Notable quotes, excerpts, and profound lines.

[kennyc]

"I saw how men died. I saw how they bore pain. I saw what hope looked like, fear and relief; I saw the dark lines that despair drew on a face; I saw courage and steadfastness. I saw faith shine in the eyes of those who trusted in what I could only think was an illusion and I saw the gallantry that made a man greet the prognosis of death with an ironic joke because he was too proud to let those about him see the terror of his soul."
- W. Somerset Maugham

Happy Birthday today W. Somerset Maugham author of 'Of Human Bondage' an incredible novel!

[kennyc]

"To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life."
- W. Somerset Maugham

[covingtoncat73]

"There are men in frock coats and top hats with the blood of the world on their hands, and they eat with silver forks and white napkins every day, and they will give up their last breath in a linen-made bed whilst the ones they sent out to die lie forgotten in the earth, mouldering bones with the poppies fat and red above ’em. Ah, mankind."

Paul Kearney, The Wolf in the Attic

[covingtoncat73]

"What do they be teaching the young these days? I declare, they think more on machines and formulas than they do on the true knowledge of the world. They blow things up, and calls it progress. They kills one another by the million, and calls it civilization."

Paul Kearney, The Wolf in the Attic

[badgoodDeb]

Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. -Carl Sagan, astronomer and author (1934-1996) [per A.Word.A.Day]

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by badgoodDeb

Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. -Carl Sagan, astronomer and author (1934-1996) [per A.Word.A.Day]

[orlok]

Originally Posted by badgoodDeb

Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. -Carl Sagan, astronomer and author (1934-1996) [per A.Word.A.Day]

Wow! Shame he didn't live to see it all coming true. Or maybe he's better off not knowing.

[GeoffC]

better off not knowing - but then again perhaps he does !!!!

[kennyc]

Asimov said some very similar things.

“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

― Isaac Asimov

[kennyc]

“Ignorance is king. Many would not profit by his abdication. Many enrich themselves by means of his dark monarchy. They are his Court, and in his name they defraud and govern, enrich themselves and perpetuate their power. Even literacy they fear, for the written word is another channel of communication that might cause their enemies to become united. Their weapons are keen-honed, and they use them with skill. They will press the battle upon the world when their interests are threatened, and the violence which follows will last until the structure of society as it now exists is leveled to rubble, and a new society emerges. I am sorry. But that is how I see it.”
― Walter M. Miller Jr., A Canticle for Leibowitz

[kennyc]

Many more anti-intellectualism quotes here: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag...ntellectualism

[kennyc]

"Everyone you meet in your life is a teacher. Learn."
- Kenny A. Chaffin

[bfisher]

When Bob Dylan wrote this, it had a universal application.

"He's only a pawn in their game."
- Bob Dylan, Only a Pawn in Their Game

http://bobdylan.com/songs/only-pawn-their-game/

[kennyc]

“In the dark times will there also be singing? Yes, there will also be singing. About the dark times.”
- Bertolt Brecht

“Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it.”
- Bertolt Brecht

[kennyc]

“The worst illiterate is the political illiterate, he doesn’t hear, doesn’t speak, nor participates in the political events. He doesn’t know the cost of life, the price of the bean, of the fish, of the flour, of the rent, of the shoes and of the medicine, all depends on political decisions. The political illiterate is so stupid that he is proud and swells his chest saying that he hates politics. The imbecile doesn’t know that, from his political ignorance is born the prostitute, the abandoned child, and the worst thieves of all, the bad politician, corrupted and flunky of the national and multinational companies.”
― Bertolt Brecht