Quotes About Contradiction

You know, there's a thing that stumps me. You're the coldest man I know. And I can't understand why - knowing that you're actually a fiend in your quiet sort of way - why I always feel, when I see you, that you're the most life-giving person I've ever met.

You know, it's such a peculiar thing—our idea of mankind in general. We all have a sort of vague, glowing picture when we say that, something solemn, big and important. But actually all we know of it is the people we meet in our lifetime. Look at them. Do you know any you'd feel big and solemn about? There's nothing but housewives haggling at pushcarts, drooling brats who write dirty words on the sidewalks, and drunken debutantes. Or their spiritual equivalents.

One can't love man without hating most of the creatures who pretend to bear his name. It's one or the other. One doesn't love God and sacrilege impartially.

The irrational is the impossible; it is that which contradicts the facts of reality; facts cannot be altered by a wish, but they can destroy the wisher. If a man desires and pursues contradictions–if he wants to have his cake and eat it, too–he disintegrates his consciousness; he turns his inner life into civil war of blind forces engaged in dark, incoherent, pointless, meaningles conflicts.

The irrational is the impossible; it is that which contradicts the facts of reality; facts cannot be altered by a wish, but they can destroy the wisher. If a man desires and pursues contradictions–if he wants to have his cake and eat it, too–he disintegrates his consciousness; he turns his inner life into civil war of blind forces engaged in dark, incoherent, pointless, meaningless conflicts.

It's the person who would sell his soul for a nickel, who is loudest in proclaiming his hatred of money—and

Her body, sagging limply from her shoulders, contradicted the inflexible precision of the legs; the cold austerity of her face contradicted the pose of her body.

Only the man who extols the purity of a love devoid of desire, is capable of the depravity of a desire devoid of love. But observe that most people are creatures cut in half who keep swinging desperately to one side or to the other.

There are no contradictions. When you think you found one. Check your premises.

she could not pay him the tribute of hostility. He knew that he disliked her violently. But he watched the shape of her mouth, the movements of her lips framing words; he watched the way she crossed her legs, a gesture smooth and exact, like an expensive instrument being folded; and he could not escape the feeling of incredulous admiration he had experienced when he had seen her for the first time.

Glory and tragedy, courage and stupidity - one set of truths didn't negate the other. For war was contradiction, as was the history of America.

Glory and tragedy, courage and stupidity—one set of truths didn't negate the other. For war was contradiction, as was the history of America.

For war was contradiction, as was the history of America.

our actions often contradicted the ideals of democracy, self-determination, and human rights we professed to embody.

Zeke embodied the contradiction of his generation: jaded about the fate of the world, idealistic about personal prospects.

If there was one thing Snake knew about people, it was that once they got attached to a theory, it was hard to get them detached. They'd screen out unhelpful facts, invent favorable ones, and ignore contradictions in their own claims. Look at those Sandy Hook truthers, babbling about false flags and crisis actors and all the rest. When people were motivated enough to believe something, they were going to believe it no matter what.

Why are the most painful memories also the sweetest; why does the sweetness always draw us back no matter how long the pain might have kept us away beforehand? I don't know

According to a survey conducted by Yankelovich Partners, a majority of people want more control over the details of their lives, but a majority of people also want to simplify their lives. There you have it—the paradox of our times.

Yet none of these models actually is hydrogen!

What we like to think of ourselves and what we really are rarely have much in common

If being a grown-up really meant knowing better, why did his father go on smoking three packs of unfiltered cigarettes a day?

The country is an amazing paradox. In other lands, when a man eats to his fullest day after day, that man becomes fat…sleepy…piggish. But in this land…it seems the more you have the more aggressive you become.

The more you find, the wronger it gets.

Getting help from a guy like you is like hiring a pyromaniac to fix the oil-burner.