Selected comfort quotes

1. How the sting of poverty, or small means, is gone when one keeps house for one's own comfort and not for the comfort of one's neighbors.

2. Who ran to help me when I fell, And would some pretty story tell, Or kiss the place to make it well? My mother.

3. The quiet conscience is an invention of the devil.

4. I know people that could serve me canned tuna and saltine crackers and have me feel more at home at their table than some people who can cook circles around me. The more you try to impress people, generally the less you do.

5. You are uneasy; you never sailed with me before, I see.

6. There may not be a Heaven, but there is a San Francisco.

7. Life is an incurable condition: the only known treatment is to try to keep the patient comfortable.

8. As soon as I got out there I felt a strange relationship with the pitcher's mound. It was as if I'd been born out there. Pitching just felt like the most natural thing in the world. Striking out batters was easy.

9. Here today we huddle tight As the darkest heathens might The snow falls chilly on our skin The snow is forcing its way in. Hush, snow, come in with us to dwell: We were thrown out by Heaven as well.

10. Modern science has been a voyage into the unknown, with a lesson in humility waiting at every stop. Many passengers would rather have stayed home.

11. I revere the memory of Mr. F. as an estimable man and most indulgent husband, only necessary to mention Asparagus and it appeared or to hint at any little delicate thing to drink and it came like magic in a pint bottle; it was not ecstasy but it was comfort.

12. Ancestors do not mean so much. The rebel who succeeds generally makes it easier for the posterity that follows him; so these descendants are usually contented and smug and soft. Rebels are made from life, not ancestors.

13. Hot water is my native element. I was in it as a baby, and I have never seemed to get out of it ever since.

14. Better a cruel truth than a comfortable delusion.

15. Most truths are so naked that people feel sorry for them and cover them up, at least a little bit.

16. I come from a family where gravy is considered a beverage.

17. There are those who so dislike the nude that they find something indecent in the naked truth.

18. Sometimes it is harder to deprive oneself of a pain than of a pleasure.

19. I love sleep because it is both pleasant and safe to use. Pleasant because one is in the best possible company and safe because sleep is the consummate protection against the unseemliness that is the invariable consequence of being awake. What you don't know won't hurt you. Sleep is death without the responsibility.

20. Organic architecture seeks superior sense of use and a finer sense of comfort, expressed in organic simplicity.

21. In a certain sense the Good is comfortless.

22. It was luxuries like air conditioning that brought down the Roman Empire. With air conditioning their windows were shut, they couldn't hear the barbarians coming.

23. Continental people have sex lives; the English have hot-water bottles.

24. In this dim world of clouding cares, We rarely know, till wildered eyes See white wings lessening up the skies, The angels with us unawares.

25. It is the soothing thing about history that it does repeat itself.

26. No matter how big or soft or warm your bed is, you still have to get out of it.

27. Noble characters and pure affections and happy scenes are very comforting things. They're a refuge from life's disillusionments.

28. Art hurts. Art urges voyages - and it is easier to stay at home.

29. Truth-tellers are not always palatable. There is a preference for candy bars.

30. Short stories that's all it's ever been Don't you worry 'bout the ending Babe, before we begin I have seen the sun That's behind the rain I have felt the joy That's behind the pain.

31. I cry out for order and find it only in art.

32. Oh, London is a man's town, there's power in the air; And Paris is a woman's town, with flowers in her hair; And it's sweet to dream in Venice, and it's great to study Rome; But when it comes to living, there is no place like home.

33. Illusion is an anodyne, bred by the gap between wish and reality.

34. Solitude is fine, but you need someone to tell you that solitude is fine.

35. Nature is less partial than she appears, and all situations in life have their compensations along with them.

36. A marciful Providunce fashioned us holler O' purpose thet we might our principles swaller.

37. When things get too heavy, just call me helium, the lightest known gas to man.

38. It is a far, far better thing to have a firm anchor in nonsense than to put out on the troubled seas of thought.

39. In all life one should comfort the afflicted, but verily, also, one should afflict the comfortable, and especially when they are comfortably, contentedly, even happily wrong.

40. It is undoubtedly easier to believe in absolutes, follow blindly, mouth received wisdom. But that is self-betrayal.

41. Even on the most solemn occasions I got away without wearing socks and hid that lack of civilisation in high boots.

42. There's something about death that is comforting. The thought that you could die tomorrow frees you to appreciate life now.

43. The habit of reading is the only one I know in which there is no alloy. It lasts when all other pleasures fade. It will be there to support you when all other resources are gone. It will be present to you when the energies of your body have fallen away from you. It will make your hours pleasant to you as long as you live.

44. All I want is a warm bed, a kind word and unlimited power.

45. People associate me with a time when movies were pleasant, when women wore pretty dresses in films and you heard beautiful music. I always love it when people write me and say 'I was having a rotten time, and I walked into a cinema and saw one of your movies, and it made such a difference.'

46. An ordinary man can...surround himself with two thousand books..and thenceforward have at least one place in the world in which it is possible to be happy.

47. Uncertainty, in the presence of vivid hopes and fears, is painful, but must be endured if we wish to live without the support of comforting fairy tales. It is not good either to forget the questions that philosophy asks, or to persuade ourselves that we have found indubitable answers to them.

48. Knowledge of physical science will not console me for ignorance of morality in time of affliction, but knowledge of morality will always console me for ignorance of physical science. (67)

49. Nothing is so conformable to reason as to disavow reason. (272)

50. Don't worry about a thing, 'cos every little thing is gonna be alright.

51. About shocking. You know I feel comfortable in my skin. I think it's an okay thing to express yourself.

52. Mrs. Joe was a very clean housekeeper, but had an exquisite art of making her cleanliness more uncomfortable and unacceptable than the dirt itself. Cleanliness is next to Godliness, and some people do the same by religion.

53. It may be that there is nothing more demoralizing than a small but adequate income.

54. One should always sleep in all of one's guest beds, to make sure that they are comfortable. (11 September 1941)

55. The best of all physicians Is apple pie and cheese!

56. The whole visible world is perhaps nothing more than than the rationalization of a man who wants to find peace for a moment. An attempt to falsify the actuality of knowledge, to regard knowledge as a goal still to be reached.

57. He was an embittered atheist (the sort of atheist who does not so much disbelieve in God as personally dislike Him), and took a sort of pleasure in thinking that human affairs would never improve. Sometimes, he said, when sleeping on the Embankment, it had consoled him to look up at Mars or Jupiter and think that there were probably Embankment sleepers there. He had a curious theory about this. Life on earth, he said, is harsh because the planet is poor in the necessities of existence. Mars, with its cold climate and scanty water, must be far poorer, and life correspondingly harsher. Whereas on earth you are merely imprisoned for stealing sixpence, on Mars you are probably boiled alive. This thought cheered Bozo, I do not know why. He was a very exceptional man.

58. Here! creep, Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all Life death does end and each day dies with sleep.

59. All lost things are in the angels' keeping, Love; No past is dead for us, but only sleeping, Love.

60. Summertime and the livin' is easy, Fish are jumpin', and the cotton is high. Oh yo' daddy's rich, and yo' ma is good lookin', So hush, little baby, don' yo' cry.

61. You read something which you thought only happened to you, and you discover that it happened 100 years ago to Dostoyevsky. This is a very great liberation for the suffering, struggling person, who always thinks that he is alone. This is why art is important. Art would not be important if life were not important, and life is important.

62. I stole a lot when I was a kid, but I wouldn't steal one candy; I'd take the whole carton. I also used to like to break into other people's houses and sit in their rooms. I found it very comforting to be in someone's empty house.

63. Good manners is the art of making those people easy with whom we converse. Whoever makes the fewest persons uneasy is the best bred in the company.

64. It was _such_ a relief to program in user mode for a change. Not having to care about the small stuff is wonderful.

65. 'Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents,' grumbled Jo, lying on the rug. 'It's so dreadful to be poor!' sighed Meg, looking down at her old dress. 'I don't think it's fair for some girls to have plenty of pretty things, and other girls nothing at all,' added little Amy, with an injured sniff. 'We've got Father and Mother, and each other,' said Beth contentedly from her corner. The four young faces on which the firelight shone brightened at the cheerful words, but darkened again as Jo said sadly, 'We haven't got Father, and shall not have him for a long time.' She didn't say 'perhaps never,' but each silently added it, thinking of Father far away, where the fighting was.

66. When things are bad, we take comfort in the thought that they could always get worse. And when they are, we find hope in the thought that things are so bad they have to get better.

67. The only ultimate disaster that can befall us, I have come to realize, is to feel ourselves at home here on earth.

68. I am a Tory Anarchist. I should like every one to go about doing just as he pleased - short of altering any of the things to which I have grown accustomed.

69. Self-pity in its early stages is as snug as a feather mattress. Only when it hardens does it become uncomfortable.

70. You don't believe that for a second. But I believe that I believe it. And for me that's pretty good. Please don't disillusion me. I haven't had breakfast yet.

71. I've seen Austratlia and I've lived on an asteroid and I'd take the asteroid.

72. Living in the lap of luxury isn't bad, except you never know when luxury is going to stand up.

73. O lift me from the grass! I die! I faint! I fail! Let thy love in kisses rain On my lips and eyelids pale. My cheek is cold and white, alas! My heart beats loud and fast: O press it to thine own again, Where it will break at last!

74. When the weather is bad as it was yesterday, everybody, almost everybody, feels cross and gloomy. Our thin linen tents - about like a fish seine, the deep mud, the irregular mails, the never to-be-seen paymasters, and 'the rest of mankind,' are growled about in 'old-soldier' style. But a fine day like today has turned out brightens and cheers us all. We people in camp are merely big children, wayward and changeable.

75. To let friendship die away by negligence and silence, is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the greatest comforts of this weary pilgrimage.

76. It ceased; yet still the sails made on A pleasant noise till noon, A noise like of a hidden brook In the leafy month of June, That to the sleeping woods all night Singeth a quiet tune.

77. If I were personally to define religion, I would say that it is a bandage that man has invented to protect a soul made bloody by circumstance.

78. This is the weather the shepherd shuns, And so do I.

79. Oh bed! oh bed! delicious bed! That heaven upon earth to the weary head.

80. It is true that every day has its own evil, and its good too. But how difficult must life be, especially farther on when the evil of each day increases as far as worldly things go, if it is not strengthened and comforted by faith. And in Christ all worldly things may become better, and, as it were, sanctified.

81. There is a certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse! As I have often found in travelling in a stagecoach, that it is often a comfort to shift one's position, and be bruised in a new place.

82. Alexandra drew her shawl closer about her and stood leaning against the frame of the mill, looking at the stars which glittered so keenly through the frosty autumn air. She always loved to watch them, to think of their vastness and distance, and of their ordered march. It fortified her to reflect upon the great operations of nature, and when she thought of the law that lay behind them, she felt a sense of personal security.

83. Like a fiend in a cloud, With howling woe, After night I do crowd, And with night will go; I turn my back to the east, From whence comforts have increased; For light doth seize my brain With frantic pain.

84. One that is ever kind said yesterday: 'Your well-beloved's hair has threads of grey, And little shadows come about her eyes; Time can but make it easier to be wise Though now it seems impossible, and so All that you need is patience.' Heart cries, 'No, I have not a crumb of comfort, not a grain. Time can but make her beauty over again: Because of that great nobleness of hers The fire that stirs about her, when she stirs, Burns but more clearly. O she had not these ways When all the wild summer was in her gaze.' O heart! O heart! if she'd but turn her head, You'd know the folly of being comforted.

85. Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn Throws up a steamy column, and the cups, That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each, So let us welcome peaceful evening in.

86. They that love beyond the world cannot be separated by it. Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still.

87. Whoe'er has traveled life's dull round, Where'er his stages may have been, May sigh to think he still has found The warmest welcome, at an inn.

88. Interestingly, according to modern astronomers, space is finite. This is a very comforting thought - particularly for people who can never remember where they have left things.

89. If I were a painter I would paint my reverie If that's the only way for you to be with me

90. it is a cheering thought to think that god is on the side of the best digestion

91. there is always a comforting thought in time of trouble when it is not our trouble

92. Most people choose movies that provide exactly what they expect, and tell them things they already know. Others are more curious. We are put on this planet only once, and to limit ourselves to the familiar is a crime against our minds

93. Be still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle, Earth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong.

94. Whether they were right or wrong in this conjecture, certain it is that minds, like bodies, will often fall into a pimpled ill-conditioned state from mere excess of comfort, and like them, are often successfully cured by remedies in themselves very nauseous and unpalatable.

95. And Love, our light at night and shade at noon, Lulls us to rest with songs, and turns away All shafts of shelterless tumultuous day.

96. 'Guess now who holds thee?'-'Death,' I said. But there The silver answer rang-'Not Death, but Love.'

97. What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity, devoid of troubling or disturbing subject matter, an art which could be for every mental worker, for the businessman was well as the man of letters, for example, a soothing, calming influence on the mind, something like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.

98. As the people here grow colder I turn to my computer And spend my evenings with it Like a friend.

99. Everyone needs a hug. It changes your metabolism.

100. Warm summer sun, shine kindly here; Warm southern wind, blow softly here; Green sod above, lie light, lie light - Good-night, dear heart, good-night, good-night.