Without doubt God is the universal moving force, but each being is moved according to the nature that God has given it. He directs angels, man, animals, brute matter, in sum all created things—but each according to its nature—and man having been created free, he is freely led. This rule is truly the eternal law and in it we must believe.
—Joseph de Maistre, 1821
Archive
Quotes
For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.
—Robert Louis Stevenson, 1879Perish the universe, provided I have my revenge.
—Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac, 1654No one wins a quarrel by quarreling.
—German proverbAll people have the common desire to be elevated in honor, but all people have something still more elevated in themselves without knowing it.
—Mencius, c. 330 BCLaughter almost ever cometh of things most disproportioned to ourselves and nature. Laughter hath only a scornful tickling.
—Philip Sidney, 1582There is no greater disaster than not to know contentment.
—Laozi, c. 550 BCAs the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live.
—Pope John Paul II, 1986There are some who, if a cat accidentally comes into the room, though they neither see it nor are told of it, will presently be in a sweat and ready to die away.
—Increase Mather, 1684Some memories are like lucky charms, talismans, one shouldn’t tell about them or they’ll lose their power.
—Iris Murdoch, 1985All our enemies are mortal.
—Paul Valéry, 1942Spoon feeding in the long run teaches us nothing but the shape of the spoon.
—E.M. Forster, 1951Democracy is the menopause of Western society, the grand climacteric of the body social. Fascism is its middle-aged lust.
—Jean Baudrillard, 1987