February 12

February 12 Quotes of the day from previous years:


 * 2004
 * If we cannot end now our differences, at least we can make the world safe for diversity. ~ John F. Kennedy
 * selected by Kalki


 * 2005
 * The apple cannot be stuck back on the Tree of Knowledge; once we begin to see, we are doomed and challenged to seek the strength to see more, not less. ~ Arthur Miller (recent death)
 * selected by Kalki


 * 2006
 * Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it. ~ Abraham Lincoln (born 12 February 1809)
 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2007
 * We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2008
 * Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science. ~ Charles Darwin (born 12 February 1809)
 * proposed by InvisibleSun


 * 2009
 * With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2010
 * I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2011
 * It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, "You toil and work and earn bread, and I'll eat it." No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2012
 * Upon the subject of education, not presuming to dictate any plan or system respecting it, I can only say that I view it as the most important subject which we as a people can be engaged in. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2013


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2014


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2015


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2016


 * proposed by Illegitimate Barrister


 * 2017


 * proposed by Pithy Francoln


 * 2018


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2019


 * proposed by DanielTom


 * 2020


 * proposed by Liquidice5


 * 2021


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2022


 * proposed by InvisibleSun


 * 2023


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2024


 * proposed by Kalki


 * 2025 : Rank or add further suggestions…

Quotes by people born this day, already used as QOTD:


 * The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * used 7 January 2005, selected by Kalki


 * In a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * used 19 November 2005, proposed by MosheZadka


 * There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved. ~ Charles Darwin, in The Origin of Species, published 24 November 1859
 * used 24 November 2005, proposed by UDScott


 * If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * used 16 June 2006, selected by Kalki


 * Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This our convention understood to be the most oppressive of all kingly oppressions, and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * used 15 February 2008, proposed by Jeff Q


 * Owing to this struggle for life, any variation, however slight and from whatever cause proceeding, if it be in any degree profitable to an individual of any species, in its infinitely complex relations to other organic beings and to external nature, will tend to the preservation of that individual, and will generally be inherited by its offspring. The offspring, also, will thus have a better chance of surviving, for, of the many individuals of any species which are periodically born, but a small number can survive. I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection, in order to mark its relation to man's power of selection. ~ Charles Darwin
 * Used 27 December 2020, proposed by Kalki, in relation to Darwin's embarking on his "Voyage of the Beagle" on the 27th of December in 1831.

Suggestions
He defended and praised slavery, which I abominated, and told me that he had just visited a great slave-owner, who had called up many of his slaves and asked them whether they were happy, and whether they wished to be free, and all answered "No." I then asked him, perhaps with a sneer, whether he thought that the answer of slaves in the presence of their master was worth anything? ~ Charles Darwin
 * 3 InvisibleSun 18:49, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
 * 2 Kalki 23:51, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
 * 1 Zarbon 22:14, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
 * 3 (strongly leaning to 4) allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

Not till the fire is dying in the grate, Look we for any kinship with the stars. Oh, wisdom never comes when it is gold, And the great price we pay for it full worth: We have it only when we are half earth. ~ George Meredith (born February 12, 1828)
 * 3 InvisibleSun 18:49, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
 * 3 Kalki 23:51, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
 * 1 Zarbon 22:14, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I would not have believed such an inferno could open up on earth. Men died but they did not retreat. ~ Vasily Chuikov (born February 12)
 * 3 Zarbon 04:07, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
 * SOURCE: Europe in Our Time, 1914 to the Present - Page 571 by Robert Reinhold Ergang -Europe - 1948
 * 2 Kalki 17:18, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
 * 2 InvisibleSun 23:09, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

