The beginning is the most important part of the work. — Plato
The first sentence of a book is a handshake, perhaps an embrace. — Jhumpa Lahiri
We are the opening verse of the opening page of the chapter of endless possibilities. — Rudyard Kipling
As the child approaches a new text he is entitled to an introduction so that when he reads, the gist of the... story can provide some guide for a fluent reading. — Marie Clay
Today we must all be aware that protocol takes precedence over procedure. — Irwin Corey
The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays is coming to its close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences. — Winston Churchill
Put it before them briefly so they will read it, clearly so they will appreciate it, picturesquely so they will remember it and, above all, accurately so they will be guided by its light. — Joseph Pulitzer
Preface Quotes
Prayer is the preface to the book of Christian living; the text of the new life sermon; the girding on of the armor for battle; the pilgrim's preparation for his journey. It must be supplemented by action or it amounts to nothing. — Austin Phelps
Everything before Jesus is preface. Everything after Jesus is appendix. Jesus is the story. — Kevin DeYoung
We fight for lost causes because we know that our defeat and dismay may be the preface to our successors' victory, though that victory itself will be temporary; we fight rather to keep something alive than in the expectation that anything will triumph. — T. S. Eliot
As we said in the preface to the first edition, C "wears well as one's experience with it grows." With a decade more experience, we still feel that way. — Brian Kernighan
Readers soon tire of prefaces, and skip them, and so the labor of writing them is lost. — Sarah Josepha Hale
Some have supposed that the mosquito is of a devout turn, and never will partake of a meal without first saying grace. The devotions of some men are but a preface to blood-sucking. — Henry Ward Beecher
[P]erhaps you notice how the denial is so often the preface to the justification. — Christopher Hitchens
I think that every so-called history book and film biography should be prefaced by the statement that what follows is the author's rendition of events and circumstances. — Barbara Kruger
Every paper published in a respectable journal should have a preface by the author stating why he is publishing the article, and what value he sees in it. I have no hope that this practice will ever be adopted. — Morris Kline
Even though my entire writing persona is prefaced on me not being an expert, I kind of am an expert. I know a lot. — Jonathan Gold
Prelude Quotes
So as a prelude whites must be made to realise that they are only human, not superior. Same with Blacks. They must be made to realise that they are also human, not inferior. — Steven Biko
Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science. — James Clerk Maxwell
Humor is a prelude to faith and laughter is the beginning of prayer. — Reinhold Niebuhr
This break is a prelude to war, which should, in light of the low level of USSR military technology and internal political and economic difficulties caused by a war, finish off Bolshevism once and for all. — Stephen Kotkin
I was fifteen years old, and I hardly knew how to play a simple Bach prelude on the piano when I began to compose music, and at the most advanced level. I had never studied such things as harmony. — Gyorgy Legeti
I was fifteen years old, and I hardly knew how to play a simple Bach prelude on the piano when I began to compose music, and at the most advanced level. I had never studied such things as harmony. — Gyorgy Ligeti
A great piece of music is beautiful regardless of how it is performed. Any prelude or fugue of Bach can be played at any tempo, with or without rhythmic nuances, and it will still be great music. That's how music should be written, so that no-one, no matter how philistine, can ruin it. — Dmitri Shostakovich
What is love but a prelude to sorrow...with heartache ahead for your goal. — Nina Simone
Healthy discontent is the prelude to progress. — Mahatma Gandhi
A great piece of music is beautiful regardless of how it is performed. — Dmitri Shostakovich
Indians today are governed by two different ideologies. Their political ideal set in the preamble of the Constitution affirms a life of liberty, equality and fraternity. Their social ideal embodied in their religion denies them. — B. R. Babasaheb Ambedkar
Nothing is more disgusting than the crowing about liberty by slaves, as most men are, and the flippant mistaking for freedom of some paper preamble like a Declaration of Independence, or the statute right to vote, by those who have never dared to think or to act. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Yet the whole preamble of the second authorization act for the Marshall Plan showed the direction Congress was ready to take about breaking down barriers within Europe. — W. Averell Harriman
If the American Revolution had produced nothing but the Declaration of Independence, it would have been worthwhile. — Samuel Eliot Morison
The real difference between the United States and other nations lies not in the words of the preamble to the Constitution, but in the fact that the substantive clauses of that Constitution are enforced by individuals independent of and not beholden to the elected branches. — Harold H. Greene
