This is a collection of quotes, edited by Dr Stephen Wilkinson of Melbourne, Australia, that may be helpful to Global Family Doctor members who are writing an article or preparing an address in which they wish to include one of the numerous quotable quotes that reside in many publications. By collecting them in one place on Global Family Doctor, it is hoped to build up a substantial resource for members.

If you wish to contribute a favourite quote, especially with a medical or health connotation, click here. Please acknowledge the author and the source of your quote. You will be acknowledged as the contributor.

Quotable Quotes Archive


Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain.
Carl G. Jung

You may not be responsible for being down, but you must b responsible for getting up.
Jesse Jackson

You can always spot a well-informed man -- his views are the same as yours.
Ilka Chase

One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important.
Bertrand Russell

Say not that you know another entirely, until you have divided an inheritance with him.
Johann Kasper Lavater

Some people think only intellect counts -- knowing how to solve problems, knowing how to get by, knowing how to identify an advantage and seize it. But the functions of intellect are insufficient without courage, love, friendship, compassion and empathy.
Dean Koontz

Marriage changes passion. Suddenly you're in bed with a relative.
Anon

Time is the best teacher; unfortunately it kills all its students.
Anon

I'm so ugly...I worked in a pet shop and people kept asking how big I'd get.
Rodney Dangerfield

A Meckel's diverticulum is frequently suspected, often sought, and rarely found.
Charles Mayo

And in the end it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.
Abraham Lincoln

It's a strange world of language in which skating on thin ice can get you into hot water.
Franklin P. Jones

My wife thinks I'm too nosey. At least, that's what she keeps scribbling in her diary.
Drake Sather

More useful than the invention of the first telephone was that of the second telephone.
Anon

He went on a crash diet and he looks a wreck.
Anon

A man went into a cloning shop. When he came out, he was beside himself.
Anon

It's easy to identify people who can't count to ten. They are in front of you in the express lane at the supermarket.
June Henderson

A friend of mine once sent me a post card with a picture of the entire planet Earth taken from space. On the back it said, "Wish you were here."
Steven Wright

I won't say our school was tough, but we had our own coroner. We used to write essays like: What I'm going to be if I grow up.
Lenny Bruce

Those are a success who have lived well, laughed often, and loved much; who have gained the respect of intelligent people and the love of children, who have filled their niche and accomplished their task, who leave the world better than they found it, whether by a perfect poem or a rescued soul; who never lacked appreciation of the earth's beauty or failed to express it; who looked for the best in others and gave the best they had.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

We deem those happy who from the experience of life have learnt to bear its ills without being overcome by them.
Carl Jung

It was 18 years ago that the cellular phone was introduced. Before that, drivers had to keep their hands busy with just a radio.
Anon

A van carrying a dozen movie stuntmen on the way to a film location in the mountains spun out of control on the icy road, crashed through a guard-rail, rolled down a 90-foot embankment, turned over, and burst into flames. There were no injuries.
Anon

I never knew my father was an alcoholic until he came home sober one night.
Andre Botes

Some folks are wise and some are otherwise.
Tobias George Smolett

When people say "life is short" they don't realise that life is the longest thing anyone ever does!
Anon

I thought I wanted a career, turns out I just wanted paychecks.
Anon

I'm addicted to placebos. I'd give them up, but it wouldn't make any difference.
Steven Wright

He who laughs last took a long time to get the joke.
Anon

To do is to be - Descartes
To be is to do - Voltaire
Doobee doobee do - Mel Torme

Did you hear about the statistician who had his head in an oven and his feet in a bucket of water? On average, he said he felt fine.
Anon

I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it.
Groucho Marx

If we study the lives of great men and women carefully and unemotionally we find that, invariably, greatness was developed, tested and revealed through the darker periods of their lives. One of the largest tributaries of the river of greatness is always the stream of adversity.
Cavett Robert

Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip.
Will Rogers

I don't approve of political jokes. I've seen too many of them get elected.

Anon

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.
Thomas Edison

Women who seek to be equal to men lack ambition.
Anon

Do you realize that in about 40 years, we'll have thousands of old ladies running around with tattoos?
Anon

All generalisations are false.

Anon

Lincoln studied by the light of a fireplace. Mozart composed by candlelight. Galileo invented by oil lamp.
Didn't they ever think to do their work during the daytime?

Jersey Tomato

Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination are omnipotent. The slogan 'press on' has solved and always willsolve the problems of the human race.
Calvin Coolidge

The Washington Post's Style Invitational once again asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition. Here are some of last year's (2003) winners with a medical flavour:

Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

Cashtration: The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.

Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

Hipatitis: Terminal coolness.

Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease.

Decafalon: The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

Glibido: All talk and no action.

Arachnoleptic fit: The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.

 

Sign seen on a plastic surgeon's window: "Come in and pick your nose!"
Anon

I don't do drugs any more. Now I can get the same effect by just standing up fast.
Anon

Dancing cheek-to-cheek is really a form of floor play.
Anon

Everyday I beat my own previous record for number of consecutive days I have stayed alive.
Anon

I am nobody. Nobody is perfect. Therefore, I am perfect.
Anon

Brain cells come and brain cells go, but FAT cells live forever.
Anon

My doctor tells me I suffer from extreme hypochondria. He prescribed a strong placebo, but I don't think it's working.
Fred Marcum

The more people I meet, the more I like my dog.
Anon

I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me.
Noel Coward

In ancient times they had no statistics, so they had to fall back on lies.
Stephen Leacock

Sign in a Family Planning clinic's car park: "Be careful when pulling out."
Anon

The best way to forget all your troubles is to wear tight shoes.
Anon

Patient to GP: "I have a man I never could trust. Why, he cheats so much I'm not even sure this baby I'm carrying is his".
Anon

Wild horses couldn't drag a secret out of a woman. However, women seldom have lunch with wild horses.
Ivern Boyett

Remember...a developer is someone who wants to build a house in the woods. An environmentalist is someone who already owns a house in the woods.
Dennis Miller

To make a long story short, there's nothing like having the boss walk in.
Doris Lilly

It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it.
Sam Levenson

I am a twenty-three-year-old liberated woman who has been on the pill for two years. It's getting expensive and I think my boyfriend should share half the cost, but I don't know him well enough to discuss money with him.
Anon

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