Aphorisms Galore!

Success and Failure

376 aphorisms  ·  9 comments

Aphorisms in This Category

tiny.ag/orx9er1h  ·  submitted 1997

The wind and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.

Edward Gibbon, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/jvo6jzxe  ·  submitted 1997

Only the mediocre are always at their best.

Jean Giraudoux, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/he6rec8v  ·  submitted 1997

When ideas fail, words come in very handy.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/sk2lr8ad  ·  submitted 1997

We will burn that bridge when we come to it.

Nick Gorski, in Success and Failure and Work and Recreation

tiny.ag/hvtbkoet  ·  submitted 1997

When everyone is against you, it means you are absolutely wrong -- or you are absolutely right.

Albert Guinon, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/pyfjvpn5  ·  submitted 1997

You can pretend to be serious; you can't pretend to be witty.

Sacha Guitry, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/dncdjxtf  ·  submitted 1997

No man who needs a monument ever ought to have one.

Nathaniel Hawthorne, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/f6aon4ji  ·  submitted 1998

Never try to out-stubborn a cat.

Robert A. Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/iwcasutl  ·  submitted 1997

The first myth of management is that it exists. The second myth of management is that success equals skill.

Robert Heller, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/ifr4pyih  ·  submitted 1997

Prophecy is many times the principal cause of the events foretold.

Thomas Hobbes, in Science and Religion and Success and Failure

tiny.ag/qn68ckxs  ·  submitted 1997

Hofstadter's Law: It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take Hofstadter's Law into account.

Doug Hofstadter, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/wiq0woar  ·  submitted 1997

Success is like a fart -- only your own smells nice.

James P. Hogan, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/vtq15sgk  ·  submitted 1997

Action cures fear, inaction creates terror.

Doug Horton, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/kjm5ugma  ·  submitted 1997

Change occurs in direct proportion to dissatisfaction, but dissatisfaction never changes.

Doug Horton, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/rsmenqfu  ·  submitted 1997

To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and whatever you hit, call it the target.

Ashleigh Brilliant, Brilliant Thoughts (copyright info: www.ashleighbrilliant.com), in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/dcbu6t7e  ·  submitted 1997

I avoid looking forward or backward, and try to keep going forward.

Charlotte Brontë, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/bvz84ngk  ·  submitted 1997

The Mythical Man-Month (paperback)

Brooks' Law: Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.

Fred Brooks, The Mythical Man-Month, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/jro1ckeb  ·  submitted 1997

A new idea is delicate. It can be killed by a sneer or a yawn; it can be stabbed to death by a joke or worried to death by a frown on the right person's brow.

Charles Brower, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/jymwcve2  ·  submitted 1997

If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.

John Kenneth Galbraith, in Success and Failure

tiny.ag/nvfl7j9k  ·  submitted 1997

Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats.

Howard Aiken, in Success and Failure