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" Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power. "

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" That all men are equal is a proposition to which, at ordinary times, no sane human being has ever given his assent. "

" Men do not learn much from the lessons of history and that is the most important of all the lessons of history. "

" Feasts must be solemn and rare, or else they cease to be feasts. "

" The most valuable of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it has to be done, whether you like it or not. "

" Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted. "

" Most of one's life is one prolonged effort to prevent oneself thinking. "

" The finest works of art are precious, among other reasons, because they make it possible for us to know, if only imperfectly and for a little while, what it actually feels like to think subtly and feel nobly. "

" I'm afraid of losing my obscurity. Genuineness only thrives in the dark. Like celery. "

" The proper study of mankind is books. "

" The worst enemy of life, freedom and the common decencies is total anarchy; their second worst enemy is total efficiency. "

" A fanatic is a man who consciously over compensates a secret doubt. "

" That we are not much sicker and much madder than we are is due exclusively to that most blessed and blessing of all natural graces, sleep. "

" Speed, it seems to me, provides the one genuinely modern pleasure. "

" Like every other good thing in this world, leisure and culture have to be paid for. Fortunately, however, it is not the leisured and the cultured who have to pay. "

" Amour is the one human activity of any importance in which laughter and pleasure preponderate, if ever so slightly, over misery and pain. "

" Words, words, words! They shut one off from the universe. Three quarters of the time one's never in contact with things, only with the beastly words that stand for them. "

" From their experience or from the recorded experience of others (history), men learn only what their passions and their metaphysical prejudices allow them to learn. "

" You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad. "

" Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards. "

" Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know. "

" Beauty is worse than wine, it intoxicates both the holder and beholder. "

" Perhaps it's good for one to suffer. Can an artist do anything if he's happy? Would he ever want to do anything? What is art, after all, but a protest against the horrible inclemency of life? "

" There is no substitute for talent. Industry and all its virtues are of no avail. "

" Cynical realism is the intelligent man's best excuse for doing nothing in an intolerable situation. "

" Hell isn't merely paved with good intentions; it's walled and roofed with them. Yes, and furnished too. "

Good Intentions

" All gods are homemade, and it is we who pull their strings, and so, give them the power to pull ours. "

" Europe is so well gardened that it resembles a work of art, a scientific theory, a neat metaphysical system. Man has re-created Europe in his own image. "

" It takes two to make a murder. There are born victims, born to have their throats cut, as the cut-throats are born to be hanged. "

" Like every man of sense and good feeling, I abominate work. "

" After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. "