faith, they chose the dream. Those who had the luck to be officials came off best. They had no need to renounce their faith, it cooled off a bit perhaps, but they had no need to renounce it; not was there any need for them to renounce for dream of their personal happiness, for officials with cold faith can get as far as they like. So I soon stopped sacrificing everything for my faith, because anyone sacrifices everything all by himself is just stupid.
Stig Dagerman
The tragedy of King impressed him intensely: "There you have it in the face!" he said - "the best and brightest man of his generation, with talents immeasurably beyond any of his contemporaries; with industry that has often sickened me to witness it; with everything in his favor but blind luck; hounded by disaster from his cradle, with none of the joy of life to which he was entitled, dying at last, with nameless suffering alone and uncared-for, in a California tavern.
Henry Adams
It's often said of Jesus that he could have saved himself, but he chose not to. And if you read the Gospels it's clear that he could have talked himself out of that crucifixion quite easily, but he was just too stubborn. The Romans didn't really want to kill him at all, but in the end they went along with it because he was being such a prick about it. The truth is he couldn't wait to get up on that cross. In fact, I think Christianity only exists because Jesus Christ just happened to be a masochist. I think he took one look at the hammer and nails and he couldn't believe his luck. He thought, "Well, in three days I'll be in Heaven, but until then I'm going to enjoy myself."
Pat Condell
The fates could not possibly be so malevolent, now that he had only a few hundred meters to go.
He was whistling in the dark, of course. How many aircraft had crashed at the very edge of the runway, after safely crossing an ocean? How many times had machines or muscles failed when there were only millimeters to go? Every possible piece of luck, bad as well as good, happened to somebody, somewhere. He had no right to expect any special treatment.
Arthur C. Clarke
Although I wish the anarchists luck, since that's the way we ought to be moving now. But I believe we need government to enforce the rules of the game. By prosecuting anti-trust violations, for instance. We need a government to maintain a system of courts that will uphold contracts and rule on compensation for damages. We need a government to ensure the safety of its citizens–to provide police protection. But government is failing at a lot of these things that it ought to be doing because it's involved in so many things it shouldn't be doing.
Milton Friedman
O Lord Most High, Creator of the Cosmos, Spinner of Galaxies, Soul of Electromagnetic Waves, Inhaler and Exhaler of Inconceivable Vacuum, Spitter of Fire and Rock, Trifler with Millennia-what could we do for Thee that Thou couldst not do for Thyself one octillion times better? Nothing. What could we do or say that could possibly interest Thee? Nothing. Oh, Mankind, rejoice in the apathy of our Creator, for it makes us free and truthful and dignified at last. No longer can a fool like Malachi Constant point to a ridiculous accident of good luck and say, ‘Somebody up there likes me.' And no longer can a tyrant say, ‘God wants this or that to happen, and anybody who doesn't help this or that to happen is against God.' O Lord Most High, what a glorious weapon is Thy Apathy, for we have unsheathed it, have thrust and slashed mightily with it, and the claptrap that has so often enslaved us or driven us into the madhouse lies slain!
Kurt Vonnegut
