Neal Shusterman Quotes

When you say you agree to a thing in principle you mean that you have not the slightest intention of carrying it out in practice.

I've heard lots of people lie to themselves but they never fool anyone.

It is one of the peculiar truths of life that people often say things that they know full well are ridiculous.

People are never more sincere than when they assume their own moral superiority.

Friends make pretence of following to the grave but before one is in it, their minds are turned and making the best of their way back to life and living people and things they understand.

Hypocrisy is nothing, in fact, but a horrible hopefulness.

We fell morally ill because we became used to saying something different from what we thought.

There is nothing in the world more difficult than candor, and nothing easier than flattery. If there is a hundredth of a fraction of a false note to candor, it immediately produces dissonance, and as a result, exposure. But in flattery, even if everything is false down to the last note, it is still pleasant, and people will listen not without pleasure; with coarse pleasure, perhaps, but pleasure nevertheless.

We sometimes imagine we hate flattery, but we only hate the way we are flattered.

It’s amazing what lies people can sustain behind the mask of their real faces.

When politeness is used to show up other people, it is reclassified as rudeness. Thus it is technically impossible to be too polite.

We often shed tears that deceive ourselves after deceiving others.

He hath great neede of a foole, that plaies the foole himselfe.

Self-deception is nature; hypocrisy is art.

The inside is packed with people. Lots of them crowding the bar, passing drinks back for people to carry to tables. A bunch of guys are pouring shots of vodka. "To Zacharov!" one toasts. "To open hearts and open bars!" calls another. "And open legs," says Anton.

All my adult life I've been in the practice of giving advice to people who are happier than I am.

You can be the smartest person in the world - which Bill Clinton is, and if he's not, his wife is - and care more than anybody else in the world - which he does, I don't doubt that for a minute. And you can care so much that you're willing to be dishonest - you can tell people one thing but do another because you really know it's for their own good. And you'll still screw it all up. Because the whole premise of what you're doing is wrong!

don't you hate people who say they're not complaining and then complain?

The reason we are so pleased to find other people's secrets is that it distracts public attention from our own.

People who repress desires often turn, suddenly, into hypocrites.

Ordinary fools are all right; you can talk to them, and try to help them out. But pompous fools-guys who are fools and are covering it all over and impressing people as to how wonderful they are with all this hocus pocus-THAT, I CANNOT STAND! An ordinary fool isn't a faker; an honest fool is all right. But a dishonest fool is terrible!

I have no use for people who exhibit manners.

When he admitted this to me, I found myself almost annoyed. It was as if he'd hidden this part of himself in order to deceive me, pretending-- as do many people I've discovered--to be what he is not. No one I've ever known is what he appears to be on the surface.

The rain probably dampened the spirits of those that decided not to come. But the people who were here didn't know it was raining because they were having so much fun.

No mention of God. They keep Him up their sleeves for as long as they can, vicars do. They know it puts people off.