“First, do no harm.” (“Primum non nocere.”)

THE FAMOUS ALLEGED DOCTORS’ OATH: “First, do no harm.” (“Primum non nocere.”)        Commonly attributed to the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates (c. 460 B.C. - c. 377 B.C.)        It is widely — and wrongly — believed that this phrase was written by Hippocrates and is part of the “The Hippocratic Oath” that doctors take. In reality, the Hippocratic Oath was written by the early followers of Hippocrates, not by Hippocrates himself. Moreover, the phrase “First, do no harm” (“Primum non nocere” in Latin) does not appear in the original version or modern versions of the Hippocratic Oath and there is no legal requirement for doctors to take this oath, though it is a tradition at most medical schools.

THE ALLEGED ALTERNATE OATH OF SOME DOCTORS: “First, do no harm. Second, leave no wallet with anything other than a condom in it.”        From a post by the anonymous author of The Enlightening Nonsense blog        His view on the high fees charged by some physicians and medical clinics

AN ECO-MINDED BUDDHIST’S CODE: “First, do no harm; second, do what you can to relieve suffering. It’s bound to be a slow process and is part of what the Dalai Lama has called ‘ethics for a new millennium.’” Everyone must take responsibility for the well-being of the planet.”        Arnold Kozak        From Kozak’s Buddhism, The Everything Buddhism Book (2011)

A NINJA’S CODE: “The rule is: first, do no harm; second, never make a challenge; third, never turn down a challenge.”        Ashida Kim         Marshal arts code in Kim’s book The Invisible Fist: Secret Ninja Methods of Vanishing Without a Trace (1998)

A TYPICAL POLITICIAN’S CODE: “The doctor’s code is, ‘First — do no harm.’ The politician’s code is, ‘First — go on television.”        Guillermo Del Toro, with co-author Chuck Hogan        Said by the character Dr. Barnes, in their modern vampire novel The Strain (2009)

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A new (and highly-recommended) book of quotations: NEVERISMS: A Quotation Lover's Guide to Things You Should Never Do, Never Say, or Never Forget By quotation maven Dr. Mardy Grothe

 

“A bridge too far” – then and now…

THE FAMOUS WORLD WAR II QUOTE: “I think we might be going a bridge too far.”        Lt. General Frederick “Boy” Browning (1896-1965)        British military officer        Comment to Field Marshal Montgomery on September 10, 1944, expressing doubts about the Allied plan to capture the bridge at Arnhem from the Germans as part of “Operation Market Garden.” Browning’s concern turned out to be prophetic. The attempt to take the bridge failed and thousands of British soldiers were killed, wounded and captured. In 1974, Browning’s phrase “a bridge too far” was used by historian Cornelius Ryan as the title of his best-selling book about this event. The book was made into the 1977 film A Bridge Too Far, which featured an all-star cast. The popularity of the book and movie helped make “a bridge too far” — and variations on it — an idiomatic way saying that something is flawed because it is excessive or otherwise goes “too far.”

GOVERNOR BREWER’S BIRTHER SMACKDOWN: “I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their ‘early baptismal or circumcision certificates,’ among other records, to the Arizona Secretary of State. This is a bridge too far.”        Arizona Governor Jan Brewer        Comment to the press on April 18, 2011, explaining why she vetoed a wacky bill concocted by “Birthers” who refuse to believe that President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

RICK SANTORUM’S LAME REMARK ABOUT BLACK PEOPLE: “Marriage is an institution that’s a bridge too far for too many African-American woman and is not desirable among African-American males.”        Sen. Rick Santorum        Conservative Republican senator and presidential candidate        Comment to the press on June 2, 2009, demonstrating again why the top result when you Google “Santorum” seems highly appropriate.

HILLARY CLINTON’S LAME QUIP ABOUT CHINESE PEOPLE: “I don’t know whether you and I will play ping-pong in public. That may be a bridge too far.”        Hillary Rodham Clinton        U.S. Secretary of State        Remark to Chinese State Councilor Liu Yandong at a U.S.-China diplomatic event in Washington, DC, April 12, 2011, lamely referencing the Nixon-era matches between Chinese and American ping pong players in 1971, which was then a historic sign of a thaw in U.S.-Chinese relations (commonly referred to as “ping pong diplomacy”).

THE DONALD TRUMP VARIATION: “Visualising this brash casino-owner and his Slovenian ex-model trophy wife Melania in the White House is a stretch but hardly a stretch too far when US voters have elected an actor for president, a muscle-bound Austrian-American action star for Governor of California and a Slovak-American wrestler as Governor of Minnesota.”        Linda S. Heard         British journalist          In an April 12, 2011 commentary in the Dubai-based Gulf News on the possibility of Donald Trump being elected President of the United States.

