Belief

"We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff, And good from bad find no partition."

"Let Hercules himself do what he may, The cat will mew and dog will have his day."

"Imperious Cæsar, dead and turn'd to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away: O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw!"

"A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm."

"What a falling-off was there!"

"I think the destiny of all men is not to sit in the rubble of their own making but to reach out for an ultimate perfection which is to be had. At the moment, it is a dream. But as of the moment we clasp hands with our neighbor, we build the first span to bridge the gap between the young and the old. At this hour, it’s a wish. But we have it within our power to make it a reality. If you want to prove that God is not dead, first prove that man is alive."

"The problem with Destiny, of course, is that she is often not careful where she puts her finger."

"when a girl is wedded, her fate is fixedwhen a child is born, his stars are fixedlife is fixed, love is fixed, death is fixed"

"When we heard what they [Simmias and Cebes] said we were all depressed, as we told each other afterwards. We had been quite convinced by the previous argument [Socrates' argument], and they seemed to confuse us again, and to drive us to doubt not only what had already been said but also what was going to be said, lest we be worthless as critics or the subject itself [the fate of the soul] admitted of no certainty."

"The problem is not the harshness of Fate, for anything we want strongly enough we get. The trouble is rather that when we have it we grow sick of it, and then we should never blame Fate, only our own desire."

"A decision, an action, are infallible omens of what we shall do another time, not for any vague, mystic, astrological reason but because they result from an automatic reaction that will repeat itself."

"Life is not a search for experience, but for ourselves. Having discovered our own fundamental level we realize that it conforms to our own destiny and we find peace."

"When one has made a mistake, one says. "Another time I shall know what to do," when one should say is: "I already know what I shall really do another time.""

"Don't you know that what happens to you once always happens again? You always react in the same way to the same thing. It's no accident when you make a mess. Then you do it again. It's called destiny."

"We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren. And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified."

"Destiny has a funny way When it comes and takes all your cares away I can't think of a single thing Other than what a beautiful state I'm in"

"We are what we must And not what we would be. I know that one hour Assures not another. The will and the power Are diverse."

"We may not have chosen the time, but the time has chosen us."

"Destiny is the bridge you build to the one you love."

"We can't run from who we are. Our destiny chooses us."

"Living in to the fear of feeling and working to capacity is a luxury only the unintentional can afford, and the unintentional are those who do not wish to guide their own destinies."

"'Tis strange how the heart can create Or colour from itself its fate; We make ourselves our own distress, We are ourselves our happiness."

"Karma is often wrongly confused with the notion of a fixed destiny. It is more like an accumulation of tendencies that can lock us into particular behavior patterns, which themselves result in further accumulations of tendencies of a similar nature... But it is not necessary to be a prisoner of old karma. Understanding the law of karma is known as the light of the world because through this understanding we can take responsibility for our destinies and be truly more guided to greater fulfillment in our lives."

"If the heavens turn against me, I can do nothing."

"Hot tunnels alternated with cool tunnels. Coolness was wedded to discomfort in the form of hard X-rays. By the time they were decanted the embryos had a horror of cold. They were predestined to emigrate to the tropics, to be miner and acetate silk spinners and steel workers. Later on their minds would be made to endorse the judgment of their bodies. "We condition them to thrive on heat," concluded Mr. Foster. "Our colleagues upstairs will teach them to love it.""

"Weddyng is desteny, And hangyng likewise."

"Sometimes a man can still meet his destiny on the road he took to avoid it."

"Nothing is more seductive than a sense of destiny."

"Our destiny is frequently met in the very paths we take to avoid it."

"Nature—pitiless in a pitiless universe—is certainly not concerned with the survival of Americans or, for that matter, of any of the two billion people now inhabiting this earth. Hence, our destiny, with the aid of God, remains in our own hands."

"No people are truly free until they can determine their own destiny."

"[Ivan:] "Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature—that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance—and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth." "No, I wouldn't consent," said Alyosha softly."

"The trick in chasing destiny is to feel it as a rider, a rider on a spinning ball waiting for a rare chance in time. Those few moments of balance between darkness and light where the infinite is in motion and the motion is felt as a dance, as a solution that dissolves the question."

"We create our own destiny by the way we do things. We have to take advantage of opportunities and be responsible for our choices."

"I believe that we are given choices, places where decisions may be made to walk one road or another. We do not know what provides these choices, but we may call it destiny to give a name to that which is unknowable. Destiny offers the choices, but we choose the road."

"Whenever a child says "I don't believe in fairies" there's a little fairy somewhere that falls right down dead."

"If that impression does not remain on this intrepid and powerful people, into whose veins all nations pour their mingling blood, it will be our immense calamity. Public action, without it, will lose the dignity of consecration. Eloquence, without it, will miss what is loftiest, will give place to a careless and pulseless disquisition, or fall to the flatness of political slang. Life, without it, will lose its sacred and mystic charm. Society, without it, will fail of inspirations, and be drowned in an animalism whose rising tides will keep pace with its wealth."

"The man who goes through life with an uncertain doctrine not knowing what he believes, what a poor, powerless creature he is! He goes around through the world as a man goes down through the street with a poor, wounded arm, forever dodging people he meets on the street for fear they may touch him."

"Begin by regarding every thing from a moral point of view, and you will end by believing in God."

"I have believed the best of every man, And find that to believe it is enough To make a bad man show him at his best, Or even a good man swing his lantern higher."

"Do not believe what I tell you here any more than if it were some tale of a tub."

"And when religious sects ran mad, He held, in spite of all his learning, That if a man's belief is bad, It will not be improved by burning."

"Tarde quæ credita lædunt credimus."

"Nothing is so firmly believed as what we least know."

"They believed—faith, I'm puzzled—I think I may call Their belief a believing in nothing at all, Or something of that sort; I know they all went For a general union of total dissent."

"O thou, whose days are yet all spring, Faith, blighted once, is past retrieving; Experience is a dumb, dead thing; The victory's in believing."

"Better trust all and be deceived, And weep that trust, and that deceiving, Than doubt one heart that, if believed, Had blessed one's life with true believing."

"Credat Judæus Apella non ego."

"Belief consists in accepting the affirmations of the soul; unbelief, in denying them."

"There is no unbelief; Whoever plants a seed beneath the sod And waits to see it push away the clod, He trusts in God."