Merely Quotes

We seek true individuality and the true individuals. But we find them not. For lo, we mortals see what our poor eyes can see; and they, the true individuals, - they belong not to this world of our merely human sense and thought.

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

Successful model? That's a myth. The year I modeled was the most painful year of my life. Editors would always talk to you in the third person as though you were merely a piece of merchandise.

Would you rather have butter or guns? Preparedness makes us powerful. Butter merely makes us fat.

One can be a brother only in something. Where there is no tie that binds men, men are not united but merely lined up.

I look askance at any movement which assists in making the peacemaker among nations merely a national warrior.

Death not merely ends life, it also bestows upon it a silent completeness, snatched from the hazardous flux to which all things human are subject.

Hence, even in the domain of natural science the aid of the experimental method becomes indispensable whenever the problem set is the analysis of transient and impermanent phenomena, and not merely the observation of persistent and relatively constant objects.

Men are by nature merely indifferent to one another; but women are by nature enemies.

Good means not merely not to do wrong, but rather not to desire to do wrong.

It is not enough to merely defend democracy. To defend it may be to lose it; to extend it is to strengthen it. Democracy is not property; it is an idea.

Good manners have much to do with the emotions. To make them ring true, one must feel them, not merely exhibit them.

The only difference between doctors and lawyers is that lawyers merely rob you, whereas doctors rob you and kill you, too.

Many a man who thinks to found a home discovers that he has merely opened a tavern for his friends.

To be in love is merely to be in a state of perceptual anesthesia - to mistake an ordinary young woman for a goddess.

To the soldier, luck is merely another word for skill.

Money and success don't change people; they merely amplify what is already there.

In baseball, democracy shines its clearest. The only race that matters is the race to the bag. The creed is the rule book. And color, merely something to distinguish one team's uniform from another's.

If you knew that your life was merely a phase or short, short segment of your entire existence, how would you live? Knowing nothing 'real' was at risk, what would you do? You'd live a gigantic, bold, fun, dazzling life. You know you would. That's what the ghosts want us to do - all the exciting things they no longer can.

Children with Hyacinth's temperament don't know better as they grow older; they merely know more.

Ambition never is in a greater hurry that I; it merely keeps pace with circumstances and with my general way of thinking.

To boast of a performance which I cannot beat is merely stupid vanity. And if I can beat it that means there is nothing special about it. What has passed is already finished with. What I find more interesting is what is still to come.

A melody is not merely something you can hum.

Barry seems to be more flamboyant merely because he gets more interviews to talk about it.

My point is, if you want to achieve anything in life, it is not enough to merely wish for it. You must develop that kind of 4:30 AM discipline that distinguishes you from others.

A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled one is truly vanquished.

She did not admire him any more than she had. It was merely that she considered him the Lesser of two evils.

Creativity is not merely the innocent spontaneity of our youth and childhood; it must also be married to the passion of the adult human being, which is a passion to live beyond one's death.

The mind has exactly the same power as the hands; not merely to grasp the world, but to change it.

I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive.