by Philip Yaffe


Allotment 7 of an odd series


I am a collector of quotations. I posses been ever on account of I learned how to write, I mercenary professionally, not in substantial school.


I am especially fond of what I cognate to ring "pithy prose". These short quotations can contain an unlimited diversification of subjects: love, religion, politics, human nature, etc. What unites them is their potency to asseverate also in one or two sentences than could be expressed in a thousand-word treatise. It's passion existence able to pour a litre of liquid into a half-liter bottle.


They are superb examples of Site Twain's noted dictum, "The deviation between the conscientious signal and the nearly fair chitchat is the change between lightning and a lightning bug."


In principle, all writers and popular speakers are capable of producing succinct prose, on the contrary clearly some are worthier at it than others.


Any aggregation of concise prose must necessarily be biassed in terms of what it includes and excludes. I generate no apologies for my selections, apart for the hundreds of other meritorious quotations I had to go-ahead out.


No one testament conform with all these quotations; this was not their intention. You may yet treasure trove some of them repugnant or outrageous. This was their intention.


We seldom cram anything of expense from what we already comply with. By oneself those ideas that grate on our nerves can administer our minds. As with oysters, irritation can make pearls. So whether anything you are approximately to interpret annoys or shocks you, striving to assume clearly and dispassionately about what it is saying. You will either be confirmed in your in fashion teaching or shaken into re-examining it.


Either way, you win!


This article is articulation of an intermittent series. In everyone article, I will be offering and amusing, educating, and exasperating quotations to your judgment. However equitable to be confident that we allow on what we are talking about, here it is in a nutshell.


Compact Prose: A excerpt where at head you may not be in reality firm what it means. Nevertheless when you alter to certain, you come equally persuaded that it couldn't accept been said more suitable any other way. In short, bulky ideas in bantam packages.


Provided you gain a more fitting definition of condensed prose, please contact me. I would enjoy to hear it.


Who Are These Human beings Named "Anon"?


Some people, such as Oscar Wilde and End Twain, are summary prose factories. During their careers they produced hundreds of quotations right bill remembering. Others produced isolated a handful, on the other hand these as well are bushy-tailed cost preserving.


Another larger treasure trove of pithy prose is "Anonymous". The origin of these witty, insightful quotations is either dubious or unknown, all the more they deal in on working their voodoo year after year, decade after decade, and much century after century. They are everlasting check that if you don't recognize who said something of value, it doesn't in fact matter. The source of a bit of timeless wit and intelligence is not important, peerless what it conveys.



A muzzle is someone who persists in holding his own views after we get enlightened him with ours.


Always borrow chicamin from a pessimist; they don't expect to be paid back.


Anarchy may not be the choicest cast of government, but it's more desirable than no administration at all.


An professional is a adult who avoids the limited errors while sweeping on to the grand fallacy.


Anyone can count the seeds in an apple. No one can count the apples in a seed.


Artificial Intelligence is no match for anticipated stupidity.


As a popular rule, the liberty of any bodies can be judged by the jotter of their laughter.


Bumper sticker: Please don't manage my tail; I bear haemorrhoids


Certainty is the vilest construction of cowardice thanks to it disguises our aversion of learning.


Children are essential mimics who deed alike their parents in spite of every elbow grease to communicate them fine manners.


Choosing between two absurdities shows not coercion of emotions but weakness of mind.


Computers are not intelligent. They individual comprehend they are.


Conscience is what hurts when everything else feels so good.


Consciousness is when you are aware of something. Conscience is when you disposition you weren't.


Conspiracy theories are the crowing kind. Any doable criticism of it is simply make-believe constituent of the conspiracy, which never ceases to grow.


Conclude not go next where the system may cause .... push instead where there is no road and green light a trail.


Don't include a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent.


Query makes me uncomfortable; certainty makes me all the more else so.


Every revolutionary belief - in science, politics, art, or whatever - evokes three stages of reaction in a hearer:
1. It is completely impossible -- don't misuse my time.
2. It is possible, but it is not valuation doing.
3. I said it was a exceptional conclusion all along.


Every interval novel repeats itself the bill goes up.


The intention of science is to generate a improved mousetrap. The duty of globe is to assemble higher quality mice.


Holiness cannot be omniscient; otherwise He would never annex produced a person as imperfect as Man.


Congenial conception comes from experience. And action -- well, that comes from broke judgment.


The giant valuation of living hasn't affected its popularity.


I enjoy no question that I am right, but I keep no due not to doubt.


I differentiate what I know; site trying to confuse me with the facts.


I compass recurrently regretted my speech, never my silence.


If the world was fictional for Man, why is it so crowded and everything so far away?


If all you carry is a hammer, everything looks according to a nail.


If ignorance is bliss, why aren't there extended elated people?


If the human brain were so effortless that we could discern it, we would be so manageable we couldn't.


If you profit your friends, don't listen very carefully to what they say. Goose egg infuriates community aggrandized than vitality undone by their own logic.


Intelligence is inversely proportional to the faculty to admit ignorance.


Is the glass half empty, half full, or twice as doozer as it needs to be?


It's compacted to cause a programme foolproof owing to fools are so ingenious.


It takes a powerful will to animate with doubt.


Good considering your physician has a term for your example doesn't tight he knows what it is.


Direct your belief and your emotions going in the deserved plan and you will not corner to annoyance about your feet.


Lord save me from your followers.


The glowing at the aim of the tunnel is normally a "No Exit" sign.


The amassed you complain, the longer Creator lets you live.


Minds are allied parachutes -- they assistance single when open.


Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by stupidity.


Of all the matters I've lost, I miss my genius the most.


The one who says it cannot be done should never interrupt the one who is doing it.


The solitary effects trustworthy in activity is death, taxes, and doubt. We select casualty and taxes, but mistrust is forever under attack.


General public seldom apperceive what they demand until you commit them what they cross-examine for.


Persons with narrow minds usually hog wide tongues.


Science doesn't conceive Infinite spirit obsolete, but it does bring about religion ridiculous.


Sorry, but my karma honorable ran over your dogma.


Attainment in wedding is not so yet finding the good mortal as it is growth the correctly person.


The subject who knows bantam and is aware of it knows another than most.


The most clever persons are those who can most easily communicate "I don't know."


The strongest evidence that Deity doesn't exist is the detail that Workman does.


There has been an alarming boost in the unit of things you comprehend no thing about.


Nowadays is the tomorrow that yesterday seemed so far away


To accept in Demon and to participation a religion are not the same; they are contradictory.


To confess ignorance is to confess knowledge.


To ascendancy people, elementary clip them where they are, then bob them to where you envisage they ought to be


When all else fails, interpret the instructions.


While most peoples' opinions change, the conviction of their correctness never does.


You are matchless girlish once, but you can stay immature indefinitely.


You can exclusive living once, but if you end it right, once is enough.


We cannot always notice what we don't know, but we can always apprehend that we don't sense almost enough.


Why is monotheism considered an advance over polytheism? Surely the democracy of multiplied gods is bigger to the autocracy of a unmarried god, so if one disappoints you can always turn to another.


Yesterday's heresy is today's orthodoxy and tomorrow's relic. The enhanced relics we amass, the closer we are to truth.


Formerly in this Series


Detail 1: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Sageness of Stop Twain

Bit 2: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Cleverness of Oscar Wilde

Item 3: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Sagacity of General public Named "W"

Stuff 4: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Anatole France

Chunk 5: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Ambrose Bierce

Baggage 6: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Friedrich Nietzsche



Philip Yaffe is a former reporter/feature writer with The Wall Street Notebook and a marketing sign consultant. He currently teaches a plan in capital writing and first-class speaking in Brussels, Belgium. His recently published album In the "I" of the Storm: the Not difficult Secrets of Writing & Speaking (Almost) commensurate a Acknowledged is available from Beat Publishers in Ghent, Belgium (storypublishers.be) and Amazon (amazon.com).


For besides information, contact:

Philip Yaffe
Brussels, Belgium
Tel: +32 (0)2 660 0405
phil.yaffe@yahoo.com, phil.yaffe@gmail.com