When we find a thinker reflecting or echoing an apparently erroneous, narrow, or even illogical thought that was popular or authoritative in his time, we must never rule out the possibility that what we have discovered is not the limit of his vision but only an example of his deliberate rhetorical accommodation to reigning prejudice which he does not share but thinks it best not to expose.
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Sex lies at the root of life, and we can never learn to reverence life until we know how to read more
Sex lies at the root of life, and we can never learn to reverence life until we know how to understand sex.
Passion holds up the botton of the world, while genius paints its roof.
Passion holds up the botton of the world, while genius paints its roof.
Anybody who is 25 or 30 years old has physical scars from all sorts of things, from tuberculosis to polio. read more
Anybody who is 25 or 30 years old has physical scars from all sorts of things, from tuberculosis to polio. It's the same with the mind.
Happiness is good health and a bad memory.
Happiness is good health and a bad memory.
Implicit in the activist conception of government is the assumption that you can take the good things in a complex read more
Implicit in the activist conception of government is the assumption that you can take the good things in a complex system for granted, and just improve the things that are not so good. What is lacking in this conception is any sense that a society, an institution, or even a single human being, is an intricate system of fragile inter-relationships, whose complexities are little understood and easily destabilized.
The power of habit and the charm of novelty are the two adverse forces which explain the follies of mankind.
The power of habit and the charm of novelty are the two adverse forces which explain the follies of mankind.
Veracity is the heart of morality.
Veracity is the heart of morality.
As memory may be a paradise from which we cannot be driven, it may also be a hell from which read more
As memory may be a paradise from which we cannot be driven, it may also be a hell from which we cannot escape. - Aphorisms and Reflections.
The awareness of their individual blemishes and shortcomings inclines the frustrated to detect ill will and meanness in their fellow read more
The awareness of their individual blemishes and shortcomings inclines the frustrated to detect ill will and meanness in their fellow men. Self-contempt, however vague, sharpens our eyes for the imperfections of others. We usually strive to reveal in others the blemishes we hide in ourselves.
