The inner censor of the mind of the true believer completes the work of the public censor; his self-discipline is as tyrannical as the obedience imposed by the regime; he terrorizes his own conscience into submission; he carries his private Iron Curtain inside his skull, to protect his illusions against the intrusion of reality.
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A recent conversation: Dubya: Look at the clock, time is racing! Cheney: That's the second hand, George.
A recent conversation: Dubya: Look at the clock, time is racing! Cheney: That's the second hand, George.
Discontent is likely to be highest when misery is bearable; when conditions have so improved that an ideal state seems read more
Discontent is likely to be highest when misery is bearable; when conditions have so improved that an ideal state seems almost within reach. A grievance is most poignant when almost redressed. De Tocqueville in his researches into the state of society in France before the revolution was struck by the discovery that "in no one of the periods which have followed the Revolution of 1789 has the national prosperity of France augmented more rapidly than it did in the twenty years preceding that event." He is forced to conclude that "the French found their position the more intolerable the better it became.
Politics is the conduct of public affairs for private advantage.
Politics is the conduct of public affairs for private advantage.
The power of a movement lies in the fact that it can indeed change the habits of people. This change read more
The power of a movement lies in the fact that it can indeed change the habits of people. This change is not the result of force but of dedication, of moral persuasion.
All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in read more
All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.
Rousseau had it backwards. We are NOT born free. We are born in the chains of the random and the read more
Rousseau had it backwards. We are NOT born free. We are born in the chains of the random and the reflexive, and are ignorant and unreasonable by simple nature. We must learn to be free, to organize the random and detect the reflexive, to acquire the knowledge of particulars and the powers of reason. The examined life is impossible if we cannot examine, order, classify, define, distinguish, always in minute particulars.
When the people have no tyrant, their own public opinion becomes one.
When the people have no tyrant, their own public opinion becomes one.
I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.
I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.
It is much safer to obey, than to govern.
It is much safer to obey, than to govern.
