Mignon McLaughlin Quotes - Page 10

Acedia is not in every dictionary; just in every heart.

If you jot down every silly thought that pops into your mind, you will soon find out everything you most seriously believe.

Many are saved from sin by being so inept at it.

Despair is anger with no place to go.

Puritans will never believe it, but life is full of disagreeable things that aren't even good for you.

Age is a slowing down of everything except fear.

Our strength is often composed of the weakness that we're damned if we're going to show.

If you're a gifted flirt, talking about the price of eggs will do as well as any other subject.

Those who are brutally honest are seldom so with themselves.

We come late, if at all, to wine and philosophy: whiskey and action are easier.

Be glad that you're greedy; the national economy would collapse if you weren't.

Your children tell you casually years later what it would have killed you with worry to know at the time.

If you see in your children most of your own faults, you have failed as a parent, but succeeded as a neurotic.

Neurotics make poor patriots; if you're ashamed of something as big as yourself, it's hard to be proud of something as small as your country.

We are irritated by rascals, intolerant of fools, and prepared to love the rest. But where are they?

Learn a little of anything, and you're ready to proselytize.

In retrospect, our triumphs could as easily have happened to someone else; but our defeats are uniquely our own.

My doctor is nice; every time I see him, I'm ashamed of what I think of doctors in general.

No matter how brilliantly an idea is stated, we will not really be moved unless we have already half thought of it ourselves.

The way the neurotic sees it: bars on his door mean that he's locked in; bars on your door mean that he's locked out.

The neurotic doesn't know how to cope with his emotional bills; some he keeps paying over and over, others he never pays at all.

One day you are an apprentice, and everybody's pet; the next, you are coldly expected to deliver. There is never sufficient warning that the second day is coming.

Neurotics are anxiety prone, accident prone, and often just prone.

The only mothers it is safe to forget on Mother's Day are the good ones.

If the pain wanders, do not waste your time with doctors.