Best 424 quotes in «cynical quotes» category

We saw too much beauty to be cynical, felt too much joy to be dismissive, climbed too many mountains to be quitters, kissed too many girls to be deceivers, saw too many sunrises not to be believers, broke too many strings to be pro's and gave too much love to be concerned where it goes.

We tolerate shapes in human beings that would horrify us if we saw them in a horse.

What a liberal really wants is to bring about change that will not in any way endanger his position.

What does not kill you will make you stronger and more cynical.

Whatever politicians, activists and manipulators propose, it is the phlegmatic, indifferent, ingrained electorate which disposes.

What I'm trying to do is deliver results, not promises; results, not vision; results, not concepts. The world is cynical about IBM's promises.

What's worse: a president who is very faithful to an ideology that you find extreme, or a president who is very cynical and appears to have no ideology at all? Neither one of those things is great.

What is love but a second-hand emotion?

What passes for hip cynical transcendence of sentiment is really some kind of fear of being really human, since to be really human [...] is probably to be unavoidably sentimental and naïve and goo-prone and generally pathetic.

What we Americans go through to pick a president is not only crazy and unnecessary but genuinely abusive. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent in a craven, cynical effort to stir up hatred and anger on both sides.

When the king asked him what he meant by infesting the sea, the pirate defiantly replied: The same as you do when you infest the whole world; but because I do it with a little ship I am called a robber, and because you do it with a great fleet, you are an emperor.

When a Cabinet Minister who is sacked for telling lies is re-appointed, in the face of every constitutional convention, only for the same man to be sacked again from the same Cabinet for the same offence by the same Prime Minister – no wonder the public are cynical about politics.

When a man speaks of the need for realism one may be sure that this is always the prelude to some bloody deed.

When people get cynical about love, they should look at us [Yoko and John Lennon] and see it is possible

You have to find some way to not become a cynical or negative person, a person who keeps walking around and opening your eyes in the outside world but inside you close down, a person who stops expecting tomorrow to be better than today.

With a lot of the movies that I've done, they've been both dramas and comedies from Shanghai Noon to Billy Bob Thornton's second movie, Daddy and Them, to just a bunch of movies that I have done have been comic, and they're usually from a cynical kind of pessimistic point of view which is probably my sense of humor, and this is a part of myself in everybody that I play.

Wonder is very necessary in life. When we're little kids, we're filled with wonder for the world - it's fascinating and miraculous. A lot of people lose that. They become cynical and jaded, especially in modern day society. Magic renews that wonder.

Yeah, it's pretty hard not to be completely cynical these days.

When you have to work with and exist amongst cynical, burned-out personnel on a set, it doesn't matter what you're shooting or how much you're being paid - it's not worth it.

With television, the image has been degenerated, no question. With the internet, commercials... people are much too cynical about image. It's stale. And all over the world, not just America.

You can tell a lot about what a man lacks by watching what he is cynical about, and many of us are cynical about love.

You know, it's fashionable right now for people to be cynical. We go in cycles like this and right now a lot of people are saying, 'Oh, America is doing terribly' and 'What are we going to do?'

You know, the cynicism that is in the politics, it is not for my soul. It makes me - out of me, an extremely bitter, cynical person that I hate to see in the mirror, really.

You may be sure that when a man begins to call himself a realist he is preparing to do something that he is secretly ashamed of doing.

You made one mistake. You married me.

A cynic always focuses on problems and not on possibilities.

You may have good relationships and you may have bad. You just have to roll with it and truly believe, and not be cynical. But, it's hard. You go through four relationships where you're not happy and you've been cheated on, or whatever - and I'm not saying this has happened to me - but you have to still believe.

You must lose a fly to catch a trout.

A cynic is just a wounded romantic.

You seem cynical because you're always talking about that selfish behavior that's dressed up as altruism. It doesn't mean there isn't altruism. It just means that it's harder to make jokes about altruism.

A cynical modification of letting go doesn't bring forgiveness, it's when, once you forgive, will you be able to let go.

