Mere Quotes

The historical approach to understanding of scientific fact is what differentiates the scholar in science from the mere experimenter.

By the mere fact that we do not go forward, we go backward.

Where the citizen uses a mere sliver or board, the pioneer uses the whole trunk of a tree.

Intelligence increases mere physical ability one half. The use of the head abridges the labor of the hands.

In the mere concept of one thing it cannot be found any character of its existence.

... where does strength come from? It is not muscle strength any more. It is not also mere intellectual strength. What is strength? Strength is the support of the people.

Much of our love is confined to mere lip service and dreams of good deeds accomplished, but true love must be expressed in unselfish acts of kindness that bring others closer to our Heavenly Father.

There are absolute atheists ... Absolute atheism is in no way a mere absence of belief in God. It is rather a refusal of God, a fight against God, a challenge to God.

New York was no mere city. It was instead an infinitely romantic notion.

Mere physical growing up, mere mastery of the bare necessities of subsistence will not suffice to reproduce the life of the group. Deliberate effort and the taking of thoughtful pains are required.

I didn't like the sound of people gasping at the mere mention of my name. It horrified me...

His life, measured in space and time, will take up a mere few lines, which my ignorance will abbreviate further.

In fact I'm in too much of a mental muddle to know where I am - an idealist or not. I'm a mere man of letters, and I do what I can with those subjects.

Teenagers are like cats - they have important business that doesn't involve mere humans.

Until 1986, developing games was a mere hobby for me. Back then, I didn't know that game designers existed, because the designers' names didn't appear on the boxes.

Life does not have meaning through mere existence or acquisition or fun. The meaning of life is inherent in the connections we make to others through honor and obligation.

This item is a mere fleabite in the ocean of our expenditure.

Writers are not mere copyists of language; they are polishers, embellishers, perfecters. They spend hours getting the timing right so that what they write sounds completely unrehearsed.

I could never put anything into a picture that wasn't actually there in front of me. That would be a pointless lie, a mere bit of artfulness.

There is sufficient reward in the mere consciousness of a good action.

[The Bible is] a mass of fables and traditions, mere mythology.

The word "art" does not designate the concept of a mere eventuality; it is a concept of rank.

Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battlefield besides, is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point.

I refuse to accept the idea that man is mere flotsam and jetsam in the river of life, unable to influence the unfolding events which surround him.

Emptiness is not a mere emptiness, but rather fullness in which the distinctiveness of everything is throughly realized.

Saying "I feel guilty" is a mere form of words. Saying "I feel ashamed" is not.

Very little evidence was found that any individual fund was able to do significantly better than that which we expected from mere random chance.

Let the efforts of us all, prove that he [Martin Luther King] was not a mere dreamer when he spoke of the beauty of genuine brotherhood and peace being more precious than diamonds or silver or gold

We hew and saw and plane facts to make them dovetail with our prejudices, so that they become mere ornaments with which to parade our objectivity.

I admit that the eyes of the intellectually and culturally lively tend to glaze over at the mere mention of sociology, often with ample justification.

... for the modern soul, for which it is mere child's play to bridge oceans and continents, there is nothing so impossible as to find the contact with the souls dwelling just around the corner.

There's some end at last for the man who follows a path; mere rambling is interminable.

The mind can store an estimated ioo trillion bits of information compared with which a computer's mere billions are virtually amnesiac.

Humor is the fastest, fleetest way of giving -it can change pain to joy in a mere millisecond.

A couple in love walking along the banks of the Seine are, in real fact, a couple in love walking along the banks of the Seine, not mere particles in motion.

Pleasures seem solid in their pursuit; but are mere clouds in the enjoyment.

The metaphysical insanities of Athanasius, of Loyola, and of Calvin, are, to my understanding, mere lapses into polytheism, differing from paganism only by being more unintelligible.

The sea was not freedom; it was a likeness of freedom, a symbol of freedom...How splendid freedom must be if a mere likeness of it, a mere reminder of it, is enough to fill a man with happiness.

The only real number is one, the rest are mere repetition

Shares are not mere pieces of paper. They represent part ownership of a business. So, when contemplating an investment, think like a prospective owner.

All zeal for a reform, that gives offence To peace and charity, is mere pretence.

I have no way and therefore want no eyes I stumbled when I saw. Full oft 'tis seen our means secure us, and our mere defects prove our commodities.

Lady of the Mere, Sole-sitting by the shores of old romance.

Self is the opaque veil that hides the Face of God from us. It can be removed only in spiritual experience, never by mere instruction.

Seeing well transforms mere existence into the art of living.

Mere exactitude, of which photography and moulage [life casting] are the lowest forms, does not inspire feelings.

If Christians would have the same faith in their God that non-Christians have in a mere materialistic idea, 'Thy Kingdom come' would shortly be a reality in this world of sorrow and travail.

Either be a true friend or a mere stranger: a true friend will delight to do good--a mere stranger will do no harm.

And yet, unless my senses deceive me, the old centuries had, and have, powers of their own which mere 'modernity' cannot kill.

If there ever comes a day when the Saints interfere with the rights of others to live as they see fit, you can know with assurance that the Church is no longer led by a Prophet, but a mere man.