1,097 Quotes Regarding Change


We must adjust to changing times and still hold to unchanging principles.
Jimmy Carter

When it is not necessary to change, it is necessary not to change.
Lucius Cary

Change means movement. Movement means friction. Only in the frictionless vacuum of a nonexistent abstract world can movement or change occur without that abrasive friction of conflict.
Saul Alinsky

The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children's games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end, which is a nuisance for the few people who grow up. And one of the games which it is most attached is called, "Keep tomorrow dark," and which is also named (by the rustics in Shropshire, I have no doubt) "Cheat the Prophet." The players listen very carefully and respectfully to all that the clever men have to say about what is to happen in the next generation. The players then wait until all the clever men are dead, and bury them nicely. Then they go and do something else. That is all. For a race of simple tastes, however, it is great fun.
G.K. Chesterson

Change is certain. Peace is followed by disturbances; departure of evil men by their return. Such recurrences should not constitute occasions for sadness but realities for awareness, so that one may be happy in the interim.
I Ching

The way of the Creative works through change and transformation, so that each thing receives its true nature and destiny and comes into permanent accord with the Great Harmony: this is what furthers and what perseveres.
I Ching

...Insidious is the cry for 'revolution,' at a time when not even the germs of new institutions exist, let alone the moral and political consciousness that could lead to a basic modification of social life. If there will be a 'revolution' in America today, it will no doubt be a move towards some variety of fascism. We must guard against the kind of revolutionary rhetoric that would have had Karl Marx burn down the British Museum because it was merely part of a repressive society. It would be criminal to overlook the serious flaws and inadequacies in our institutions, or to fail to utilize the substantial degree of freedom that most of us enjoy, within the framework of these flawed institutions, to modify them or even replace them by a better social order. One who pays some attention to history will not be surprised if those who cry most loudly that we must smash and destroy are later found among the administrators of some new system of repression.
Noam Chomsky

Religions change; Beer and Wine remain.
Hervey Allen

They must often change who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.
Confucius

Complainers change their complaints, but they never reduce the amount of time spent in complaining.
Mason Cooley

Excuses change nothing, but make everyone feel better.
Mason Cooley

Change often makes accepted customs into crimes.
Mason Cooley

Change is upsetting. Repetition is tedious. Three cheers for variation!
Mason Cooley

I change my opinions often, but not my way of thinking.
Mason Cooley

History shows that the human mind, fed by constant accessions of knowledge, periodically grows too large for its theoretical coverings, and bursts them asunder to appear in new habiliments, as the feeding and growing grub, at intervals, casts its too narrow skin and assumes another.... Truly the imago state of Man seems to be terribly distant, but every moult is a step gained.
Charles Darwin

Never swap horses crossing a stream.
American Proverb

Complete adaptation to environment means death. The essential point in all response is the desire to control environment.
John Dewey

Change begets change. Nothing propagates so fast. If a man habituated to a narrow circle of cares and pleasures, out of which he seldom travels, step beyond it, though for never so brief a space, his departure from the monotonous scene on which he has been an actor of importance would seem to be the signal for instant confusion.... The mine which Time has slowly dug beneath familiar objects is sprung in an instant; and what was rock before, becomes but sand and dust.
Charles Dickens

Change is inevitable in a progressive country. Change is constant.
Benjamin Disraeli

In a progressive country change is constant; ... change ... is inevitable.
Benjamin Disraeli