As salve for the more astringent posts preceding, I thought I’d start putting up a series of some of my favorite quotes. I began keeping these on a pad of legal paper years ago, anytime I came across something I really liked, thinking maybe one day I could use them as epigrams. Well, the pages are starting to tear and I need to put them in some more permanent form. So I’m going to put them here. And continue the practice online. Some days I may just put up one, others I’ll do a few.
Bear in mind that in many instances I do not necessarily agree with the sentiments expressed. Often I disagree strongly, but the quote is fertile ground for debate, and that I welcome.
I put one up a few posts back, the one about equality from Roberto Calasso. So now, here are a few more. Enjoy.
“All great efforts to improve human beings by way of training are thwarted through the apathy of those who hold the sole feasible road to be that of stricter breeding.” Charles Spearman, 1927
“Well, I mean, yes idealism, yes the dignity of pure research, yes the pursuit of truth in all its forms, but there comes a point I’m afraid where you begin to suspect that if there’s any real truth, it’s that the entire multidimensional infinity of the Universe is almost certainly being run by a bunch of maniacs.” Frankie Mouse, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
“What the public wants is the image of passion, not passion itself.” Roland Barthes
“Persistence of the normal is strong.” Barbara Tuchman
