Today's Words of Wisdom - October 31, 2015

Today is the birthday of the following people:

John Keats (1795 – 1821):

“Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?”

and

“Give me books, French wine, fruit, fine weather and a little music played out of doors by somebody I do not know.”

and

“I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart’s affections and the truth of the Imagination.”

and

“A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”

and

“The poetry of the earth is never dead.”

and

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,'--that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

Ad Rock (1966 - ):

"But make no mistakes and switch up my channel

I'm Buddy Rich when I fly off the handle

What could it be, it's a mirage

You're scheming on a thing - that's sabotage."

Larry Mullen, Jr. (1961 - ):

"My drumming career has always been based on a complete lack of expertise."

Peter Jackson (1961 - ):

"Everybody's life has these moments, where one thing leads to another. Some are big and obvious and some are small and seemingly insignificant."

Neal Stephenson (1959 - ):

"The difference between stupid and intelligent people—and this is true whether or not they are well-educated—is that intelligent people can handle subtlety. They are not baffled by ambiguous or even contradictory situations—in fact, they expect them and are apt to become suspicious when things seem overly straightforward."

and

“Nothing is more important than that you see and love the beauty that is right in front of you, or else you will have no defense against the ugliness that will hem you in and come at you in so many ways.”

Katherine Paterson (1932 - ):

“Reading can be a road to freedom or a key to a secret garden, which, if tended, will transform all of life.”

and

“It is not enough to simply teach children to read;

we have to give them something worth reading.

Something that will stretch their imaginations-

something that will help them make sense of their own lives

and encourage them to reach out toward people

whose lives are quite different from their own.”

and

“All of us can think of a book... that we hope none of our children or any other children have taken off the shelf. But if I have the right to remove that book from the shelf - that work I abhor - then you also have exactly the same right and so does everyone else. And then we have no books left on the shelf for any of us.”