Proverbs often contradict one another, as any reader soon discovers. The sagacity that advises us to look before we leap promptly warns us that if we hesitate we are lost; that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but out of sight, out of mind.

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I cannot believe that the purpose of life is (merely) to be happy. I think the purpose of life is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate. I think it is above all to matter, to count, to stand for something. To have it make some difference that you lived at all.

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Humor is, I think, the sublets and chanciest of literary forms. It is surely not accidental that there are a thousand novelists, essayists, poets or journalists for each humorist. It is a long, long time between James Thurbers

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I cannot believe that the purpose of life is to be happy. I think the purpose of life is to be useful, to be responsible, to be compassionate. It is, above all to matter, to count, to stand for something, to have made some difference that you lived at all.

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Truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to make sense.

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Acting is a form of deception, and actors can mesmerize themselves almost as easily as an audience.

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Courage is the capacity to confirm what can be imagined.

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I never cease being dumbfounded by the unbelievable things people believe

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Extremists think 'communication' means agreeing with them.

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I never cease being dumbfounded by the unbelievable things people believe.

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The only reason for being a professional writer is that you can't help it.

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For some not to be martyrs is martyrdom indeed.

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I learned that it is the weak who are cruel, and that gentleness is to be expected only from the strong.

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Most men do not mature, they simply grow taller.

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If you are going to do something wrong, at least enjoy it.

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If you are going to do something wrong at least enjoy it.

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We see things as we are, not as they are.

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