WIST Quotations

Vance, Jack -- The Languages of Pao, ch. 5, epigraph (1958)

Dave — Wed, 30 Apr 2025 18:28:01 +0000

Any collocation of persons, no matter how numerous, how scant, how even their homogeneity, how firmly they profess common doctrine, will presently reveal themselves to consist of smaller groups espousing variant versions of the common creed; and these sub-groups will manifest sub-sub-groups, and so to the final limit of the single individual, and even in this single person conflicting tendencies will express themselves.

Jack Vance (1916-2013) American writer [John Holbrook Vance]
The Languages of Pao, ch. 5, epigraph (1958)
(Source)

The epigraph is attributed to the fictional Adam Ostwald, in his book Human Society.

First published in Satellite Science Fiction magazine (1957-12).

Bolt, Robert -- Lawrence of Arabia, Part 1, sc. 106 (1962) [with Michael Wilson]

Dave — Tue, 08 Apr 2025 23:04:12 +0000

LAWRENCE: (calling after him) Sherif Ali, so long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they be a little people. A silly people! Greedy, barbarous, and cruel — as you are!

Robert Bolt (1924-1995) English dramatist
Lawrence of Arabia, Part 1, sc. 106 (1962) [with Michael Wilson]
(Source)

After Sherif Ali has killed the Arab guide Lawrence was using for being of the wrong tribe to use one of the Harith tribe's wells.

Russell, Bertrand -- Interview by Woodrow Wyatt, BBC TV (1959)

Dave — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 16:12:40 +0000

A fanatical group all together have a comfortable feeling that they’re all friends with one another. They are all very much excited about the same thing. You can see it in any political party. There’s always a fringe of fanatics in any political party, and they feel very cozy with one another; and when that is spread about and is combined with a propensity to hate some other group, you get fanaticism well developed.

Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
Interview by Woodrow Wyatt, BBC TV (1959)
(Source)

Collected in Bertrand Russell's BBC Interviews (1959) [UK] and Bertrand Russell Speaks His Mind (1960) [US]. Reprinted (abridged) in The Humanist (1982-11/12), and in Russell Society News, #37 (1983-02).

Chesterfield (Lord) -- Letter to his son, #167 (29 Oct 1748)

Dave — Thu, 04 Mar 2021 18:29:41 +0000

Remember, that the wit, humor, and jokes of most mixed companies are local. They thrive in that particular soil, but will not often bear transplanting. Every company is differently circumstanced, has its particular cant, and jargon; which may give occasion to wit and mirth, within that circle, but would seem flat and insipid in any other, and therefore will not bear repeating.

Lord Chesterfield (1694-1773) English statesman, wit [Philip Dormer Stanhope]
Letter to his son, #167 (29 Oct 1748)
(Source)

Emerson, Ralph Waldo -- “Self-Reliance,” Essays: First Series (1841)

Dave — Mon, 06 Feb 2017 21:29:41 +0000

If I know your sect, I anticipate your argument.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
“Self-Reliance,” Essays: First Series (1841)
(Source)

Adams, Henry -- The Education of Henry Adams, ch. 1 (1907)

Dave — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 04:01:09 +0000

Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, had always been the systematic organization of hatreds.

Henry Adams (1838-1918) American journalist, historian, academic, novelist
The Education of Henry Adams, ch. 1 (1907)

Restated by George Will in saying that the value of political parties was that "They organize our animosities." Interview, The Colbert Report (3 Jun 2008) at 6:43.

Inge, William Ralph -- “Patriotism,” Outspoken Essays: First Series (1915)

Dave — Mon, 18 Jan 2016 16:52:30 +0000

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)

Roosevelt, Theodore -- Autobiography, ch. 5 “Applied Idealism” (1913)

Dave — Tue, 18 Aug 2015 12:50:30 +0000

Unrestricted individualism spells ruin to the individual himself. But so does the elimination of individualism, whether by law or custom.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer, US President (1901–1909)
Autobiography, ch. 5 “Applied Idealism” (1913)
(Source)

Lewis, C.S. -- Letter to Father Peter Milward (6 May 1963)

Dave — Wed, 15 Jul 2015 17:41:15 +0000

You ask me in effect why I am not a Roman Catholic. If it comes to that, why am I not — and why are you not — a Presbyterian, a Quaker, a Mohammedan, a Hindu, or a Confucianist? After how prolonged and sympathetic study and on what grounds have we rejected these religions? I think those who press a man to desert the religion in which he has been bred and in which he believes he has found the means of Grace ought to produce positive reasons for the change — not demand from him reasons against all other religions. It would have to be all, wouldn’t it?

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
Letter to Father Peter Milward (6 May 1963)

Orwell, George -- Essay (1945-05), “Notes on Nationalism,” Polemic Magazine (1945-10)

Dave — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 14:54:06 +0000

All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts. A British Tory will defend self-determination in Europe and oppose it in India with no feeling of inconsistency. Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage — torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians — which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by ‘our’ side.

George Orwell (1903-1950) English journalist, essayist, writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
Essay (1945-05), “Notes on Nationalism,” Polemic Magazine (1945-10)
(Source)

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, Sr. -- Article (1872-12), “The Poet at the Breakfast-Table,” Atlantic Monthly

Dave — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 15:44:17 +0000

We are all tattooed in our cradles with the beliefs of our tribe; the record may seem superficial, but it is indelible. You cannot educate a man wholly out of the superstitious fears which were early implanted in his imagination; no matter how utterly his reason may reject them, he will still feel as the famous woman did about ghosts, Je ne crois pas, mais je les crains, — “I don’t believe in them, but I am afraid of them, nevertheless.”

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) American poet, essayist, scholar
Article (1872-12), “The Poet at the Breakfast-Table,” Atlantic Monthly
(Source)

Collected in The Poet at the Breakfast-Table, ch. 12 (1872).

Hoffer, Eric -- True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements, Part 1, ch. 2, § 9 (1951)

Dave — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 12:46:31 +0000

The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim all excellence for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause.

Eric Hoffer (1902-1983) American writer, philosopher, longshoreman
True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements, Part 1, ch. 2, § 9 (1951)
(Source)

Kipling, Rudyard -- “The Law of the Jungle,” The Second Jungle Book (1899)

Dave — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:09:37 +0000

For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.

Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) English writer
“The Law of the Jungle,” The Second Jungle Book (1899)