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Carl L. Becker Quotes

Historian

Carl L. Becker was an American historian known for his profound contributions to the philosophy of history. His research involved the interpretation of history and the relativity of history, which had a profound impact on later historians.

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All Mind History Ifs Speech Accepting Class Ideas Knows Logic Lying

Famous Carl L. Becker Quotes

“Virginia was in fact a landowning aristocracy, without nobility or merchant class, or any considerable small peasant farming class; and the other Southern colonies, except North Carolina, were on the whole similar to Virginia in these respects.”

Whole Facts Class Southern Nobility Farming Peasants Virginia Aristocracy Merchants Colony Carolina North Carolina

Author:Carl L. Becker

“The logic of all this seems to be that it is all right for young people in a democracy to learn about any civilization or social theory that is not dangerous, but that they should remain entirely ignorant of any civilization or social theory that might be dangerous on the ground that what you don't know can't hurt you ... a complete denial of the democratic principle that the general diffusion of knowledge and learning through the community is essential to the preservation of free government.”

Source: Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

“Logic is something the mind has created to conceal its timidity, a hocus-pocus designed to give formal validity to conclusions we are willing to accept if everybody else in our set will too.”

Ifs Giving Mind Accepting Willing Logic Conclusion Formal Validity Timidity Hocus Pocus

Author:Carl L. Becker

“All historians, even the most scientific, have bias, if in no other sense than the determination not to have any.”

Ifs History Determination Persistence Historian Bias

Author:Carl L. Becker

“Corporations have at different times been so far unable to distinguish freedom of speech from freedom of lying that their freedom has to be curbed.”

Different Lying Speech Corporations Freedom Of Speech Different Times

Author:Carl L. Becker

“No class of Americans, so far as I know, has ever objected . . . to any amount of governmental meddling if it appeared to benefit that particular class.”

Ifs Knows Class Particular Amount Benefits Meddling

Book:Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

Source: Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

“History is an indispensable even though not the highest form of intellectual endeavor.”

Form History Highest Intellectual Endeavor Indispensable

Author:Carl L. Becker

“My own mind is my own church.”

Life Mind Pain Church My Own

Author:Carl L. Becker

“To ask whether the natural rights philosophy of the Declaration of Independence is true or false, is essentially a meaningless question.”

Philosophy Asks Natural Rights Independence Meaningless Declaration Declaration Of Independence Natural Rights True Or False

Book:Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas

Source: Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas

“History is the memory of things said and done.”

Said Done Memories History Said And Done

Book:Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

Source: Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

“The significance of man is that he is insignificant and is aware of it.”

Men Belief Irony Significance Ironic Insignificant

Author:Carl L. Becker

“No one can deny that much of our modern advertising is essentially dishonest; and it can be maintained that to lie freely and all the time for private profit is not to abuse the right of free speech, whether it is a violation of the law or not. But again the practical question is, how much lying for private profit is to be permitted by law?”

Law Lying Time Modern Speech Abuse Profit Deny Practicals Advertising Free Speech Violation

Book:Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

Source: Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life

“Serious thinkers are few, and the world is ruled by crude ideas.”

World Ideas Serious Thinker Crude

Author:Carl L. Becker

“All historical writing, even the most honest, is unconsciously subjective, since every age is bound, in spite of itself, to make the dead perform whatever tricks it finds necessary for its own peace of mind.”

Writing Mind Age Honest Historical Bounds Tricks Spite Peace Of Mind Subjective

Author:Carl L. Becker

“Reason is incompetent to answer any fundamental question about God, or morality, or the meaning of life.”

Reason Answers Morality Fundamentals Meaning Of Life Incompetent

Author:Carl L. Becker

“Generally speaking, men are influenced by books which clarify their own thought, which express their own notions well, or which suggest to them ideas which their minds are already predisposed to accept”

Men Mind Wells Book Ideas Accepting Influence Speech Notion

Book:Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas

Source: Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas

“The value of history is, indeed, not scientific but moral: by liberalizing the mind, by deepening the sympathies, by fortifying the will, it enables us to control, not society, but ourselves - a much more important thing; it prepares us to live more humanely in the present and to meet rather than to foretell the future.”

Mind Important Values Moral Important Things Value Of History

Author:Carl L. Becker

About the Author

Born: September 7, 1873
Died: April 10, 1945
Known for: Historian
Quotes: 17

Books & Sources

Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of LifeRelated source material

Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political IdeasRelated source material

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