Tag Archives: Charles Dickens

*Quotation Quotient

(Published March 23, 2014 in the Monterey County Herald.)

1. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

A. Jon Stewart

B. Charles Dickens

C. Leo Tolstoy

2. “So much attention is paid to the aggressive sins, such as violence and cruelty and greed with all their tragic effects, that too little attention is paid to the passive sins, such as apathy and laziness, which in the long run can have a more devastating and destructive effect upon society than the others.”

A. Eleanor Roosevelt

B. Eleanor Rigby

C. Eleanor Clift

3. “We make our own fortunes and we call them fate.”

A. Austin Powers

B. Benjamin Disraeli

C. Oscar Hammerstein

4. “Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions.”

A. J. Edgar Hoover

B. George Washington

C. Albert Einstein

5. “The trouble with the rat race is even if you win, you’re still a rat.”

A. B. F. Skinner

B. Lily Tomlin

C. Sammy Davis Jr.

6. “Life is an error-making and an error-correcting process, and nature in marking man’s papers will grade him for wisdom as measured both by survival and by the quality of life of those who survive.”

A. Jonas Salk

B. Paul Simon

C. Halle Berry

7. “It may seem a strange principle to enunciate as the very first requirement in a hospital that it should do the sick no harm.”

A. Florence Henderson

B. Florence Griffith Joyner

C. Florence Nightingale

8. “This administration today, here and now, declares unconditional war on poverty in America.”

A. Lyndon Johnson

B. Barack Obama

C. Dwight Eisenhower

9. “Life is a corrupting process from the time a child learns to play his mother off against his father in the politics of when to go to bed; he who fears corruption fears life.”

A. Benjamin Spock

B. Saul Alinsky

C. Roseanne Barr

10. “My candle burns at both ends;/ It will not last the night;/ But, ah, my foes, and, oh, my friends -/ it gives a lovely light.”

A. Edna St. Vincent Millay

B. Virginia Woolf

C. Elton John

 Answers: 1-B, 2-A , 3-B , 4-C , 5-B , 6-A , 7-C , 8-A , 9-B , 10-A

 Scoring:               10–QQQQ = Quote-Master   

(number correct)        8-9–QQQ = Scholar                       

                                   6-7–QQ = Literate

                                  4-5–Q = Semi-Literate

                                 0-3–No Q = Quote-Dunce

BONUS QUOTE:

 “When people ask me if I have any spare change, I tell them I have it at home in my spare wallet.” – Nick Arnette

 (Arnette is a comedian and inspirational speaker.)