William Osler Quotes

People are funny, and in the most tragic situations, when comedy erupts from nowhere, it can turn on its head within the space of a second or a minute. You're laughing one minute and you're crying the next and that's just life for me, and that is what people are like.

If all else fails, the character of a man can be recognized by nothing so surely as by a jest which he takes badly.

The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter.

It is quite true, as some poets said, that the God who created man must have had a sinister sense of humor, creating him a reasonable being, yet forcing him to take this ridiculous posture, and driving him with blind craving for this ridiculous performance.

I'm still passionately interested in what my fellow humans are up to. For me, a day spent monitoring the passing parade is a day well-spent.

I'm fascinated by what people will do to each other. Actually, I'm sort of interested in the gory details of life.

The basis of tragedy is man's helplessness against disease, war and death; the basis of comedy is man's helplessness against vanity (the vanity of love, greed, lust, power).

War not only teaches what man can be, but it teaches also what he must not be.

People who take themselves too seriously, who can't see anything else, are usually funny.

I think that people are fascinated with the stories, with human nature and the dark turns it can take.

Military history is essential to understanding any history and, moreover, is a terrifying and sobering study in the realities of human nature - for yes, to me, such a thing exists, and history indeed proves it.

We want to ascribe a kind of tragic grimness to people, but people are funny.

Human beings have become so insensitive to daily life, they don't remember what happened five minutes back.

The center of human nature is rooted in ten thousand ordinary acts of kindness that define our days.

The uniform necessities of human nature produce in a great measure uniformity of life, and for part of the day make one place like another; to dress and to undress, to eat and to sleep, are the same in London as in the country.

Life is not a tragedy, it is a comedy. To be alive means to have a sense of humor.

Madness is a special form of the spirit and clings to all teachings and philosophies, but even more to daily life, since life itself is full of craziness and at bottom utterly illogical. Man strives toward reason only so that he can make rules for himself.

Absurdity is one of the most human things about us: a manifestation of our most advanced and interesting characteristics.

A sense of humor is the one thing no one will admit to not having.

It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.

Human beings do not like to look squarely into the face of tragedy. Gloom is unpopular.

What is ridiculous about human beings, Doctor,' the prince said, 'is actually their total incapacity to be ridiculous

Most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally evil, but by people being fundamentally people.

Life should be taken ironically; otherwise, it becomes a tragedy.

Man is made of ordinary things, and habit is his nurse.