The inner censor of the mind of the true believer completes the work of the public censor; his self-discipline is as tyrannical as the obedience imposed by the regime; he terrorizes his own conscience into submission; he carries his private Iron Curtain inside his skull, to protect his illusions against the intrusion of reality.
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Power is not revealed by striking hard or often, but by striking true.
Power is not revealed by striking hard or often, but by striking true.
There is in us a tendency to locate the shaping forces of our existence outside ourselves. Success and failure are read more
There is in us a tendency to locate the shaping forces of our existence outside ourselves. Success and failure are unavoidably related in our minds with the state of things around us. Hence it is that people with a sense of fulfillment think it is a good world and would like to preserve it as it is, while the frustrated favor radical change. The tendency to look for all causes outside ourselves persists even when it is clear that our state of being is the product of personal qualities such as ability, character, appearance, health and so on.
...regrettable as it may seem to the idealist, the experience of history provides little warrant for the belief that real read more
...regrettable as it may seem to the idealist, the experience of history provides little warrant for the belief that real progress, and the freedom that makes progress possible, lies in unification. For where unification has been able to establish unity of ideas it has usually ended in uniformity, paralysing the growth of new ideas. And where the unification has merely brought about an artificial or imposed unity, its irksomeness has led through discord to disruption.Vitality springs from diversity- which makes for real progress so long as there is mutual toleration, based on the recognition that worse may come from an attempt to suppress differences than from acceptance of them. For this reason, the kind of peace that makes progress possible is best assured by the mutual checks created by a balance of forces- alike in the sphere of internal politics and of international relations.
The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity, since the tastes, knowledge, and principles of the majority form read more
The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity, since the tastes, knowledge, and principles of the majority form the tribunal of appeal.
If you make a living, if you earn your own money, you're free -- however free one can be on read more
If you make a living, if you earn your own money, you're free -- however free one can be on this planet.
Diplomacy is to do and say the nastiest things in the nicest way.
Diplomacy is to do and say the nastiest things in the nicest way.
All I ask is equal freedom. When it is denied, as it always is, I take it anyhow.
All I ask is equal freedom. When it is denied, as it always is, I take it anyhow.
...when we renounce the self and become part of a compact whole, we not only renounce personal advantage but are read more
...when we renounce the self and become part of a compact whole, we not only renounce personal advantage but are also rid of personal responsibility. There is no telling to what extremes of cruelty and ruthlessness a man will go when he is freed from the fears, hesitations, doubts and the vague stirrings of decency that go with individual judgement. When we lose our individual independence in the corporateness of a mass movement, we find a new freedom- freedom to hate, bully, lie, torture, murder and betray without shame and remorse. Herein undoubtedly lies part of the attractiveness of a mass movement.
Democracy does not guarantee equality of conditions -- it only guarantees equality of opportunity.
Democracy does not guarantee equality of conditions -- it only guarantees equality of opportunity.