THE JENNIFER GARNER VARIATION: “[Agatha Christie] fans are most furious about the decision...Purists think the remake is a crime too far. But we think our sizzling shots of Garner, star of hit movies Elektra and Juno, show it’s no mystery why audiences might want to see her in the role.”        Adam Thorn        Columnist for the UK News of the World        In an April 3, 2011 story about negative reactions to the casting of Jennifer Garner as Agatha Christie’s character Miss Marple in an upcoming movie remake.

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Related reading and viewing:

“I think, therefore I am.”

FAMOUS PHILOSOPHER’S QUOTE: “Cogito ergo sum.” (“I think, therefore I am.”)        René Descartes (1596-1650)        French mathematician and philosopher          Famous axiom in his book Principia Philosophiae (Principles of Philosophy, 1644)        Descartes first recorded the axiom in French, as “Je pense, donc je suis,” in his philosophical and mathematical treatise, Le Discours de la Méthode (A Discourse on Method, 1637). However, the Latin version from Principia Philosophiae is better known. The French and Latin versions of the quote have traditionally been translated in English as “I think, therefore I am.” Alternate translations include “I am thinking, therefore I am” and “I am thinking, therefore I exist.”

FAMOUS CARNIVORE’S COUNTERQUOTE: “We eat, therefore we hunt.”        Sarah Palin        Conservative American politician, celebrity and avid hunter        Part of the rambling speech Palin gave on July 26, 2009, announcing her resignation as Governor of Alaska. The full quote is: “Stand strong, and remind them patriots will protect our guaranteed, individual right to bear arms, and by the way, Hollywood needs to know, we eat, therefore we hunt.”

AVANT-GARDE PAINTER’S VARIATION: “I Suck Therefore I Am”         Agus Suwage          Indonesian artist        This is the title of the 2004 painting by Suwage shown at left. It’s estimated to be worth up to 207,000 Malaysian Ringgits (over $61,975 in U.S. currency).

SHOPAHOLIC VARIATION: “I Shop Therefore I Am”        Barbara Kruger        American multimedia artist          These words on the artwork by Kruger shown at left are seemingly a send-up of consumerism. But ironically, the image was later used on tote bags and t-shirts sold by Bloomingdale’s.

ALCOHOLIC TEACHER VARIATION: “I Teach Therefore I Drink”         Slogan on a t-shirt sold by www.Shirt-Fight.com

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Comments? Questions? Corrections? Post them on my Famous Quotations Facebook group.

Further reading: new and forthcoming books of quotations…

 

“Variety’s the spice of life.”

THE POET’S FAMOUS QUOTE: “Variety’s the very spice of life That gives it all its flavour.”        William Cowper (1731-1800)        British poet        From his multi-volume poetic work The Task (1785), Book II, “The Timepiece”        The saying “Variety’s the spice of life” is usually traced to this poem by Cowper, though it may already have been proverbial when he used it. Another familiar line from this poem is “God made the country, and man made the town.” Other famous lines from Cowper’s poetry include: “God moves in a mysterious way” (Olney Hymns, 1779) and “I am monarch of all I survey” (“Verses Supposed to be Written by Alexander Selkirk”, 1782).

A P.O.W.’S COUNTERQUOTE: “Variety is not the spice of life. It is the very stuff of it.”        Christopher Burney (1917–1980)        British author and former spy for British Special Operations during World War II         Burney’s conclusion in the book Solitary Confinement (1952), an account of the 18 months he spent in a Nazi prison cell during World War II.

JOHNNY CARSON’S QUIP: “If variety is the spice of life, marriage is the big can of leftover Spam.”         Johnny Carson (1925-2005)        American comedian and host of The Tonight Show from 1962 to 1992        Quoted in Ifferisms: An Anthology of Aphorisms That Begin with the Word "IF" (2009), one of the many entertaining books of quotations compiled by quote maven Dr. Mardy Grothe

OGDEN NASH’S VARIATION: “I believe a little incompatibility is the spice of life,    particularly if he has income and she is pattable.”         Ogden Nash (1902-1971)        The poem “I Do, I Will, I Have,” included in Nash’s book Versus (1949)

BASEBALL WISDOM FROM THE YANKEE SCOOTER: “The bunt is the spice of baseball, the unexpected weapon, the stiletto in the ribs.”        Phil “The Scooter” Rizzuto (1917-2007)        Baseball player for the New York Yankees, elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1994        Quoted in the Baseball Digest, July 1964

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Comments? Questions? Corrections? Post them on my quotations Facebook group.

Further reading: quotation books by Mardy Grothe...

