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It may be true that the weak will always be driven to the wall but it is the task of a just society to see that the wall is climbable.

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
Always
Tasks
Driven
Weak
Wall
Justice
Society
True
May
Task

More quotes by Sydney J. Harris

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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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If you want to know what a man's character is really like... ask him to tell you the living person he most admires - for hero worship is the truest index of a man's private nature.
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American parents, on the whole, do not want their sons to be artisans or craftsmen, but business or professional people. As a result, millions of youngsters are being prepared for careers they have little aptitude for - and little interest in except for dubious prestige.
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Ninety per cent of the world's woe comes from people not knowing themselves, their abilities, their frailties, and even their real virtues. Most of us go almost all the way through life as complete strangers to ourselves - so how can we know anyone else?
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The greatest enemy of progress is not stagnation, but false progress.
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People decline invitations when they are indisposed physically, and I wish they would do likewise when they feel indisposed emotionally. A person has no more right to attend a party with a head full of venom than with a throat full of virus.
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Western civilization has not yet learned the lesson that the energy we expend in 'getting things done' is less important than the moral strength it takes to decide what is worth doing and what is right to do.
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If you cannot endure to be thought in the wrong, you will begin to do terrible things to make the wrong appear right.
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We have not passed that subtle line between childhood and adulthood until we have stopped saying 'It got lost,' and say, 'I lost it.'
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We must become masters of our own actions and attitudes. To let another person determine whether we will be rude or gracious, elated or depressed is to give control of ourselves. The only true possession is self possession.
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Genealogy: A perverse preoccupation of those who seek to demonstrate that their forebears were better people than they are.
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Nuclear war is inevitable, says the pessimists Nuclear war is impossible, says the optimists Nuclear war is inevitable unless we make it impossible, says the realists.
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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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We truly possess only what we are able to renounce otherwise, we are simply possessed by our possessions.
Sydney J. Harris
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Ancient boundaries are meaningless, except for political purposes old divisions of clan and tribe are sentimental remnants of the pre-atomic age neither creed nor color nor place of origin is relevant to the realities of modern power to utterly seek and destroy.
Sydney J. Harris
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Once we assuage our conscience by calling something a necessary evil, it begins to look more and more necessary and less and less evil.
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The most important thing in an argument, next to being right, is to leave an escape hatch for your opponent, so that he can gracefully swing over to your side without too much apparent loss of face.
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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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An idealist believes the short run doesn't count. A cynic believes the long run doesn't matter. A realist believes that what is done or left undone in the short run determines the long run.
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More trouble is caused in this world by indiscreet answers than by indiscreet questions.
Sydney J. Harris