Like an apparently strict musical form it breaks the five minute whole into its structural parts - a descriptive preamble, the action of taking the cards, the development of the cards' manipulation and the revelation of what has been achieved. — Gavin Bryars
I imagine an America that can actually change. That we become a nation that prospers again but without pillaging the resources of nations that make their people hate us. That we become a nation that, as the constitution says in its preamble, its very first paragraph, 'promotes the general welfare' of its people. — Richard Schiff
Virginity is now a mere preamble or waiting room to be got out of as soon as possible; it is without significance. — Ursula K. Le Guin
Virginity is now a mere preamble or waiting room to be got out of as soon as possible; it is without significance. Old age is similarly a waiting room, where you go after life's over and wait for cancer or a stroke. The years before and after the menstrual years are vestigial: the only meaningful condition left to women is that of fruitfulness. — Ursula K. LeGuin
Virginity is now a mere preamble or waiting room to be got out of as soon as possible; it is without significance. Old age is similarly a waiting room, where you go after life's over and wait for cancer or a stroke. The years before and after the menstrual years are vestigial: the only meaningful condition left to women is that of fruitfulness. — Ursula K. Le Guin
I'd like to quit thinking of the present as some minor insignificant preamble to something else. — Richard Linklater
In a thousand words I can have the Lord's Prayer, the 23rd Psalm, the Hippocratic Oath, a sonnet by Shakespeare, the Preamble to the Constitution, Lincoln's Gettysburg Address and almost all of the Boy Scout Oath. Now exactly what picture were you planning to trade for all that? — Roy H. Williams
The religion of the short poem, in every age and in every literature, has a single commandment: Less is always more. The short poem rejects preamble and summary. It's about all and everything, the metaphysics of a few words surrounded by much silence. …The short poem is a match flaring up in a dark universe. — Charles Simic
Well, first let's say that the fundamental responsibility of any government is national security - in the preamble to the Constitution, provide for the common defense and insure domestic tranquility. — Angus King
I wish the government would read the Constitution. I think that would probably help quite a bit. And maybe they did read it and maybe they got confused when they read the preamble which says one of the duties is to promote the general welfare. — Benjamin Carson
The preamble of thought, the transition through which it passes from the unconscious to the conscious, is action. Only so much do I know, as I have lived. Instantly we know whose words are loaded with life, and whose not. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
The Second Amendment has a preamble about the need for a militia. Because there is a need for a militia to be at the ready, therefore the right to keep and bear arms must be secured. — Ruth Bader Ginsburg
If the Constitution was a movie, the Preamble would be the trailer, the First Amendment the establishing shot, the 13th the crowd pleaser and the 14th the ultimate hero scene. — Henry Rollins
Interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the Constitution is a glorious liberty document. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. Is slavery among them? Is it at the gateway? or is it in the temple? It is neither. — Frederick Douglass
The monument serves to remind the appellate courts and judges of the circuit and district courts of this state and members of the bar who appear before them as well as the people of Alabama who visit the Alabama Judicial Building of the truth stated in the preamble of the Alabama Constitution, that in order to establish justice we must invoke the favor and guidance of Almighty God. — Roy Moore
The psychology of the alchemist is that of reveries trying to constitute themselves in experiments on the exterior world. A double vocabulary must be established between reverie and experiment. The exaltation of the names of substances is the preamble to experiments on the "exalted" substances. — Gaston Bachelard
Preaching Christianity to skeptics without first setting out the praeambula fidei [preambles of faith], and then complaining when they don’t accept it, is like yelling in English at someone who only speaks Chinese, and then dismissing him as a fool when he doesn’t understand you. In both cases, while there is certainly a fool in the picture, it isn’t the listener. — Edward Feser
We do, in former chairman Lee Atwater's words, offer the party as a big tent, and therefore that message has to be clear. How we do that within the platform, the preamble to the platform or whatnot, that remains to be seen. But that message will have to be articulated with great clarity. — Dan Quayle
You can't go on like you're going to start really living one day like all this is some preamble to some great life thats magically going to appear. I'm a firm believer that you have to create your own miracles, don't hold out that there's something better waiting on the other side. It doesn't work that way. When you're gone, you're gone. Don't wait. — Perry Moore
In Conclusion
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