Niels Bohr Quotes

Men of ill judgment ignore the good that lies within their hands, till they have lost it.

I stood there and stared, into the sky and at the city around me. I stood, hands at my side, and I saw what had happened to me and who I was and the way things would always be for me. Truth. There was no more wishing, or wondering. I knew who I was, and what I would always do. I believed it, as my teeth touched and my eyes were overrun.

But it was equally clear to her that this was her fate, that she had called its name and it had come to her, and she could do nothing now but own it.

I'm interested in characters who should know better, who know they should give up, move on, accept life as it is, with all its constraints - life, death, time - but don't.

We shall not grow wiser before we learn that much that we have done was very foolish.

The turning point really is just knowing you're an imbecile.

Ignorant men don't know what good they hold in their hands until they've flung it away.

You can have immediate regrets, but if you look at stuff and say, 'Things happen for a reason', there's a fatalistic thing about it. Something will happen that will justify it in some way.

Whether you like it or not, you're forced to come to the realisation that death is out there. But I don't fear death, I'm a fatalist. I believe when it's your time, that's it. It's the hand you're dealt.

The hardest thing to see is what is in front of your eyes.

If nothing else I have become an expert on fate.

And what is writ is writ - / Would it were worthier!

What must be shall be.

That what will come, and must come, shall come well.

And no matter what, there's not one thing in this world *or* the next that we can do or hope or guess at or wish or pray that can change it or help it one iota. Because whatever is, is. That's all. And all there is now is to be ready for it, strong enough for it, whatever it may be. That's all. That's all that matters. It's all that matters because it's all that's possible.

I say, "Look, I'm here now. There must be a reason I'm here." If that's fatalistic, be that as it may. Where my work is, is where my life is, and if we're falling in the ocean, we're falling into the ocean.

...life is in Fate's hands now. You made your choice to stay... it's too late to change that, so stop agonizing over it.... You're making my scales itch. Saphira, from "Eragon

Wish that everything should come about just as it does.

There's a lot of idiots in the world, so live with it.

...this is the way fate usually treats us, it's right there behind us, it has already reached out a hand to touch us on the shoulder while we're still muttering to ourselves, It's all over, that's it, who cares anyhow.

It's no use crying over spilt milk, because all of the forces of the universe were bent on spilling it.

Man is better without knowledge of things to come, for what is to be will be, and man can neither avert nor hasten. It is better to go in the dark when the road must pass a lion and there is no other road.

I made no more protests. What was the use of struggling against fate

Clip your year-end column and put it away for 10 years. See if you don’t feel like an idiot when you reread it.

Do you ever wonder why things have to turn out the way they do?