Phenomenal nature shadows him wherever he goes. Clouds in the staring sky transmit to one another, by means of slow signs, incredi...bly detailed information regarding him. His inmost thoughts are discussed at nightfall, in manual alphabet, by darkly gesticulating trees. Pebbles or stains or sunflecks form patterns representing in some awful way messages which he must intercept. Everything is a cipher and of everything he is the theme.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
As I sit looking out of a window of the building I wish I did not have to write the instructional manual on the uses... of a new metal. I look down into the street and see people, each walking with an inner peace, And envy them--they are so far away from me! Not one of them has to worry about getting out this manual on scheduleLESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Courtin's manual of etiquette of 1671 explains: "These little people are allowed to amuse themselves without anyone troubling to s...ee whether they are behaving well or badly; they are permitted to do as they please; nothing is forbidden them; they laugh when they ought to cry, they cry when they ought to laugh, they talk when they ought to be silent, and they are mute when good manners require them to replay. It is cruelty to allow them to go on living in this way. The parents say that when they are bigger they will be corrected. Would it not be better to deal with them in such a way that there was nothing to correct?"LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Between labor and play stands work. A man is a worker if he is personally interested in the job which society pays him to do; what... from the point of view of society is necessary labor is from his point of view voluntary play. Whether a job is to be classified as labor or work depends, not on the job itself, but on the tastes of the individual who undertakes it. The difference does not, for example, coincide with the difference between a manual and a mental job; a gardener or a cobbler may be a worker, a bank clerk a laborer.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
A great deal of unnecessary worry is indulged in by theatregoers trying to understand what Bernard Shaw means. They are not satisf...ied to listen to a pleasantly written scene in which three or four clever people say clever things, but they need to purse their lips and scowl a little and debate as to whether Shaw meant the lines to be an attack on monogamy as an institution or a plea for manual training in the public school system.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
One who has not only the four S's, which are required in every good lover, but even the whole alphabet; as for example ... Agreeab...le, Bountiful, Constant, Dutiful, Easy, Faithful, Gallant, Honourable, Ingenious, Kind, Loyal, Mild, Noble, Officious, Prudent, Quiet, Rich, Secret, True, Valiant, Wise; the X indeed, is too harsh a letter to agree with him, but he is Young and Zealous.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
A child is nothing like a racing car. . . . Souping up babies doesn't work that way. The child is what she is. There is a certain ...irreducible if elusive core. Pushing, pulling, stretching, and shrinking will not really change it. There may be spectacular interim results. The baby may say the alphabet before she walks, master two-times or even ten-times table at three. In the long run, however, this forced precocity tends to be irrelevant. . . . Whatever gains there are become unimportant. The losses can be irrevocable.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Ven you're a married man, Samivel, you'll understand a good many things as you don't understand now; but vether it's worth goin' t...hrough so much, to learn so little, as the charity-boy said ven he got to the end of the alphabet, is a matter of taste.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The chess pieces are the block alphabet which shapes thoughts; and these thoughts, although making a visual design on the chess-bo...ard, express their beauty abstractly, like a poem.... I have come to the personal conclusion that while all artists are not chess players, all chess players are artists.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »