Quotes About Compromise

You say eether and I say eyether,You say neether and I say nyther;Eether, eyether, neether, nyther—Let's call the whole thing off!

In almost every marriage there is a selfish and an unselfish partner. A pattern is set up and soon becomes inflexible, of one person always making the demands and one person always giving way.

A pig won't meet another pig halfway, but a man will meet a man.

The notion of the perfect whole, the ultimate solution in which all good things coexist, seems to me not merely unobtainable--that is a truism--but conceptually incoherent. ......Some among the great goods cannot live together. That is a conceptual truth. We are doomed to choose, and every choice may entail an irreparable loss.

The world that we encounter in ordinary experience is one in which we are faced by choices equally absolute, the realisation of some of which must inevitably mean the sacrifice of others.

If an animal has to be sacrificed when a new bridge is built, what will it take to build a whole new world?

He that will have a perfect brother must resign himself to remain brotherless.

Every choice has its obverse, that is to say a renunciation, and so there is no difference between the act of choosing and the act of renouncing.

Perché ogni scelta ha un rovescio cioè una rinuncia, e così non c'è differenza tra l'atto di scegliere e l'atto di rinunciare.

Complete freedom consists of being able to do what you like, provided you also do something you like less.

È libertà completa quella di poter fare ciò che si vuole a patto di fare anche qualche cosa che piaccia meno. La vera schiavitù è la condanna all'astensione: Tantalo e non Ercole.

Before marriage keep your eyes wide open, after marriage keep them half closed.

In trying to remove from Christianity everything that could possibly be objected to in the name of science, in trying to bribe off the enemy by those concessions which the enemy most desires, the apologist has really abandoned what he started out to defend.

Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.

If you wish to live in harmony, you must respect every person and, in non-essential matters, yield!

History is filled with tragic examples of wars that result from diplomatic impasse. Whether in our local communities or in international relations, the skillful use of our communicative capacities to negotiate and resolve differences is the first evidence of human wisdom.

when I see you here amidst all this, I realise that I proposed to a very small part of you. I thought I was giving you a home and a position, but here I see that I am taking you away from so much.

The best way to resolve any problem in the human world is for all sides to sit down and talk.

The aim of argument is differing in order to agree; the failure of argument is when you agree to differ.

You can't win an argument. You can't because if you lose it, you lose it; and if you win it, you lose it.

I don't want to argue with my wife about her car - or my driving.

Politics is made up largely of irrelevancies.

Her husband's foot touches hers, she pulls her foot away. Terrible to flinch from what you once, briefly, loved, or thought you did, or wanted to think you did. But are shackled to, regardless, for life.

Sometimes the threat is so grave, the worst of enemies must become the best of friends.