Take me as I am and believe that it is better to die because you lived, than to live because you have never lived!
(Friedrich Hölderlin (1770 - 1843))

As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and a complete narcissistic moron.
(Henry Mencken, American journalist, essayist and satirist 1880 - 1956 @ The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920)

The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
(allegedly Winston Churchill)

What is democracy? It is what it says, the rule of the people. It is as good as the people are, or as bad.
(Mary Renault))

We learn from history that we do not learn from history. What experience and history teaches us is that people and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it.
(Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hege)

Most people fail in life not because they aim too high and miss, but because they aim too low and hit.
(Les Brown)

Fear kills more dreams than failure ever will.
(Suzy Kassem)

It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default.
(J.K. Rowling)

We’re not yet an endangered specie, though we tried already often enough, to become one.
(Douglas Adams)

The trouble with committing political suicide is that you live to regret it.
(Winston Churchill)

Indeed, the rule of citizens over non-citizens, of members over strangers, is probably the most common form of tyranny in human history.
(Michael Walzer)

When we are unable to find tranquillity within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere.
(François de La Rochefoucauld)

Happiness is the only thing that is doubled when you share it.
(Albert Schweitzer)

I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.
(Stephen Covey)

Patriotism is a substitute for religion. Fundamentally, only religious wars are conducted. You make something divine out of your fatherland and go to war. This is patriotism.
(Peter Bichsel)

We would frequently be ashamed of our good deeds if people saw all of the motives that produced them.
(François de La Rochefoucauld)

In a foreign country, nobody is more exotic then the foreigner himself...
(Ernst Bloch)

One does not travel in order to arrive, but for the sake of travel itself.
(Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

Tourists don't know where they've been, travellers don't know where they're going.
(Paul Theroux)

When the wind of change blows, some build walls and others build windmills.
(Chinese Proverb)

Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you did not do than by the things you did do. So, throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
(Mark Twain)

To travel reveals you the world, to die the universe.
(Brigitte Kamm & Heinz Sibler)

When written in Chinese, the word "crisis" is composed of two characters.
One represents danger and the other represents opportunity.
(John F. Kennedy)

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.
(Mark Twain)

Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.
(Sokrates)

Public opinion is no more than this: what people think that other people think.
(Alfred Austin)

A ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for.
(William G. T. Shedd (1820 – 1894))

Self-confidence is the key that opens every door.
(aphorism)

When one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity.
When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion.
(Robert M. Pirsig)

If you think you’re too small to make a difference,
try to sleep in a closed room with a mosquito.
(African Proverb)

You become rich only by the things you don’t desire.
(Mahatma Gandhi)

There are more people which capitulate, than people that fail.
(Henry Ford)

As long you can’t forgive others their being different,
you’re still far away from the way to wisdom.
(Chinese Proverb)

We all live under the same sky, but we don’t have the same horizon.
(Konrad Adenauer)

Don’t spend your time searching for an obstacle. Perhaps there is none.
(Franz Kafka)

Everything, man can imagine, is feasible.
(Wernher von Braun)

The biggest temptation in life is,
to mix up your dreams with reality.
The biggest beating -
to sacrifice your dreams in favour of reality.
(unknown author)

Stop looking at yourself - look at the world around you.
(found scribbled on a toilet mirror in Auckland NZ)

At birth, the circle of your life opens until the day you die and the circle gets closed in harmony. There is nothing you can do to change that.
But it will mainly be up to you, where you want to stop on your way, which experiences you will collect, what you give, what you take and what will be given to you and whether you reach the intermediate stops as well as your final destination on a straight way, on a detour or even on a shortcut.
(Brigitte Kamm & Heinz Sibler)

Your shit is our bread & butter.
(on a plumbers car in Exmouth, Westaustrakien)

Some might call it destiny, but often it is only a lack of your own making decisions.
(Brigitte Kamm & Heinz Sibler)

We hope our visitors will appreciate the values we consider important:
family, hospitality, peace and tranquillity, time for conversation and sharing, time to relax. We put those values ahead of TV - we have none, work - we do work, but we have not become slaves to it and the pressures of modern life.
(visitors handbook, published by the government of Kiribati (Pazifik island))

Of all the things we wear, the most important is a smile and good humour (only).
(T-Shirt print, a bit altered by Brigitte Kamm & Heinz Sibler)

Inmate or not, all humans are imprisoned by greed and aversion, by ignorance, prejudice and attachments.
(Phra Khemadhamo)

Be who you are and say what you feel,
because those who mind don't matter
and those who matter don't mind.
(Dr Seuss)

Most Tourists are as young dogs,
they sniff at everything but they hardly learn anything.
(Ernst R. Hauschka (born 1926))

Don't call yourself poor, if your dreams didn't come true.
Only those are really poor, who have never had a dream.
(Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830 - 1916))

Who believes he can get along without the world, is wrong.
But who believes, the world dosn't get along without him, is even wronger.
(François de la Rochefoucauld (1613 - 1680))

Who has real authority, won't be afraid of admitting his mistakes.
(Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970))

Those have a true name, who skip their titles, as they would diminish it.
(Sigmund Graff (1898 - 1979))

It's better to regret what you've enjoyed, than to regret, that you haven't enjoyed at all.
(Giovanni Boccacio (1313-1375))

In the end we all travel very lightly indeed. Nothing to carry more substantial than memories... And maybe that's the heaviest baggage of all...
(Keri Hulme)

You never know what you get when things get changed.
But do you know what you get when things do not get changed?
(Elias Canetti)

Good food, nice weather, without knickers it´s even better!
(Monika Koch)

If everyone wanted to play first violin there could be no orchestra.
(Robert Schumann)

Do it the Tongan way, do it tomorrow!
(T-Shirt print from Tonga)

If there is a faith which can move mountains it´s the faith in ones own power.
(Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach)