If I decide to be an idiot, then I'll be an idiot on my own accord.
Art is not a mirror but an icon. It takes the chaos in which we live and shows us structure and pattern, not the structure of conformity which imprisons but the structure which liberates, sets us free to become growing, mature human beings.
One must never forbid oneself anything. One must also be able to go back, one must always be able to change.
. . . virtue is not merely a state in conformity with the right principle, but one that implies the right principle; and the right principle in moral conduct is prudence.
We must assess our thoughts and beliefs and reckon whether they are moving us closer to conformity to Christ or farther away from it.
Mathematics takes us into the region of absolute necessity, to which not only the actual word, but every possible word, must conform.
I must say to myself that I ruined myself, and that nobody great or small can be ruined except by his own hand. I am quite ready to say so. . . . Terrible as was what the world did to me, what I did to myself was far more terrible still.
The eager and often inconsiderate appeals of reformers and revolutionists are indispensable to counterbalance the inertia and fossilism marking so large a part of human institutions.
Today, whether it is a student who holds a sit-in to get the army recruiters off his campus, or the mother of a dead soldier who refuses to leave the front gate of the president's ranch, we continue to be saved by brave people who risk ridicule and rejection but end up turning huge tides of public opinion in the direction of righteousness. We owe them enormous debts of gratitude. It is not easy to stand up for what is right, especially when everyone else is afraid to leave the comfortable path of conformity.
Curiosity has no important place in my work, only conformity.
Tess was my first experience of a woman who had inhabited her weirdness, moved into the areas of herself that made her distinct from those around her, and learned how to display them proudly.
God elevates nations that behave in conformity with God's standards but he withdraws his blessings from a people who disregard those standards.
I am convinced that creativity is a priori to the integrity of the universe and that life is regenerative and conformity meaningless.
Even a dead fish can go with the flow.
Great fear, conformity, immorality: these are heavy burdens. They drain us of creative energy. And when we are drained of creative energy, we do not create. We procreate, but we do not create.
We are half ruined by conformity, but we should be wholly ruined without it.
Most people are more comfortable with old problems than with new solutions.
Someone once said that under the bell jar of compliance, the only thing that blooms is rage.
The happy life is regarded as a life in conformity with virtue. It is a life which involves effort and is not spent in amusement.
The attractive idea that we can now have a parliament of man with authority to control the conduct of nations by legislation or an international police force with power to enforce national conformity to rules of right conduct is a counsel of perfection.