Quotes About Identity

Am I then more of an American than those who drew their first breath on American Ground?

On what rests the hope of the republic? One country, one language, one flag!

Somehow, by some accident, he had been lost on a planet that was not his own.

It's not enough to be Hungarian, you must have talent too.

The modern individual is committed to being successful, not to being a person. He belongs rightly to the 'action generation' whose motto is 'do more but feel less.

Few people in our culture have the courage to be themselves. Most people adopt roles, play games, wear masks, or put up facades.

And we need to know what it is to be human, if we are to avoid becoming narcissists.

Once we give up our true self to play a role, we are fated to be rejected because we have already rejected ourselves. Yet we will struggle to make the role more successful, hoping to overcome our fate but finding ourselves more enmeshed in it. We are caught in a vicious cycle that keeps closing in, diminishing our life and being.

The modern individual is committed to being successful, not to being a person.

Rich or poor, high or low, all men are equal in sin. There are surface differences and degrees, but a deep identity beneath. So on the same principle all souls are of the same value. Here is the true democracy of Christianity. So there is one ransom for all, for the need of all is identical. III.

Sometimes, I think I'm the child of the Devil. Honestly, I do believe that. I've invited the Devil in, and now I can't get him out. I've tried burning him out and cutting him out and he don't take no notice. Why should he? He doesn't want to be homeless. He's got me. Little, skinny, violent me.

A person can write five million words about itself, and forget to tell you its name. Or its sex. People don't include obvious identifiers in diaries: things such as what they're called or where their home is. They are simply 'I' who lives.

It's a question I often ask myself: what would I do with me? And I don't know the answer. I don't know what I'd do, except run away.

It seems to me that we're in danger of losing sight of certain basic civic values in society by allowing the growth of a whole generation of people who really have no sense of attachment to society.

every man has a map in his heart of his own country and that the heart will never allow you to forget this map. (p. 18)

I am just a tiny person in Africa, but there is a place for me, and for everybody, to sit down on this earth and touch it and call it their own.

We don't forget.... Our heads may be small, but they are as full of memories as the sky may sometimes be full of swarming bees, thousands and thousands of memories, of smells, of places, of little things that happened to us and which came back, unexpectedly, to remind us who we are.

I am his Highness' dog at Kew;Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?

Most women have no characters at all.

That true self-love and social are the same.

On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.

Know thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man.

The bodkin, comb, and essence to prepare?   For this your locks in paper durance bound,   For this with tort'ring irons wreath'd around? 100   For this with fillets strain'd your tender head,   And bravely bore the double loads of lead?

I am his Highness' dog at Kew; Pray tell me sir, whose dog are you?