Quotes About Control

Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter

A police state is a country run by criminals

The natural impulse of men is to follow, he thought, and whoever has the strongest sense of purpose will always dominate the rest.

The whole principle [of censorship] is wrong. It's like demanding that grown men live on skim milk because the baby can't have steak.

Good composition is like a suspension bridge; each line adds strength and takes none away... Making lines run into each other is not composition. There must be motive for the connection. Get the art of controlling the observer – that is composition.

To award prizes is to attempt to control the course of another man's work. It is a bid to have him do what you will approve. It affects not only the one who wins the award, but all those who in any measure strive for it.

The brain can be a wonderful tool, can be a willing slave, as has been evidenced by some men, but of course it works poorly when it has not the habit of usage. An automobile can become a source of delight, but the first time you drive you are as apt to go up a tree as to go up the road.

There is a danger in letting a camera make all its preprogrammed decisions for you:

The big things are beyond us, Georgie. We can't control them. It's the everyday things that matter in life. That's what's real.

A lion is at liberty who can follow the laws of his own nature, who can eat when his stomach tells him, who can sleep when his fierce eyes grow weary, who can scratch long furrows in a forest tree when his claws feel so disposed. He is not at liberty when he lives in a cage, is fed on horseflesh at 4 p.m., and is compelled at the point of a red-hot poker to spell P-I-G – PIG, in the presence of a diverted crowd.

For where men have made the earth that is trodden underfoot, and have largely veiled the heavens themselves, it is but natural that they should think that they have made everything, and that it is they who rule it.

Political stress is always apt to shrink the private arena and attach it on to the public

But cruelty is an appetite that grows with feeding

The cyclists best chance is to gather all the responsibility that can be gathered. Hoard it from those around you. Have faith that you will do a better job with it than they will, and make it so. [...] Don't leave your fate to the stars, or to luck.

A hallmark of petty tyrants—including many Rule Nazis—is that their power over a narrow domain is coupled with low prestige; they simmer and sulk about the lack of respect they get. This mix of power and low social status creates a deadly brew—it provokes them to take out their frustration and resentment on others.

Psychologist Susan Fiske observes, 'Attention is directed up the hierarchy. Secretaries know more about their bosses than vice versa; graduate students know more about their advisors than vice versa.' Fiske explains this happens because, like our fellow primates, 'people pay attention to those who control their outcomes. In an effort to predict and possibly influence what is going to happen to them, people gather information about those with power.

Then there are people with modest but real power—and who take sick satisfaction from frustrating and pushing others around.

When people (regardless of personality) wield power, their ability to lord it over others causes them to (1) become more focused on their own needs and wants; (2) become less focused on others' needs, wants, and actions; and (3) act as if written and unwritten rules others are expected to follow don't apply to them.

Few rich men own their property. The property owns them.

Stress can bring out your unresolved issues. Like many silent sons, you may be at a low boiling point but not realize it. When stress occurs, your reactions are extreme and you don't understand why.

Then He arose and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, "Peace, be still!" – Mark 4:39

I can't ever let the actions of other people cause me to sin.

Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world. It controls our thoughts, minds, hearts, and spirits . . . . A person who . . . does not regard music as a marvelous creation of God . . . does not deserve to be called a human being; he should be permitted to hear nothing but the braying of asses and the grunting of hogs.

For the world is Mine, and all its fullness. – Psalm 50:12