Quotes, Excerpts, Anecdotes.

Scopenhauer, Arthur wrote:

Scholars are those who have read in books, but thinkers, men of genius, world-enlighteners, and reformers of the human race are those who have read directly in the book of the world.

Schopenhauer, Arthur wrote:

The middle ages showed us the results of thinking without experimentation, our present century shows us what experimentation without thinking leads to.

Otto Weininger wrote:

Great men take themselves
and the world too seriously to become what is called
merely intellectual. Men who are merely intellectual are
insincere ; they are people who have never really been
deeply engrossed by things and who do not feel an overpowering
desire for production. All that they care about is
that their work should glitter and sparkle like a well-cut
stone, not that it should illuminate anything. They are
more occupied with what will be said of what they think
than by the thoughts themselves.

Friedrich Holderlin wrote:

And you, what is your concern? That at times something rises in you, in one instant, like the mouth of a dying man, your heart opens itself to you so powerfully and then closes-precisely, this is the ill omen.

Friedrich Holderlin wrote:

The sons of the sun are nourished by their deeds; they live by triumph; their own spirit emboldens them, and their strength is their joy.

Seneca wrote:

’Rehearse death’. To say this is to tell a person to rehearse his freedom. A person who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave.

Eric Hoffer, The True Believer wrote:

Mass movements do not usually rise until the prevailing order has been discredited. The discrediting is not an automatic result of the blunders and abuses of those in power, but the deliberate work of men of words with a grievance. Where the articulate are absent or without a grievance, the prevailing dispensation, though incompetent and corrupt, may continue in power until it falls and crumbles of itself. On the other hand, a dispensation of undoubted merit and vigor may be swept away if it fails to win the allegiance of the articulate minority.

Quote :

Things are different in the case of the typical man of words. The masses listen to him because they “know that his words, however urgent, cannot have immediate results. The authorities either ignore him or use mild methods to muzzle him. Thus imperceptibly the man of words undermines established institutions, discredits those in power, weakens prevailing beliefs and loyalties, and sets the stage for the rise of a mass movement.

Quote :

Whatever the type, there is a deep-seated craving common to almost all men of words which determines their attitude to the prevailing order. It is a craving for recognition; a craving for a clearly marked status above the common run of humanity. “Vanity,” said Napoleon, “made the Revolution; liberty was only a pretext.” There is apparently an irremediable insecurity at the core of every intellectual, be he noncreative or creative. Even the most gifted and prolific seem to live a life of eternal self-doubting and have to prove their worth anew each day. What de Rémusat said of Thiers is perhaps true of most men of words: “he has much more vanity than ambition; and he prefers consideration to obedience, and the appearance of power to power itself. Consult him constantly, and then do just as you please. He will take more notice of your deference to him than of your actions.

Lovecraft, H.P. wrote:

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of the infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far.

Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote:

He who despises most things will be a lawgiver among them, and he who dares most of all will be most in the right.

The oft-referenced "Milgram Obedience Experiment" framed research from the get-go as both inspired by and an explanation of Nazi behaviour. Methodology & data was unreliable - 60% of people disobeyed instructions of the authority & refused to continue![You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

— samisdat.info (@samisdat_info) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Homeric epithets are some of the best parts of his epiks (although I doubt much-emphasized today given "red-haired Menelaos," "white-armed Helen," "blue-eyed Athena," "fair-haired Ceres," and so on...) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

— Just Loki (@LokiJulianus) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

BTW SJWs are totally not to blame for this. The "mistake" in translating eye color started like 150 years ago. It's one of the most common epithets in Homer and the average beady-eyed Classics dork would have been driven INSANE by the repetition of "blue-eyed Athena." [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

— Just Loki (@LokiJulianus) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Also, isn't it interesting how "classicists" who go on and on and on about the diversity of the ancient world forget to mention the blue-eyed, red-haired Libyans. [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

— Just Loki (@LokiJulianus) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Fascism is an incomprehensible Lovecraftian entity to the socialist mind. [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

— Friendly Whale Shark Jackson (@TAJackson20) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Marquis De Vauvenargues wrote:

Intellectual mediocrity and sloth, make more philosophers than do reason and reflection.


Wisdom is a tyrant of the weak.


It is true that the greater number of men are scarcely capable of profound knowledge, but it is equally true that the superficial knowledge they seek only serves to satisfy their vanity. It is hurtful to those who possess true genius; for it necessarily draws them away from their main object, wastes their industry over details and subjects foreign to their needs and natural talent, and lastly does not serve, as they flatter themselves, to prove the breadth of their mind. In all ages there have been men of very moderate intelligence who knew much, and on the contrary, men of the highest intelligence who knew very little. Ignorance is not lack of intelligence, nor knowledge a proof of genius.

Baltasar Gracian wrote:

A wise person cannot be recognized by what he or she says in the public square, for there the wise do not speak with their tongue but with that of the general foolishness.

are shrimp okay [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

— owen cyclops (@owenbroadcast) [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Baltasar Gracian wrote:

A realistic assessment of yourself: of your spirit, of your mind, of your judgement, of your passion. No one can be master of himself who does not first understand himself. There are mirrors for the face, but none for the soul. So make one out of careful consideration of yourself. And while it may be well to forget the outer image, remember the inner in order to fill out its defects, to make it better. Poll the powers of your mind and of your will in order to achieve something. Take stock of what temper you have for the business of the day. Sound your depths, and measure your capacity for everything.

Napoleon Bonaparte wrote:

Some men are so physically and morally constituted as to see everything through a highly colored medium. They raise up a picture in the mind on every slight occasion, and give to every trivial occurrence a dramatic interest. But whatever knowledge, or talent, or courage, or other good qualities, such men may possess, Nature has not formed them for the command of armies, or the direction of great military operations.

Kvasir wrote:

Baltasar Gracian wrote:

A realistic assessment of yourself: of your spirit, of your mind, of your judgement, of your passion. No one can be master of himself who does not first understand himself. There are mirrors for the face, but none for the soul. So make one out of careful consideration of yourself. And while it may be well to forget the outer image, remember the inner in order to fill out its defects, to make it better. Poll the powers of your mind and of your will in order to achieve something. Take stock of what temper you have for the business of the day. Sound your depths, and measure your capacity for everything.

Kvasir wrote:

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