Archive

Quotes

Real education must ultimately be limited to men who insist on knowing—the rest is mere sheep herding.

—Ezra Pound, 1934

A tree’s a tree. How many more do you need to look at?

—Ronald Reagan, 1965

Idolatry is the mother of all games.

—Novatian, c. 255

To escape its wretched lot, the populace has three ways, two imaginary and one real. The first two are the rum shop and the church; the third is the social revolution.

—Mikhail Bakunin, 1871

The only authors whom I acknowledge as American are the journalists. They indeed are not great writers, but they speak the language of their countrymen, and make themselves heard by them. 

—Alexis de Tocqueville, 1840

The nature of God is a circle, of which the center is everywhere and the circumference is nowhere.

—Empedocles, c. 450 BC

The state dictates and coerces; religion teaches and persuades. The state enacts laws; religion gives commandments. The state is armed with physical force and makes use of it if need be; the force of religion is love and benevolence.

—Moses Mendelssohn, 1783

How sickness enlarges the dimension of a man’s self to himself! He is his own exclusive object.

—Charles Lamb, 1833

The legislator is like the navigator of a ship on the high seas. He can steer the vessel on which he sails, but he cannot alter its construction, raise the wind, or stop the waves from swelling beneath his feet.

—Alexis de Tocqueville, 1835

It was lonesome, the leaving.

—Wetatonmi, c. 1877

The highest result of education is tolerance.

—Helen Keller, 1903

If there is a technological advance without a social advance, there is, almost automatically, an increase in human misery.

—Michael Harrington, 1962

And then, sir, there is this consideration: that if the abuse be enormous, nature will rise up and, claiming her original rights, overturn a corrupt political system.

—Samuel Johnson, 1791