"I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind."

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More quotes from: George Bernard Shaw

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• "Alcohol is the anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life. "
• "All censorships exist to prevent any one from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All ..."
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• "An election is a moral horror, as bad as a battle except for the blood; ..."
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• "An index is a great leveller. "
• "Animals are my friends... and I don't eat my friends. "
• "Assassination is the extreme form of censorship. "
• "Baseball has the great advantage over cricket of being sooner ended. "
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• "Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance. "
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• "Choose silence of all virtues, for by it you hear other men's imperfections, and conceal ..."
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• "Crude classifications and false generalizations are the curse of organized life. "
• "Cruelty would be delicious if one could only find some sort of cruelty that didn't ..."
• "Dancing is a perpendicular expression of a horizontal desire. "
• "Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve. "
• "Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment ..."
• "Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few. "
• "Do not do unto others as you expect they should do unto you. Their tastes ..."
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• "England and America are two countries separated by the same language. "
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• "Everything happens to everybody sooner or later if there is time enough. "
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• "Fashions are the only induced epidemics, proving that epidemics can be induced by tradesmen. "
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• "Few of us have vitality enough to make any of our instincts imperious. "
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• "Forgive him, for he believes that the customs of his tribe are the laws of ..."
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• "If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples ..."
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• "Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you ..."
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• "It is a curious sensation: the sort of pain that goes mercifully beyond our powers ..."
• "It is dangerous to be sincere unless you are also stupid. "
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• "It is most unwise for people in love to marry. "
• "It is the mark of a truly intelligent person to be moved by statistics. "
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• "Lack of money is the root of all evil. "
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• "The British soldier can stand up to anything except the British War Office. "
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• "The natural term of the affection of the human animal for its offspring is six ..."
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• "The only service a friend can really render is to keep up your courage by ..."
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• "The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and ..."
• "The perfect love affair is one which is conducted entirely by post. "
• "The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react. "
• "The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got ..."
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• "The secret of being miserable is to have leisure to bother about whether you are ..."
• "The seven deadly sins... food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes,respectability and children. Nothing can lift those ..."
• "The test of a man or woman's breeding is how they behave in a quarrel. "
• "The things most people want to know about are usually none of their business. "
• "The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the ..."
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• "The truth is, hardly any of us have ethical energy enough for more than one ..."
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• "There are only two classes in good society in England: the equestrian classes and the ..."
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• "There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it. "
• "There is no sincerer love than the love of food. "
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• "Use your health, even to the point of wearing it out. That is what it ..."
• "Very few people can afford to be poor. "
• "Virtue is insufficient temptation. "
• "Vivisection is a social evil because if it advances human knowledge, it does so at ..."
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• "We are made wise not by the recollection of our past, but by the responsibility ..."
• "We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing. "
• "We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth ..."
• "We learn from experience that men never learn anything from experience. "
• "We must always think about things, and we must think about things as they are, ..."
• "What Englishman will give his mind to politics as long as he can afford to ..."
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• "When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that ..."
• "When I was young, I observed that nine out of ten things I did were ..."
• "When our relatives are at home, we have to think of all their good points ..."
• "When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, ..."
• "Which painting in the National Gallery would I save if there was a fire? The ..."
• "Why should we take advice on sex from the pope? If he knows anything about ..."
• "Why, except as a means of livelihood, a man should desire to act on the ..."
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• "You are going to let the fear of poverty govern you life and your reward ..."
• "You can always tell an old soldier by the inside of his holsters and cartridge ..."
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• "You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human ..."
• "Youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children. "
• "Youth is wasted on the young. "