Breslin gives me his wise-teacher smile, which is kind and crinkly and would make me feel warm all over if I was dumber than a bag of hair.

A lifetime spent in the study of the history of societies since the dawn of mankind presumably inclined him to skepticism and misgivings in regard to any great scheme, religious or political, that set out to create universal happiness in one fell swoop; what it was more likely to create, in his opinion, was universal misery; and his faith in heaven-sent saviors was hardly greater.

A man is not mature unless he gets a certificate of maturity from a woman.

Are you always so cynical?' said Angelica. 'No,' said Katherine. 'Sometimes I'm asleep.

Being unhappy alone isn't all that much fun, but what's even tougher is playing one's part without forgetting one's lines, coping with other people's compassion, their comments, being there with the right line when they give the cue.

But if my life were to be a movie, it most definitely would not be a romantic comedy – more like a dramatic comedy. A dramedy.

A happy ending. Huh. I thought that was why we were here. Now. Five hundred years into Earth’s future. So we could start over, and live happily-ever-after. It wasn’t turning out that way, was it?

As they talked, West reflected privately that he knew exactly why people confided in Tom Severin, who never muddled an issue with moralizing or judgements, and never tried to change your opinions or talk you out of wanting something. Severin was never shocked by anything. And although he could be frequently disloyal or dishonorable, he was never dishonest. "I'll tell you what your problem is," Severin eventually said. "It's feelings." West paused with a crystal glass of brandy close to his lips. "Do you mean that unlike you, I have them?" "I have feelings too, but I never let them turn into obstacles. If I were in your situation, for example, I would marry the woman I wanted and not worry about what was best for her. And if the children you raise turn out badly, that's their business, isn't it? They'll decide for themselves whether or not they want to be good. Personally, I've always seen more advantage in being bad. Everyone knows the meek won't really inherit the earth. That's why I don't hire meek people." "I hope you're never going to be a father," West said sincerely. "Oh, I will," Severin said. "I have to leave my fortune to someone, after all. I'd rather it be my own offspring- it's the next best thing to leaving it to myself.

At least you pay for them.” “I could support a foundling hospital, and you would applaud my virtue.” “I didn’t expect you to populate your own orphanage,” she said.

Did it ever occur to you that when he told you he would come back he was lying? Many a man has done it. He probably meant no malice – he just did not want to see your tears and pleading. If you find him in Tarras you may not like what you discover. He won't thank you for crossing 'mountain and down' to find him. Life is not like the songs Avalon, tis far less pretty.

Cuando haces una obra de caridad, on en mi caso de solidaridad, te sientes con derecho a ser como eres y tener lo que tienes. Ya pagaste tu impuesto, ¿ajá?

Every man alive is half idiot & half hero. Only heroes could survive in this maelstrom & only idiots would want to.

Do you know what happens when you play a country song backwards? You get your wife back, your dog back and your job back.

Dreams are just lies that we tell ourselves while we're asleep.

George stared at the dove. What would she say if she could speak to him? What would she wish for, for her father? For she, too, had been harmed by a man who had meant to show his utmost love for her. It made George wonder why love was suppose to be such a wonderful thing. As far as he could tell, love was just another excuse for causing pain.

Every time you see a beautiful woman, just remember, somebody else got tired of her shit

He didn't mind, though. He hardly noticed at all. Because that's the thing about hope--when it seems that there's no point in moving, it pushes us so forcefully that we come to feel like we /need/ it to keep going... And that's what hope really is, after all. An anesthetic. Something that takes the sharp edges of reality out of focus just enough that we can keep looking at it, keep moving forward with steps that are guided by the assurance that every inch of ground can't possibly be covered in broken glass. And then when it /is/--- when your feet are left as coiled ribbons of wet skin-- you forget what guided you there in the first place.

Has anybody ever told you you’re a remarkably cynical person?” “I like to think of it as learning from experience.

He could be so cynical. So dry and acidic. As blank as a page. Could he be tender, too?