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Quotations by Inge, William Ralph
We have enslaved the rest of the animal creation, and have treated our distant cousins in fur and feathers so badly that beyond doubt, if they were able to formulate a religion, they would depict the Devil in human form.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“The Idea of Progress,” Romanes Lecture (27 May 1920)
Full text.
True faith is belief in the reality of absolute values.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Confessio Fidei,” Outspoken Essays: Second Series (1922)
Man, as we know him, is a poor creature; but he is halfway between an ape and a god, and he is traveling in the right direction.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Confessio Fidei,” Outspoken Essays: Second Series (1922)
So the pendulum swings, now violently, now slowly; and every institution not only carries within it the seeds of its own dissolution, but prepares the way for its most hated rival.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Democracy and the Future,” The Atlantic Monthly (1922)
Full text.
Democracy is a form of government which may be rationally defended, not as being as good, but as being less bad than any other.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
See also Churchill.
Like other idealisms, patriotism varies from a noble devotion to a moral lunacy.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Patriotism varies, from a noble devotion to a moral lunacy.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
It is becoming impossible for those who mix at all with their fellow-men to believe that the grace of God is distributed denominationally.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Admiration for ourselves and our institutions is too often measured by our contempt and dislike for foreigners.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Beneath the dingy uniformity of international fashions in dress, man remains what he has always been — a splendid fighting animal, a self-sacrificing hero, and a bloodthirsty savage.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Human nature is at once sublime and horrible, holy and satanic. Apart from the accumulation of knowledge and experience, which are external and precarious acquisitions, there is no proof that we have changed much since the first stone age.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Democracy is a form of government which may be rationally defended, not as being good, but as being less bad than any other.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
See Churchill.
History gives no countenance to the theory that popular governments are either more moral or more pacific than strong monarchies.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
If an autocracy does not rest on the army, which leads to the chaos of praetorianism, it must rely on ‘panem et circenses.’ Hence it has some of the worst faults of democracy, without its advantages.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
The excesses of revolutionists are not an argument against democracy, since revolutions are anything rather than democratic.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
The democracy is a ready victim to shibboleths and catchwords, as all demagogues know too well.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
No one can govern who cannot afford to be unpopular, and no democratic official can afford to be unpopular. Sometimes he has to wink at flagrant injustice and oppression; at other times a fanatical agitation compels him to pass laws which forbid the citizen to indulge perfectly harmless tastes, or tax him to contribute to the pleasures of the majority.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Democracy postulates community of interest or loyal patriotism. When these are absent it cannot long exist.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
Senseless extravagance is the best friend of revolution.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Our Present Discontents,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1919)
But it must be remembered that, in spite of the proverb, it takes in reality only one to make a quarrel. It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favour of vegetarianism, while the wolf remains of a different opinion.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Patriotism,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1915)
Sometimes quoted as "while wolves remain of a different opinion."
Devil-worship remains what it was, even when the idol is draped in the national flag.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Patriotism,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1915)
But, though pugnacity and acquisitiveness have been the real foundation of much miscalled patriotism, better motives are generally mingled with these primitive instincts. It is the subtle blend of noble and ignoble sentiment which makes patriotism such a difficult problem for the moralist. The patriot nearly always believes, or thinks he believes, that he desires the greatness of his country because his country stands for something intrinsically great and valuable.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Patriotism,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1915)
The history of the Jews also shows that oppression and persecution are far more efficacious in binding a nation together than community of interest and national prosperity. Increase of wealth divides rather than unites a people; but suffering shared in common binds it together with hoops of steel.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Patriotism,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1915)
Events in the past may be roughly divided into those which probably never happened and those which do not matter. This is what makes the trade of historian so attractive.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Prognostications,” Assessments and Anticipations (1929)
The aim of education is the knowledge not of facts but of values.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“The Training of Reason” (1918)
In A. C. Benson (ed.), Cambridge Essays on Education (1918)
In private life, no motive of action is at present so powerful and so persistent as acquisitiveness, which, unlike most other desires, knows no satiety.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
“Patriotism,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1915)
Worry is the interest paid on trouble before it falls due.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
(Attributed)
We must cut our coat according to our cloth, and adapt ourselves to changing circumstances.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
Lay Thoughts of a Dean (1926)
There are two kinds of fools: one says, “This is old, therefore it is good”; the other says, “This is new, therefore it is better.”
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
More Lay Thoughts of a Dean (1931)
Personalize your sympathies; depersonalize you antipathies.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
More Lay Thoughts of a Dean (1931)
The proper time to influence the character of a child is about a hundred years before he is born.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
More Lay Thoughts of a Dean (1931)
A nation is a society united by a delusion about its ancestry and by a common hatred of its neighbours.
William Ralph Inge (1860-1954) English prelate [Dean Inge]
The End of an Age: And Other Essays (1948)
