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It is not only useless, it is harmful, to believe in oneself until one truly knows oneself. And to know oneself means to accept our moments of insanity, of eccentricity, of childishness and blindness.

Sydney J. Harris

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Sydney J. Harris
Age: 69 †
Born: 1917
Born: September 14
Died: 1986
Died: December 8
Journalist
London
England
Sydney Harris
Believe
Useless
Oneself
Accept
Truly
Childishness
Accepting
Eccentricity
Means
Harmful
Moments
Blindness
Mean
Insanity

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Norbert Blei is a writer the way people used to be troubadours and minstrels, celebrating what he has seen and heart and felt in a deceptively simple style reminiscent of the early Sherwood Anderson. . . . Like Anderson, he is a lover, and his affection invests his writing with a singular charm.
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Never let your fears be the boundaries of your dreams. Happiness is a direction, not a place.
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Being yourself is not remaining what you were, or being satisfied with what you are. It is the point of departure and far from the goal.
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When we inform, we lead from strength when we communicate, we lead from weakness—and it is precisely this confession of mortality that engages the ears, heads and hearts of those we want to enlist as allies in a common cause.
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The truest test of independent judgment is being able to dislike someone who admires us, and to admire someone who dislikes us.
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There are always too many Democratic congressmen, too many Republican congressmen, and never enough U.S. congressmen.
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Why are we willing to accept a new mathematical formula we don't understand as the product of a brilliant mind, while rejecting a new art form we don't understand as the product of a deranged mind?
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Sincerity that thinks it is the sole possessor of the truth is a deadlier sin than hypocrisy, which knows better.
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Perseverance is the most overrated of traits, if it is unaccompanied by talent beating your head against a wall is more likely to produce a concussion in the head than a hole in the wall.
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The three hardest tasks in the world are neither physical feats nor intellectual achievements, but moral acts: to return love for hate, to include the excluded, and to say, 'I was wrong'.
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No one should pay attention to a man delivering a lecture or a sermon on his philosophy of life until we know exactly how he treats his wife, his children, his neighbors, his friends, his subordinates and his enemies.
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Any philosophy that can be put in a nutshell belongs there.
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Our dilemma is that we hate change and love it at the same time what we really want is for things to remain the same but get better.
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We can often endure an extra pound of pain far more easily than we can suffer the withdrawal of an ounce of accustomed pleasure.
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Life is, if anything, the art of combination. Of discrimination. Of freely picking one's own personal pattern out of a hundred choices. Not letting it be picked for you—either by the Establishment, or by the Rebels. Conformity of Hip is no better than Conformity of Square.
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This is a lesson mankind has not yet learned. We identify, and stratify, and treat persons largely on the basis of their accidental (physical) characteristics, which have no deeper meaning.
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It's surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you're not comfortable within yourself, you can't be comfortable with others.
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Nothing is as easy to make as a promise this winter to do something next summer this is how commencement speakers are caught.
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The founder of every creed from Jesus Christ to Karl Marx, would be appalled to return to earth and see what has been made of that creed, not by its enemies, but by its most devoted adherents.
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There's no point in burying a hatchet if you're going to put up a marker on the site.
Sydney J. Harris