| 23 Feb, 2009 |
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As you journey through life take a minute every now and then to give a thought for the other fellow. He could be plotting something. Two and two continue to make four, in spite of the whine of the amateur for three, or the cry of the critic for five. Any appeasement of tyranny is treason to this republic and to the democratic ideal. The art of progress is to preserve order amid change and to preserve change amid order. What most experimenters take for granted before they begin their experiments is infinitely more interesting than any results to which their experiments lead. Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason. There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. I sometimes think that God, in creating man, overestimated His ability. Always and never are two words you should always remember never to use. Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow. The English country gentleman galloping after a fox -- the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable. To be good, according to the vulgar standard of goodness, is obviously quite easy. It merely requires a certain amount of sordid terror, a certain lack of imaginative thought, and a certain low passion for middle-class respectability. The fact is, that civilization requires slaves. The Greeks were quite right there. Unless there are slaves to do the ugly, horrible, uninteresting work, culture, and contemplation become almost impossible. Human slavery is wrong, insecure, and demoralizing. On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the future of the world depends. The basis for optimism is sheer terror. Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people. Alas, I am dying beyond my means. A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it. Action is the last refuge of those who cannot dream. Only the shallow know themselves. As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular. To be willing to die for an idea is to set a rather high price on conjecture. The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple. The Berlin Wall is the defining achievement of socialism. Football is a mistake. It combines the two worst elements of American life. Violence and committee meetings. I have noticed that the people who are late are often so much jollier than the people who have to wait for them. Belief is the death of intelligence. Only the madman is absolutely sure. I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow. The man who is swimming against the stream knows the strength of it. Nothing recedes like success. There is no limit to stupidity. Space itself is said to be bounded by its own curvature, but stupidity continues beyond infinity. I try to know what I need to know. I make sure to know what I want to know. Science has proof without any certainty. Creationists have certainty without any proof. An ambassador is a man of virtue sent to lie abroad for his country; a news-writer is a man without virtue who lies at home for himself. Student: "Can you do problem number twelve?" Wyler: Twelve?...NO!...That problem is on the test. The truth of the matter is that window management under X is not yet well understood. Nothing is illegal if one hundred businessmen decide to do it. This calls for a very special plan of psychology and extreme violence. Sometimes it is more important to discover what one cannot do, than what one can do. If you choose not to live in a cluster, uh, dorm... Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, and a dark side, and it holds the universe together ... Oscar Wilde: "I wish I had said that." Whistler: "You will, Oscar; you will. Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms. Usenet is distributed network anarchy at its best---or worst, depending on what is posted on any particular day. My life is a simple thing that would interest no one. It is a known fact that I was born and that is all that is necessary. My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind. Imagination is more important than knowledge. I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. |
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