WIST Quotations

Burke, Edmund -- (Attributed)

Dave — Wed, 04 Jun 2025 15:02:35 +0000

If an idiot were to tell you the same story every day for a year, you would end by believing it.

Edmund Burke (1729–1797) Anglo-Irish statesman, orator, philosopher
(Attributed)
(Source)

Quoted without citation in John Frederick Boyes, Lacon in Council, "Literature, Poetry, Oratory, Genius, &c." (1865). That is the earliest reference I could find for this quote.

Sometimes misattributed to Horace Mann.

Arendt, Hannah -- Origins of Totalitarianism, Part 3, ch. 13 “Ideology and Terror” (1951)

Dave — Tue, 12 May 2020 20:01:22 +0000

The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (i.e., the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (i.e., the standards of thought) no longer exist.

Hannah Arendt (1906–1975) German-American philosopher, political theorist
Origins of Totalitarianism, Part 3, ch. 13 “Ideology and Terror” (1951)
(Source)

Colton, Charles Caleb -- Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Vol. 1, § 240 (1820)

Dave — Sat, 19 Jan 2019 05:17:35 +0000

The intoxication of anger, like that of the grape, shows us to others, but hides us from ourselves; and we injure our own cause, in the opinion of the world, when we too passionately and eagerly defend it […] Neither will all men be disposed to view our quarrels precisely in the same light that we do; and a man’s blindness to his own defects will ever increase, in proportion as he is angry with others, or pleased with himself.

Charles Caleb "C. C." Colton (1780–1832) English cleric, writer, aphorist
Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Vol. 1, § 240 (1820)
(Source)

Keynes, John Maynard -- New Statesman and Nation (15 Jul 1933)

Dave — Wed, 14 Dec 2016 05:03:07 +0000

Words ought to be a little wild, for they are the assault of thoughts on the unthinking.

John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946) English economist
New Statesman and Nation (15 Jul 1933)

Thoreau, Henry David -- A Week on the Concord and Marrimack Rivers, “Sunday” (1849)

Dave — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 14:43:36 +0000

You can hardly convince a man of an error in a lifetime, but must content yourself with the reflection that the progress of science is slow. If he is not convinced, his grandchildren may be.

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) American philosopher and writer
A Week on the Concord and Marrimack Rivers, “Sunday” (1849)
(Source)