George Bernard Shaw Quotes
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A fashion is nothing but an induced epidemic.
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Men get tired of everything, of heaven no less than of hell; and that all history is nothing but a record of the oscillations of the world between these two extremes. An epoch is but a swing of the pendulum; and each generation thinks the world is progressing because it is always moving.
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A married man forms married habits and becomes dependent on marriage just as a sailor becomes dependent on the sea.
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The confusion of marriage with morality has done more to destroy the conscience of the human race than any other single error.
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Worst of all, there is no sign of any relaxation of antisemitism. Logically it has nothing to do with Fascism. But the human raceis imitative rather than logical; and as Fascism spreads antisemitism spreads.
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A veteran journalist has never had time to think twice before he writes.
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The British are apt to make merits of their stupidities, and to represent their various incapacities as points of good breeding.
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Love is a gross exaggeration of the difference between one person and everybody else.
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There are scores of thousands of human insects who are ready at a moment's notice to reveal the Will of God on every possible subject...
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Nationalism must now be added to the refuse pile of superstitions. We are now citizens of the world, and the man who divides the race into elect Irishmen and reprobate foreign devils (especially Englishmen) had better live on the Blaskets where he can admire himself without disturbance.
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When the military man approaches, the world locks up its spoons and packs off its womankind.
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Morality is not respectability.
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I ask you, what am I? I’m one of the undeserving poor: thats what I am. Think of what that means to a man.
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The universal regard for money is the one hopeful fact in our civilization. Money is the most important thing in the world. It represents health, strength, honor, generosity and beauty . . . . Not the least of its virtues is that it destroys basic people as certainly as it fortifies and dignifies noble people.
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Nothing is ever done in this world until men are prepared to kill one another if it is not done.
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The heretic is always better dead. And mortal eyes cannot distinguish the saint from the heretic.
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Nothing soothes me more after a long and maddening course of pianoforte recitals than to sit and have my teeth drilled.
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It is not true that men can be divided into absolutely honest persons and absolutely dishonest ones. Our honesty varies with the strain put on it.
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In an article on Bunyan lately published in the "Contemporary Review" - the only article on the subject worth reading on the subject I ever saw (yes, thank you, I am familiar with Macaulay's patronizing prattle about "The Pilgrim's Progress") etc.
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No man can be a pure specialist without being in the strict sense an idiot.
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Our laws make law impossible; our liberties destroy all freedom; our property is organized robbery; our morality an impudent hypocrisy; our wisdom is administered by inexperienced or mal-experienced dupes; our power wielded by cowards and weaklings; and our honour false in all its points. I am an enemy of the existing order for good reasons...
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I believe in Michelangelo, Velasquez, and Rembrandt; in the might of design, the mystery of color, the redemption of all things by Beauty everlasting, and the message of Art that has made these hands blessed. Amen. Amen.
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Optimistic lies have such immense therapeutic value that a doctor who cannot tell them convincingly has mistaken his profession.
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An Irishman's imagination never lets him alone, never convinces him, never satisfies him; but it makes him that he can't face reality nor deal with it nor handle it nor conquer it: he can only sneer at them that do, and be 'agreeable to strangers', like a good-for-nothing woman on the streets.