Folly Quotes - page 17
There is a great deal of fallacy and folly about the ordinary talk of confidential conversation; to say nothing of the loathsome American notion of a heart to heart talk. People are often very misleading when they talk about themselves; even when they are perfectly honest, and even modest, in talking about themselves. But people tell a great deal so long as they talk about everything except themselves.
G. K. Chesterton
When it was reported to General Washington that the army was frequently indulging in swearing, he immediately sent out the following order The general is sorry to be informed that the foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and swearing a vice little known heretofore in the American army is growing into fashion. Let the men and officers reflect 'that we can not hope for the blessing of heaven on our army if we insult it by our impiety and folly.'
George Washington
The perils of change are so great the promise of the most hopeful theories is so often deceptive, that it is frequently the wiser part to uphold the existing state of things, if it can be done, even though, in point of argument, it should be utterly indefensible...Resistance is folly or heroism-a virtue or a vice-in most cases, according to the probabilities there are of its being successful.
Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury
The Holy Spirit is God eternally giving himself; like a never-ending spring he pours forth nothing less than himself. In view of this ceaseless gift, we come to see the limitations of all that perishes, the folly of the consumerist mindset. We begin to understand why the quest for novelty leaves us unsatisfied and wanting. Are we not looking for an eternal gift? For the spring that will never run dry?
Pope Benedict XVI
We have become a society that can't self-correct, that can't address its obvious problems, that can't pull out of its nosedive. And so to our list of disasters let us add this fourth entry: we have entered an age of folly that - for all our Facebooking and the twittling tweedle-dee-tweets of the twitterati - we can't wake up from.
Thomas Frank
