"Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials."
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Lin Yutang quotes (page 1 of 7)
138 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow."
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"On the whole, the enjoyment of leisure is something which decidedly costs less than the enjoyment of luxury. All it requires is an artistic temperament which is bent on seeking a perfectly useless afternoon spent in a perfectly useless manner."
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"Happiness has always seemed like a bluebird, and consists of moments."
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"A man who has to be punctually at a certain place at five o'clock has the whole afternoon ruined for him already."
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"Those who are wise won't be busy, and those who are too busy can't be wise."
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"When small men begin to cast big shadows, it means that the sun is about to set."
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"Neckties strangle clear thinking."
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"Hope is like a road in the country; there was never a road, but when many people walk on it, the road comes into existence."
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"The history omankind seems like kite flying; sometimes, when the wind is favorable, we let go the string a little and the kite soars a little higher; sometimes the wind is too rough and we have to lower it a little, and sometimes it gets caught among the tree branches; but to reach the upper strata of pure bliss-ah, perhaps never."
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"So much of unhappiness, it seems to me, is due to nerves; and bad nerves are the result of having nothing to do, or doing a thing badly, unsuccessfully or incompetently. Of all the unhappy people in the world, the unhappiest are those who have not found something they want to do. True happiness comes to those who do their work well, followed by a refreshing period of rest. True happiness comes from the right amount of work for the day."
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"There is so much to love and to admire in this life that it is an act of ingratitude not to be happy and content in this existence."
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"Once Confucius was walking on the mountains and he came across a woman weeping by a grave. He asked the woman what here sorrow was, and she replied, We are a family of hunters. My father was eaten by a tiger. My husband was bitten by a tiger and died. And now my only son! Why don't you move down and live in the valley? Why do you continue to live up here? asked Confucius. And the woman replied, But sir, there are no tax collectors here! Confucius added to his disciples, You see, a bad government is more to be feared than tigers."
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"I have a hankering to go back to the Orient and discard my necktie. Neckties strangle clear thinking."
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"Love is an immortal wound that cannot be closed up. A person loses something, a part of her soul, when she loves someone. And she goes about looking for that lost part of her soul, for she knows that otherwise she is incomplete and cannot be at rest. It is only when she is with the person she loves that she becomes complete again in herself; but the moment he leaves, she loses that part which he has taken with him and knows no rest till she has found him once more."
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"The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials."
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"There is a great probability that our loss of capacity for enjoying the positive joys of life is largely due to the decreased sensibility of our senses and our lack of full use of them. All human happiness is sensuous happiness."
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"I have done my best. That is about all the philosophy of living one needs."
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"The man who has not the habit of reading is imprisoned in his immediate world."
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"Instead of holding on to the Biblical view that we are made in the image of God, we come to realize that we are made in the image of the monkey."
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