What the world needs now...

THE FAMOUS SONG LYRIC: “What the world needs now is love, sweet love.”        Hal David        American song lyricist        The well-known line from the Burt Bacharach/Hal David song “What the World Needs Now Is Love,” first recorded and popularized in by Jackie DeShannon in 1965.

PROCHNOW’S VARIATION: “What the world needs is six months of peace so we can catch up on our worrying.”        Herbert V. Prochnow (1897-1998)         American toastmaster, author and bank executive        A quip included in his book 1000 Stories and Illustrations for All Occasions (1994)        (Cartoon by Mike Keefe)

THE WEINER SIZE COUNTERQUOTE: “I used to charge for access to my blog. But now it’s free, because I’ve realized what the world needs now is not love and peace and other boring turds, but raw unauthorized lists of things that YOU need to do to improve your SEO, PageRank and weiner size.”        Noah Stokes                 Founder of Bold, a design and development studio based in the San Francisco Bay area        On a page on his website explaining why he is “the best choice for all your front end development needs”

ONE MAN’S VISION FOR WOMAN: “One of the greatest needs we have today is for women to simply be women. We don’t need any more truck drivers, body builders, cigarette smokers, foul-mouthed beer guzzlers or picket line walkers. The men have furnished us with all of this business for many years. What the world needs now and it needs it badly—is for women to be women again!”        Todd Stickler         Christian journalist        In his opinion piece “The Christian Woman’s Role In Today’s Society,” originally published in the February 1984 of Christianity Magazine

THE TEEN ANGST VARIATION: “What the world needs now is a new Frank Sinatra So I can get you in bed What the world needs now is another folk singer Like I need a hole in my head.”        Cracker        American alternative-rock group        Lyrics from their 1992 song “Teen Angst”

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Comments? Questions? Corrections? Post them on my quotations Facebook group.

Further reading: books of quotations about love…

Things you won’t go broke underestimating...

THE COMMON MISQUOTE (AND WHAT MENCKEN ACTUALLY SAID): “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.”         A famous quip commonly attributed to journalist and editor H.L. Mencken (1880-1956)        Although this saying is often credited to Mencken, it’s actually a paraphrase of something he wrote in his column in the September 19, 1926 edition of the Chicago Daily Tribune. He was discussing the recent upsurge in tabloid newspapers geared toward uneducated readers, including “near-illiterates.” Mencken predicted (correctly) that “journalism of the future…will move in the direction” of the tabloids and noted drily:        “No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”        Over time, this longer quote came to be paraphrased and misquoted, most commonly in the form “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.”

A FEMINIST’S VARIATION:   “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the maturity of the American male. On the contrary, as the films of Judd Apatow and magazines like Maxim make clear, immaturity among 20- and 30-something guys is a reliable cash source.”        Kate Tuttle         Freelance journalist and editor        In a review published by the Boston Globe, March 18, 2011

A FOOTBALL FAN’S VARIATION: “To paraphrase H.L. Mencken, you’ll never go wrong underestimating the intelligence of those trying to reach a new collective-bargaining agreement...Now the principals are exchanging insults on Twitter. Management is taking cheap shots at the players, and the players are responding in kind, each group blaming the other, as if the blame isn’t equal.”        Sports journalist Art Spander        Commenting on the ongoing collective bargaining deadlock between the National Football League team owners and players, in his column on the Real Clear Sports website, March 10, 2011. (Cartoon by Daryl Cagle.)

THE A.D.D. VARI... (UH, WHAT WORD WAS I TYPING?): “No one in this world has ever lost money by underestimating the attention span of the American people.”         Editorial by the St. Louis Post Dispatch, July 9, 2010

A LIBERAL JOURNALIST’S OPINION OF CERTAIN REPUBLICANS: “Bachmann, Sharron Angle, Sarah Palin and others have turned the GOP into an international joke and brought amazement at the support and enthusiasm they generate. Legendary journalist H.L. Mencken once said nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American consumer. The same could be said of the American voters who actually cast their ballots for these folks.”        Doug Thompson        Publisher and founder of the website CapitolHillBlue.com        In a post on his website titled “The GOP’s invasion of the Intelligence-snatchers”

A LIBERAL ACTIVIST’S OPINION OF A CERTAIN DEMOCRAT: “No one ever went broke underestimating how low a politician will go to gain an advantage. Exhibit A: Vice President Joseph Biden, who likens Wikileaks honcho Julian Assange to a ‘high-tech terrorist.’”        Gabor Rona        International Legal Director for the Human Rights First organization        In a post on the group’s website regarding a comment Biden made about Assange on Meet the Press on December 19, 2010

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Further reading: by and about H.L. Mencken...