We should not be frightened by appearances.

 

We should not be frightened by appearances.
--
Chapter VI, Consolation For Difficulties, p. 206

 

Alain de Botton

» Alain de Botton - all quotes »

Similar quotes

 

No one in the history of the written word, not even William MacGonagall, or Spike Milligan or D. H. Lawrence, is so wide open to damaging quotation. Try this, more or less at random: 'A murderer in the moment of his murder could feel a sense of beauty and perfection as complete as the transport of a saint.' Or this: Film is a phenomenon whose resemblance to death has been ignored for too long. His italics.
On every page Mailer will come up with a formulation both grandiose and crass. This is expected of him. It is also expected of the reviewer to introduce a lingering 'yet' or 'however' at some point, and say that 'somehow' Mailer's 'fearless honesty' redeems his notorious excesses. He isn't frightened of sounding outrageous; he isn't frightened of making a fool of himself; and, above all, he isn't frightened of being boring. Well, fear has its uses. Perhaps he ought to be a little less frightened of being frightened.

 

Martin Amis

 

"My father was frightened of his mother. I was frightened of my father and I am damned well going to see to it that my children are frightened of me."

 

George V of the United Kingdom

 

I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones.

 

John Cage

 

If publishers and editors exert themselves to keep certain topics out of print, it is not because they are frightened of prosecution but because they are frightened of public opinion. In this country intellectual cowardice is the worst enemy a writer or journalist has to face, and that fact does not seem to me to have had the discussion it deserves.

 

George Orwell

 

The other morning, I woke up. I was frightened – I’m always frightened in the morning, I don’t know where I am. But I heard this beautiful reassuring sound, it sounded like my childhood. I thought, what’s that? Is it? Church bells behind the hill? Or, no – it’s an ice cream van, in the rain. It was me, BREATHING!

 

Dylan Moran