Will Durant Quotes
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It is true that even across the Himalayan barrier India has sent to the west, such gifts as grammar and logic, philosophy and fables, hypnotism and chess, and above all numerals and the decimal system.
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In progressive societies the concentration of wealth may reach a point where the strength of number in the many poor rivals the strength of ability in the few rich; then the unstable equilibrium generates a critical situation, which history has diversely met by legislation redistributing wealth or by revolution distributing poverty.
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Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance.
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If we have never been amazed by the very fact that we exist, we are squandering the greatest fact of all.
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In my youth I stressed freedom, and in my old age I stress order. I have made the great discovery that liberty is a product of order.
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As to harmonizing the theory of evolution with the Biblical account of creation, I do not believe it can be done, and I do not see why it should be. The story of Genesis is beautiful, and profoundly significant as symbolism: there is no good reason to torture it into conformity with modern theory.
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Perhaps it is one secret of their power that, having studied the fluctuations of prices, the bankers know that history is inflationary.
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Civilization exists by geological consent, subject to change without notice.
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In the last analysis civilization is based upon the food supply.
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History is mostly guessing; the rest is prejudice.
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Contentment is rare among men as it is natural among animals.
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A civilization is born Stoic and dies Epicurean.
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The world wisely prefers happiness to wisdom.
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When liberty exceeds intelligence, it begets chaos, which begets dictatorship.
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Every state begins in compulsion; but the habits of obedience become the content of conscience, and soon every citizen thrills with loyalty to the flag. The citizen is right; for however the state begins, it soon becomes an indispensable prop to order.
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Peace is an unstable equilibrium, which can be preserved only by acknowledged supremacy or equal power.
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Men decided that it was better to pay taxes than to fight among themselves; better to pay tribute to one magnificent robber than to bribe them all.
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A great civilization is not conquered from without, until it has destroyed itself from within. The essential causes of Rome's decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars.
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Cultivate your garden Do not depend upon teachers to educate you follow your own bent, pursue your curiosity bravely, express yourself, make your own harmony In the end, education, like happiness, is individual, and must come to us from life and from ourselves. There is no way; each pilgrim must make his own path. "Happiness," said Chamfort, "is not easily won; it is hard to find it in ourselves, and impossible to find it elsewhere.
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Read, think well of mankind, go to our libraries and rejoice.
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I came to think of myself, not as a dance and chaos of molecules, but as a brief and minute portion of that majestic process.
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Civilization is social order promoting cultural creation. Four elements constitute it: economic provision, political organization, moral tradition, and the pursuit of knowledge and the arts. It begins where chaos and insecurity end. For when fear is overcome, curiosity and constructiveness are free, and man passes by natural impulse towards the understanding and embellishment of life.
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To say nothing, especially when speaking, is half the art of diplomacy.
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Paul created a theology of which none but the vaguest warrants can be found in the words of Christ.