Quotes from Lin Yutang

Love of one's fellowmen should not be a doctrine, an article of faith, a matter of intellectual conviction, or a thesis supported by arguments. The love of mankind which requires reasons is no true love. This love should be perfectly natural, as natural for man as for the birds to flap their wings. It should be a direct feeling, springing naturally from a healthy soul, living in touch with Nature.

With the predominance of economic problems and economic thinking, which is overshadowing all other forms of human thinking, we remain completely ignorant of, and indifferent to, a more humanized knowledge and a more humanized philosophy, a philosophy that deals with the problems of the individual life.

Nothing matters to a man who says nothing matters

Every man must find his own philosophy, his attitude towards life.

A good cook was like a good educator; his duty was solely to bring out the talent of the chicken and show it to best advantage, as a good teacher brings out the talent inherent in a young man. Granted that the original talent was there in the chicken, too much coaxing, stuffing, imposing, and spicing would merely distract from its simple beauty and virtue.

It is difficult to imagine this kind of a new world because our present world is so different. On the whole, our life is too complex, our scholarship too serious, our philosophy too somber, and our thoughts too involved. This seriousness and this involved complexity of our thought and scholarship make the present world such an unhappy one today.

Il n'y a pas de livres en ce monde que chacun devrait lire, il n'y a que des livres qu'une personne devrait lire à un certain moment, dans un certain endroit, dans des circonstances données et à une certaine époque de sa vie. Je crois que la lecture, comme le mariage, est déterminée par le destin.

Reality + Dreams + Humor = Wisdom   So

Reality—Dreams = Animal Being Reality + Dreams = A Heart-Ache (usually called Idealism) Reality + Humor = Realism (also called Conservatism) Dreams—Humor = Fanaticism Dreams + Humor = Fantasy Reality + Dreams + Humor = Wisdom

One dies without regret if there is one in the whole world a "bosom friend," or one who "knows his heart.

The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials.

You have no idea how quickly a girl grows up.

when after a perfect dinner I lounge in an armchair, when there is no one I hate to look at in the company and conversation rambles off at a light pace to an unknown destination, and I am spiritually and physically at peace with the world;

knew as well as any American that America was shipping oil and scrap iron to Tokyo to bomb Chinese women and children.

What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as child? Variant: What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child?

nothing the western nations can do can stop her or keep her down.

We have lost the courage to hope.

The fonder you are of your ideals, the greater your heartbreaks.

my formula for the Chinese national mind is: R4D1H3S3 There

Totisesti on olemassa hetkiä, jolloin elämä on meille liian suurta, jolloin kaikki tyynni on liitossa meitä vastaan pettääkseen ja tuhotakseen toiveemme; silloin ihminen on kuin kulkija, joka on metsässä kadottanut suuntamerkit tai joutunut maanalaiseen luolaan, missä törmää kivimuuriin, kääntyipä minne hyvänsä.

A sabedoria da vida consiste em eliminar o que não é essencial.

that it is not when he is working in the office but when he is lying idly on the sand that his soul utters, "Life is beautiful

The result is a constant, unintelligent elaboration of the Chinaman as a stage fiction, which is as childish as it is untrue and with which the West is so familiar, and a continuation of the early Portuguese sailors' tradition minus the sailors' obscenity of language, but with essentially the same sailors' obscenity of mind.

Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials.