Cynthia Ozick Quotes

A true history of human events would show that a far larger proportion of our acts are the result of sudden impulse and accident than of that reason of which we so much boast.

Inconsistency is the only thing in which men are consistent.

History sometimes makes fun of us and our best intentions.

Curious how often you Humans manage to obtain that which you do not want.

If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed.

I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this.

Sometimes I think you do the things you think are best at the time for what you need to take care of, and then just one thing leads to another thing. And one day you're there going, 'How did I get here? It wasn't my ultimate plan, but I'm here.'

You meet people, and you're like, 'I don't know how I feel about you,' and someone does something surprising that changes your mind. We're interesting creatures; we're nuanced, complicated and layered, and we make all sorts of choices.

↑ top up position down The fact that I suspect I'm an asshole means I probably am not, because a real asshole doesn't think he's an asshole, does he? Therefore, by realizing that I'm an asshole, I am in fact negating that very realization, am I not? Descartes's Asshole Axiom: I think I am; therefor I'm not one.

Sex is God's joke on the human race ... if we didn't have sex to make us ridiculous, She would have had to think up something else instead.

That's just how I see things. I think things that are the most dramatic or tragic can also look the most ridiculous and funny. That's part of being human.

If I'm smart then I'll run away, but I'm not so I guess I'll stay

I think through living one's life, one both changes and remains the same. One can see it either way, one can see oneself as being now what one was and one can see oneself as being absolutely different from what one was. It's a trick of thought.

I am skeptical in principle, gullible in practice.

Mankind is made up of inconsistencies, and no man acts invariably up to his predominant character. The wisest man sometimes acts weakly, and the weakest sometimes wisely.

When somebody says I wouldn't change a thing they're thinking of something they would change.

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

If you think anyone is sane you just don't know enough about them.

People are funny. They want the front of the bus, the middle of the road and the back of the church. —Mrs. Miracle

Vices and virtues are of a strange nature, for the more we have, the fewer we think we have.

I suppose it's too bad people can't be a little more consistent. But if they were, maybe they would stop being people.

It strikes me how strange people are. You can see them every day - you can think you know them - and then you fшnd out you hardly know them at all.

I'm a misunderstood genius." "What's misunderstood?" "Nobody thinks I'm a genius.

I don't think much new ever happens. Most of us spend our days the same way people spent their days in the year 1000: walking around smiling, trying to earn enough to eat, while neurotically doing these little self-proofs in our head about how much better we are than these other slobs, while simultaneously, in another part of our brain, secretly feeling woefully inadequate to these smarter, more beautiful people.

One of the persistent ironies of reform is the impossibility of predicting the full consequences of change.