Quote

I have a hankering to go back to the Orient and discard my necktie. Neckties strangle clear thinking.

Lin Yutang

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Lin Yutang
Age: 80 †
Born: 1895
Born: October 10
Died: 1976
Died: March 26
Lexicographer
Linguist
Novelist
Philosopher
Translator
Writer
Neckties
Hankering
Orient
Strangle
Discard
Clear
Back
Thinking
Necktie

More quotes by Lin Yutang

Image
However vague they are, dreams have a way of concealing themselves and leave us no peace until they are translated into reality, like seeds germinating underground, sure to sprout in their search for the sunlight.
Lin Yutang
Image
Everything has its place and time. We men of the nineteen-forties can smile at the mistakes of the nineteen-thirties, and, in turn, the men of the nineteen-fifties will laugh at the mistakes of the nineteen-forties. It is this historical perspective that shall save us.
Lin Yutang
Image
An educated man is one who has the loves and hatreds together.
Lin Yutang
Image
Now it is characteristic of play that one plays without reason and there must be no reason for it. Play is its own good reason.
Lin Yutang
Image
Neckties strangle clear thinking.
Lin Yutang
Image
If man be sensible and one fine morning, while he is lying in bed, counts at the tips of his fingers how many things in this life truly will give him enjoyment, invariably he will find food is the first one.
Lin Yutang
Image
Such is human psychology that if we don't express our joy, we soon cease to feel it.
Lin Yutang
Image
Nothing matters to a man who says nothing matters.
Lin Yutang
Image
A tendency to fly too straight at a goal, instead of circling around it, often carries one too far.
Lin Yutang
Image
The purpose of a short story is ... that the reader shall come away with the satisfactory feeling that a particular insight into human character has been gained, or that his (or her) knowledge of life has been deepened, or that pity, love or sympathy for a human being is awakened.
Lin Yutang
Image
To glorify the past and paint the future is easy, to survey the present and emerge with some light and understanding is difficult.
Lin Yutang
Image
The Chinese do not draw any distinction between food and medicine.
Lin Yutang
Image
Art is both creation and recreation.
Lin Yutang
Image
Business men who are busy the whole day and immediately go to bed after supper, snoring like cows, are not likely to contribute anything to culture.
Lin Yutang
Image
Let him cry whoever feels like crying, for we were animals before we became reasoning beings, and the shedding of a tear, whether of forgiveness or of pity or of sheer delight at beauty, will do him a lot of good.
Lin Yutang
Image
All human happiness is sensuous happiness.
Lin Yutang
Image
Of all the unhappy people in the world, the unhappiest are those who have not found something they want to do.
Lin Yutang
Image
Probably the difference between man and the monkeys is that the monkeys are merely bored, while man has boredom plus imagination.
Lin Yutang
Image
The wise man reads both books and life itself.
Lin Yutang
Image
All I know is that if God loves me only half as much as my mother does, he will not send me to Hell.
Lin Yutang