quotations about circumstances
A man ... may carve out his circumstances, but his circumstances will carve him out as well.
FREDERICK DOUGLASS
address before the literary societies of Western Reserve College at commencement, July 12, 1854
I endeavour to subdue circumstances to myself, and not myself to circumstances.
HORACE
Epistles
To become the master of his circumstances--to override them, as the stately ship overrides the waves, stormy or smooth, as her obedient element--not 'whelmed and lost in them--this is the aim and effort of every loftier nature.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
I am what time, circumstance, history, have made of me, certainly, but I am, also, much more than that. So are we all.
JAMES BALDWIN
Notes of a Native Son
Our circumstances are like a jigsaw puzzle, which is always in flux, with the pieces being arranged on the board by the singular Cosmic mover and shaker. Only the Creator has the ability to take the tattered remnants of jagged-edged pieces and restore them so they slip easily into place beside smooth-edged ones. Even when we willfully disobey, God works things together, thought it's only in the passage of time, coupled with generous wisdom from above, do we gain a semblance of discernment.
KEN R. ABELL
An Ordinary Story of Extraordinary Hope
And circumstance, that unspiritual god,
And miscreator, makes and helps along
Our coming evils, with a critch-like rod,
Whose touch turns hope to dust--the dust we all have trod.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past.
KARL MARX
The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte
Stop blaming outside circumstances for your inside chaos.
STEVE MARABOLI
Unapologetically You
I am still determined to be cheerful and to be happy, in whatever situation I may be; for I have also learnt, from experience, that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances. We carry the seeds of the one or the other about with us, in our minds, wheresoever we go.
MARTHA WASHINGTON
letter to Mrs. Warren, Dec. 26, 1789
Leave frivolous circumstances.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
The Taming of the Shrew
Circumstance is like wax in the hands of God and the soul; and as for influence, it is a circumstance of itself, and like the winds of the world may be set to grinding corn or gunpowder.
CLARENCE LATHBURY
"Soul of Circumstance?", New-Church Messenger, February 28, 1912
Circumstance does not make the man; it reveals him to himself.
JAMES ALLEN
As a Man Thinketh
My circumstances
Being so near the truth as I will make them,
Must first induce you to believe.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Cymbeline
Who does the best that circumstance allows,
Does well, acts nobly, angels could no more.
EDWARD YOUNG
Night Thoughts
People are always blaming circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
Mrs. Warren's Profession
Leaders, attitudes and circumstances are like the fortunes of war. They change.
MICHAEL GOODSPEED
When Reason Fails
You know it isn't all that often,
We get this kind of chance.
Why don't we get caught in this moment?
Be victims of sweet circumstance?
Tonight I feel like all creation,
Is asking us to dance.
KATHY MATTEA
"Asking Us to Dance"
She knows herself to be at the mercy of events, and she knows by now that events have no mercy.
MARGARET ATWOOD
The Blind Assassin
We often convince ourselves that we cannot change, that we cannot overcome the circumstances of our lives. That is simply not true. You have been blessed with immeasurable power to make positive changes in your life. But you can't just wish it, you can't just hope it, you can't just want it... you have to LIVE it, BE it, DO it.
STEVE MARABOLI
Unapologetically You
I am the very slave of circumstance
And impulse--borne away with every breath.
LORD BYRON
Sardanapalus