Famous quotes containing the words general, population and/or prefer:
“Women born at the turn of the century have been conditioned not to speak openly of their wedding nights. Of other nights in bed with other men they speak not at all. Today a woman having bedded with a great general feels free to tell us that in bed the general could not present arms. Women of my generation would have spared the great general the revelation of this failure.”
—Jessamyn West (1907–1984)
“America is like one of those old-fashioned six-cylinder truck engines that can be missing two sparkplugs and have a broken flywheel and have a crankshaft that’s 5000 millimeters off fitting properly, and two bad ball-bearings, and still runs. We’re in that kind of situation. We can have substantial parts of the population committing suicide, and still run and look fairly good.”
—Thomas McGuane (b. 1939)
“Men look on knowledge which they learn—or might learn—from others as they do on the most beautiful structures which are not their own: in outward objects, they would rather behold their own hogsty than their neighbor’s palace; and in mental ones, would prefer one grain of knowledge gained by their own observation to all the wisdom of a thousand Solomons.”
—Sarah Fielding (1710–1768)