He who knows the truth and does not speak it is a miserable coward. - Julius Streicher
 * 3 Zarbon 16:57, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * 1 Kalki 17:18, 11 February 2009 (UTC) The statement is a great one, but the speaker is a miserable fool and hypocrite, and cowardly in ways he cannot even perceive, and that is the Truth.
 * Why would you judge the person? See, what you should be doing is judging the quotes, not the people who say them...this isn't opinionpedia, it's qotd...whether or not I like the people saying the quotes is beyond the point here. But, for the record, I don't judge any man as a coward or a fool. In fact, I don't believe in that word "coward". Anyone who can actually formulate a well-established thought such as this one is great to me. And I let that be my only guiding principle. If words are power, then judge words. - Zarbon 05:21, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * I perceive many circumstances — of words, meanings, people and the correspondence, or lack of them, between their words, meanings and their actions, and I assess many forms of foolishness, cowardice and hypocrisy to be at work in many minds — as well as many forms of wisdom, courage, and profound fairness. I honestly state that I am simply not inclined to rate so often (but not always) true a statement as a desirable selection as a quote of the day when enunciated by a person of so foul and profoundly brutal a disposition. It is only a relatively minor quibble that it is not literally true in all instances, for many are the truths that courageous people can be willing to hide or even on some occasions deny, for the sake of far greater sense of truly vital virtues than can arise with any merely mechanistic formulations or semblance of them.


 * 2 InvisibleSun 23:09, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
 * 2 allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC) (I know nothing about the man who came up with the quote.)

This is essentially a people's contest. On the side of the Union it is a struggle for maintaining in the world that form and substance of government whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men — to lift artificial weights from their shoulders; to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all; to afford all an unfettered start, and a fair chance in the race of life. Yielding to partial and temporary departures, from necessity, this is the leading object of the government for whose existence we contend. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * 3 Kalki (talk &middot; contributions) 14:30, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
 * 1 allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * 3 Kalki (talk &middot; contributions) 14:30, 3 February 2010 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
 * 1 allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

I have always thought that all men should be free; but if any should be slaves, it should be first those who desire it for themselves, and secondly, those who desire it for others. When I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * 3 Kalki (talk &middot; contributions) 14:30, 3 February 2010 (UTC) with a strong lean toward 4.
 * 1 (leaning toward 2) allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * 3 Kalki (talk &middot; contributions) 15:47, 6 February 2010 (UTC) * 4 Kalki (talk &middot; contributions) 14:30, 3 February 2010 (UTC) with a strong lean toward 4.
 * 1 (leaning toward 2) allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

I cannot anyhow be contented to view this wonderful universe, and especially the nature of man, and to conclude that everything is the result of brute force. I am inclined to look at everything as resulting from designed laws, with the details, whether good or bad, left to the working out of what we may call chance. ~ Charles Darwin
 * 3 Suggested by bystander 22:08, 11 February 2012 (UTC) (with a strong lean towards 4).
 * 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 01:42, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * 2 allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

We can allow satellites, planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universe, to be governed by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by special act. ~ Charles Darwin
 * 3 Suggested by bystander 22:08, 11 February 2012 (UTC) (with a strong lean towards 4).
 * 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 01:42, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * 4 allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. ~ Abraham Lincoln
 * proposed by anonymous
 * While I in no way endorse the sentiment in this quote, I wish to argue for this quote's inclusion on the grounds that people tend not to be aware that the real Lincoln was not nearly as noble as he is often construed to be. As this quote demonstrates, Lincoln was a racist, not an egalitarian; a collectivist, not an individualist.  He does not deserve our worship, nor does any other president.  3 (strongly leaning to 4) allixpeeke (talk) 01:02, 23 August 2014 (UTC)\
 * 0. I would give it a negative score if I could. Is this a joke? Taken completely out of context. – Illegitimate Barrister 19:41, 4 August 2015 (UTC)


 * 4. – Illegitimate Barrister 19:42, 4 August 2015 (UTC)


 * 4. – Illegitimate Barrister 19:45, 4 August 2015 (UTC)


 * 4. – Illegitimate Barrister 19:45, 4 August 2015 (UTC)


 * 3.25. – Illegitimate Barrister 15:04, 6 August 2015 (UTC)


 * 3.25. – Illegitimate Barrister 22:41, 7 August 2015 (UTC)


 * 4. – Illegitimate Barrister, 09:44, 20 September 2015 (UTC)


 * 3. – Illegitimate Barrister, 22:24, 23 March 2016 (UTC)


 * 3. – Illegitimate Barrister, 22:24, 23 March 2016 (UTC)


 * 3. – Illegitimate Barrister (talk • contribs) 04:42, 29 September 2017 (UTC)