"The chief want, in every state that I have been into, was a high and earnest purpose in its inhabitants."
Purpose quotes
Purpose
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Purpose quotes (page 44 of 149)
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"But, on more accounts than one, I had had enough of moose-hunting. I had not come to the woods for this purpose, nor had I foreseen it, though I had been willing to learn how the Indian manvred; but one moose killed was as good, if not as bad, as a dozen."
"In those days, when my hands were much employed, I read but little, but the least scraps of paper which lay on the ground, my holder, or tablecloth, afforded me as much entertainment, in fact answered the same purpose as the Iliad."
"For most purposes, a man with a machine is better than a man without a machine."
"But we have to ask ourselves, what's the purpose of the stock market? It's supposed to be a source of capital for growing business. It's lost that purpose."
"When Republicans used reconciliation in 2001 for the Bush tax cuts, they used it to increase the deficit. The whole purpose of reconciliation is for deficit reduction!"
"Nature shaped the claw to trap, and the tooth to kill, but the thorn...the thorn's only purpose is to hurt."
"It is the vain endeavor to make ourselves what we are not that has strewn history with so many broken purposes and lives left in the rough."
"A marciful Providunce fashioned us holler O' purpose thet we might our principles swaller."
"If I have sometimes seemed to make fun of Woman, I assure you it has only been for the purpose of egging her on."
"Man would sooner have the Void for his purpose than be void of Purpose."
"Moral sensibilities are nowadays at such cross-purposes that to one man a morality is proved by its utility, while to another its utility refutes it."
"For the purpose of knowledge we must know how to make use of the inward current which draws us towards a thing, and also of the current which after a time draws us away from it."
"When I contemplated purpose I also contemplated chance and foolishness."
"We can speak very much to the purpose and yet in such a way that the whole world cries out in contradiction: namely, when we are not speaking to the whole world."
"Whoever thinks much and to good purpose easily forgets his own experiences, but not the thoughts which these experiences have called forth."
"You are good when you are fully awake in your speech, Yet you are not evil when you sleep while your tongue staggers without purpose. And even stumbling speech may strengthen a weak tongue."
"We lose all that time which we might employ better."
"I think that as an individual and as individuals in general, if we can't leave the earth feeling like we left something that someone in the future can use then I don't feel like we've served our purpose on this earth in an effective manner."
"I have a different purpose in writing each novel. Some of them seem more similar than others, but the purposes are always different."