James M. Barrie quotes
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“The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking what one does.”
-- James M. BarrieSource : Source: souljourns.net
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“Those who bring sunshine into the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.”
-- James M. BarrieSource : "Christ's Second Coming Fulfilled". Book by Marion Morris, 1917.
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“Nothing is really work unless you would rather be doing something else.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“If you cannot teach me to fly, teach me to sing.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“We should be slower to think that the man at his worst is the real man, and certain that the better we are ourselves the less likely is he to be at his worst in our company. Every time he talks away his own character before us he is signifying contempt for ours.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The most useless are those who never change through the years.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“I'm youth, I'm joy, I'm a little bird that has broken out of the egg.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Never ascribe to an opponent motives meaner than your own.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The best place a person can die, is where they die for others.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“There are few more impressive sights in the world than a Scotsman on the make.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“As soon as you can say what you think and not what some other person has thought for you, you are on the way to being a remarkable man.”
-- James M. BarrieSource : James M. Barrie (2013). “Tommy And Grizel (Annotated Edition)”, p.25, Jazzybee Verlag
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“For several days after my first book was published, I carried it about in my pocket and took surreptitious peeps at it to make sure the ink had not faded.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Do you know," Peter asked, "why swallows build in the eaves of houses? It is to listen to the stories.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Let no one who loves be unhappy, even love unreturned has its rainbow.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.”
-- James M. BarrieSource : Rectorial Address at St Andrew's, 3 May 1922, in The Times 4 May 1922
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“Do you believe in fairies? Say quick that you believe. If you believe, clap your hands!”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The praise that comes from love does not make us vain, but more humble.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Shall we make a new rule of life from tonight: always to try to be a little kinder than is necessary?”
-- James M. BarrieSource : James M. Barrie (2013). “The Little White Bird (Annotated Edition)”, p.32, Jazzybee Verlag
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“A woman can be anything the man who loves her would have her be.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Dreams do come true, if we only wish hard enough, You can have anything in life if you will sacrifice everything else for it.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“We are all failures - at least the best of us are.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“His lordship may compel us to be equal upstairs, but there will never be equality in the servants' hall.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Ambition it is the last infirmity of noble minds.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“When the first baby laughed for the first time, the laugh broke into a thousand pieces and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Every time you say you don't believe in fairies, a fairy dies.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“The difference between him and the other boys at such a time was that they knew it was make-believe, while to hime make-believe and true were exactly the same thing. This sometimes troubled them, as when they had to make-believe that they had had their dinners.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“It may have been quixotic, but it was magnificent.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“When ladies used to come to me in dreams, I said, 'Pretty mother, pretty mother.' But when at last she really came, I shot her.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“One's religion is whatever he is most interested in.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“I am not young enough to know everything.”
-- James M. BarrieSource : The Admirable Crichton (performed 1902, pubd. 1914) act 1
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“You must have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by; but some of them are golden only because we let them slip by.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“You just think lovely wonderful thoughts," Peter explained, "and they lift you up in the air.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Would you like an adventure now, or would like to have your tea first?”
-- James M. BarrieSource : "Peter Pan: Top 100 Classic Novels".
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“But the years came and went without bringing the careless boy; and when they met again Wendy was a married woman, and Peter was no more to her than a little dust in the box in which she had kept her toys.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Mrs. Darling: There are many different kinds of bravery. There's the bravery of thinking of others before one's self. Now, your father has never brandished a sword nor fired a pistol, thank heavens. But he has made many sacrifices for his family, and put away many dreams. Michael: Where did he put them? Mrs. Darling: He put them in a drawer. And sometimes, late at night, we take them out and admire them. But it gets harder and harder to close the drawer... He does. And that is why he is brave.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“I think it's perfectly lovely the way you talk about girls...”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Girls are much too clever to fall out of their prams”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Love, it is said, is blind, but love is not blind. It is an extra eye, which shows us what is most worthy of regard. To see the best is to see most clearly, and it is the lover's privilege.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Some day,' said Smee, 'the clock will run down, and then he'll get you.' Hook wetted his dry lips, 'Aye,' he said, 'that's the fear that haunts me.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“No, no," Mr. Darling always said, "I am responsible for it all. I, George Darling, did it. MEA CULPA, MEA CULPA." He had had a classical education.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“I'll teach you how to jump on the wind's back, and then away we go.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“He looked at her uncomfortably; blinking, you know, like one not sure whether he was awake or asleep.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“All of this has happened before, and it will all happen again.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“I suppose it's like the ticking crocodile, isn't it? Time is chasing after all of us.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Peter invented, with Wendy's help, a new game that fascinated him enormously, until he suddenly had no more interest in it, which, as you have been told, was what always happened with his games. It consisted in pretending not to have adventures...”
-- James M. Barrie -
“...it was like an examination paper that asks grammar, when what you want to be asked is Kings of England.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“It was dreadful the way all the three were looking at him, just as if they did not admire him.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“They were going round and round the island, but they did not meet because all were going at the same rate.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Mr. Darling used to boast to Wendy that her mother not only loved him but respected him. He was one of those deep ones who know about stocks and shares. Of course no one really knows, but he quite seemed to know, and he often said stocks were up and shares were down in a way that would have made any woman respect him.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Most disquieting reflection of all, was it not bad form to think about good form?”
-- James M. Barrie -
“They knew in what they called their hearts that one can get on quite well without a mother, and that it is only the mothers who think you can't.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Growing up is such a barbarous business, full of inconvenience... and pimples.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Years rolled on again, and Wendy had a daughter. This ought not to be written in ink but in a golden splash.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“If he thought at all, but I don't believe he ever thought, it was that he and his shadow, when brought near each other, would join like drops of water...”
-- James M. Barrie -
“A moment after the fairy's entrance the window was blown open by the breathing of the little stars, and Peter dropped in.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Peter: Oh, the cleverness of me. Wendy: Of course, I did nothing... Peter: You did a little. Wendy: Oh, the cleverness of you.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“See," he said, "the arrow struck against this. It is the kiss I gave her. It has saved her life.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Again came that ringing crow, and Peter dropped in front of them. "Greeting, boys," he cried, and mechanically they saluted, and then again was silence. He frowned. "I am back," he said hotly, "why do you not cheer?”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“i know i'm not clever but i'm always right.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Absence makes the heart grow fonder… or forgetful.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“After you have been unfair to him he will love you again, but he will never afterwards be quite the same boy. No one ever gets over the first unfairness; no one except Peter.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“He was a little boy, and she was grown up. She huddled by the fire not daring to move, helpless and guilty, a big woman.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“All are keeping a sharp look-out in front, but none suspects that the danger may be creeping up from behind.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Strength instead of being the lusty child of passion, grows by grappling with and subduing them.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Courage: The lovely virtue-the rib of Himself that God sent down to His children.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Always be kinder than necessary.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“The gates of heaven are so easily found when we are little, and they are always standing open to let children wander in.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“You canna expect to be baith grand and comfortable.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“I like well to be in the company of explorers”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The man who is in real danger is the man who thinks he is perfectly safe.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Dreams do come true, if we only wish hard enough.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The best of our fiction is by novelists who allow that it is as good as they can give, and the worst by novelists who maintain that they could do much better if only the public would let them.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“What is genius? It is the power to be a boy again at will.”
-- James M. BarrieSource : James M. Barrie (2013). “Tommy And Grizel (Annotated Edition)”, p.166, Jazzybee Verlag
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“It's a sort of bloom on a woman. If you have it, you don't need to have anything else, and if you don't have it, it doesn't much matter what else you have. Some women, the few, have charm for all; and most have charm for one. But some have charm for none.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“How shall we ever know if it's morning if there's no servant to pull up the blinds?”
-- James M. Barrie -
“You find a glimmer of happiness in this world, there's always someone who wants to destroy it.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“You [Scots] come of a race of men the very wind of whose name has swept to the ultimate seas.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Have you noticed that many jewels make women either incredibly fat or incredibly thin?”
-- James M. Barrie -
“May God blast anyone who writes a biography of me.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“All great writers begin with a good leather binding and a respectable title.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Wise children always choose a mother who was a shocking flirt in her maiden days, and so had several offers before she accepted their fortunate papa.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Anything is possible if you wish hard enough.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“A loving wife is better than making 50 in cricket, or even 99, beyond that I will not go.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Oh the gladness of their gladness when they're glad, And the sadness of their sadness when they're sad; But the gladness of their gladness, and the sadness of their sadness, Are as nothing to their badness when they're bad”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Forget not your past, for in the future it may help you grow”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Them that has china plates themsel's is the maist careful not to break the china plates of others”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The man of science appears to be the only man who has something to say just now, and the only man who does not know how to say it.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“Has it ever struck you that trout bite best on the Sabbath? God's critters tempting decent men.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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“Times have changed since a certain author was executed for murdering his publisher. They say that when the author was on the scaffold he said good-bye to the minister and to the reporters, and then he saw some publishers sitting in the front row below, and to them he did not say good-bye. He said instead, "I'll see you again."”
-- James M. Barrie -
“They hold their great balls in the open air, in what is called a fairy-ring. For weeks afterward you can see the ring on the grass. It is not there when they begin, but they make it by waltzing round and round. Sometimes you will find mushrooms inside the ring, and these are fairy chairs that the servants have forgotten to clear away. The chairs and the rings are the only tell-tale marks these little people leave behind them, and they would remove even these were they not so fond of dancing that they toe it till the very moment of the opening of the gates.”
-- James M. Barrie -
“The Elizabethan age might be better named the beginning of the smoking era..”
-- James M. Barrie -
“I am aware that those hateful persons called Original Researchers now maintain that Raleigh was not the man; but to them I turn a deaf ear.”
-- James M. Barrie -
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