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[W]ithout humour you cannot run a sweetie-shop, let alone a nation.

John Buchan

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John Buchan
Age: 64 †
Born: 1875
Born: August 26
Died: 1940
Died: February 11
Barrister
Biographer
Former Governor General Of Canada
Journalist
Military Personnel
Novelist
Poet
Politician
Science Fiction Writer
Perth
Scotland
John Buchan
1st Baron Tweedsmuir
Lord Tweedsmuir
Cannot
Humour
Shops
Nation
Humor
Alone
Nations
Funny
Sweetie
Running
Shop

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Most true points are fine points. There never was a dispute between mortals where both sides hadn't a bit of right.
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I once played the chief part in a rather exciting business without ever once budging from London . And the joke of it was that the man who went out to look for adventure only saw a bit of the game, and I who sat in my chambers saw it all and pulled the strings. 'They also serve who only stand and wait,' you know.
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Wise men never grow up indeed, they grow younger, for they lose the appalling worldly wisdom of youth.
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I believe that all wisdom consists in caring immensely for a few right things, and not caring a straw about the rest.
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I was a peaceful sedentary man, a lover of a quiet life, with no appetite for perils and commotions. But I was beginning to realise that I was very obstinate.
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That is the supreme value of history. The study of it is the best guarantee against repeating it.
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It was foreordained that I should go alone to Umvelos', and in the promptings of my own infallible heart I believed I saw the workings of Omnipotence. Such is our moral arrogance, and yet without such a belief I think that mankind would have ever been content to bide sluggishly at home.
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Leadership is only courage and wisdom, and a great carefulness of self.
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I am an ordinary sort of fellow, not braver than other people, but I hate to see a good man downed, and that long knife would not be the end of Scudder if I could play the game in his place.
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He who would valiant be against all disaster let him in constancy follow the Master. There's no discouragement shall make him once relent his first avowed intent to be a pilgrim.
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London is like the tropical bush -- if you don't exercise constant care the jungle, in the shape of the slums, will break in.
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You think that a wall as solid as the earth separates civilization from barbarism. I tell you the division is a thread, a sheet of glass. A touch here, a push there, and you bring back the reign of Saturn.
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An atheist is a man who has no invisible means of support.
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You see only the productions of second-rate folk who are in a hurry to get wealth and fame. The true knowledge, the deadly knowledge, is still kept secret. But, believe me, my friend, it is there.
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There may be peace without joy, and joy without peace, but the two combined make happiness.
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We can pay our debts to the past by putting the future in debt to ourselves.
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History gives us a kind of chart, and we dare not surrender even a small rushlight in the darkness. The hasty reformer who does not remember the past will find himself condemned to repeat it.
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Our sufferings have taught us that no nation is sufficient unto itself, and that our prosperity depends in the long run, not upon the failures of our neighbors but their successes.
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Every man at the bottom of his heart believes that he is a born detective.
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What would you call the highest happiness, Lewie? he asked. The sense of competence, was the answer, given without hesitation.
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