Before I go on with this short history, let me make a general observation— the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. This philosophy fitted on to my early adult life, when I saw the improbable, the implausible, often the "impossible, " come true. F. Scott Fitzgerald
About This Quote

You have to be able to think of both sides, you have to be able to see that something is hopeless yet still be determined to reach it. If you are always thinking that something is impossible then you are never going to accomplish anything.

Source: The Crackup

Some Similar Quotes
  1. The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends. - Friedrich Nietzsche
  2. We have become, by the power of a glorious evolutionary accident called intelligence, the stewards of life's continuity on earth. We did not ask for this role, but we cannot abjure it. We may not be suited to it, but here we are. - Stephen Jay Gould
  3. Any intelligent person knows that life is a beautiful thing and that the purpose of life is to be happy, " said my father as he watched the three beauties. "But it seems only idiots are ever happy. How can we explain this? - Orhan Pamuk
  4. He had just about enough intelligence to open his mouth when he wanted to eat, but certainly no more. - P.g. Wodehouse
  5. Ms. Wormwood: Calvin, can you tell us what Lewis and Clark did? Calvin: No, but I can recite the secret superhero origin of each member of Captain Napalm's Thermonuclear League of Liberty. Ms. Wormwood: See me after class, Calvin. Calvin: [retrospectively] I'm not dumb. I... - Bill Watterson
More Quotes By F. Scott Fitzgerald
  1. I fell in love with her courage, her sincerity, and her flaming self respect. And it's these things I'd believe in, even if the whole world indulged in wild suspicions that she wasn't all she should be. I love her and it is the beginning...
  2. I wasn't actually in love, but I felt a sort of tender curiosity.
  3. I'm not sentimental-- I'm as romantic as you are. The idea, you know, is that the sentimental person thinks things will last--the romanticperson has a desperate confidence that they won't.
  4. She was beautiful, but not like those girls in the magazines. She was beautiful, for the way she thought. She was beautiful, for the sparkle in her eyes when she talked about something she loved. She was beautiful, for her ability to make other people...
  5. Actually that’s my secret – I can’t even talk about you to anybody because I don’t want any more people to know how wonderful you are.
Related Topics