Category: Thought

The deterioration of a government begins almost always by the decay of its principles.

Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, Book VIII, Chapter 1.

Alles ist einfacher, als man denken kann,
zugleich verschränkter, als zu begreifen ist.

Everything is simpler than one can imagine, at the same time more involved than can be comprehended.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Maxims and Reflections (1833), Maxim 1209.

In abstract theory, people ought to-day to view the infamy of Heliogabalus with at least the disfavor we reserve for our neighbors’ children: in practise, a knave’s wickedness becomes with time an element of romance, and large iniquities serve as colorful relief to the tedium of history. And it seems banal to point out that it no longer matters ethically, to anyone breathing, that a shoe-maker’s son, rather more than three centuries ago, made ruin of his body through intemperance, for the case is no longer within the jurisdiction of morals.

The fictional author John Charteris in James Branch Cabell’s Beyond Life: Dizaine des Démiurges (1919), Chapter IV, “Which Admires the Economist,” §5.

Whether one is a conservative or a radical, a protectionist or a free trader, a cosmopolitan or a nationalist, a churchman or a heathen, it is useful to know the causes and consequences of economic phenomena.

George Stigler, The Economist as Preacher and Other Essays (1982), p.61.

Still, it is a pity we no longer really notice that material world which we unthinkingly contemn. Much abominable talk about “the un-wholesome restlessness of modern life” is thus bred by our blindness to the fact that restlessness is pre-eminently a natural trait.

The fictional author John Charteris in James Branch Cabell’s Beyond Life: Dizaine des Démiurges (1919), Chapter V, “Which Considers the Reactionary,” §8.

Science is made up of so many things that appear obvious after they are explained.

Pardot Kynes, a character in Frank Herbert’s Dune (1965), Book Two: Muad’Dib.

To be loved, be lovable.

Publius Ovidius Naso (March 20, 43 BC – 17 AD), The Art of Love (2 AD), Book II, line 107.

Vice thrives and lives by concealment.

Publius Vergilius Maro (October 15, 70 BC – September 21, 19 BC), known in English as Virgil, Georgics, Book III, line 454.

Science should remain above politics, if it’s to do its job.

Nancy Kress, Probability Space (2002).

Solvency is maintained by means of a national debt, on the principle, ‘If you will not lend me the money, how can I pay you?’

Ralph Waldo Emerson, “English Traits” (1856).