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Quote by Richard M. Weaver

“Hysterical optimism will prevail until the world again admits the existence of tragedy, and it cannot admit the existence of tragedy until it again distinguishes between good and evil. . . Hysterical optimism as a sin against knowledge.”

Quote by Richard M. Weaver

Author

Richard M. Weaver

Richard M. Weaver was an influential American philosopher, born on March 3, 1910, and died on April 1, 1963. He is known for his profound insights into language, culture, and political philosophy, particularly for his work 'The Language of Art', which explored the nature of language and its relationship to reality. more

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“The issue ultimately involved is whether there is a source of truth higher than, and independent of, man; and the answer to the question is decisive for one’s view of the nature and destiny of man.”

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Book:Ideas Have Consequences: Expanded Edition

Source: Ideas Have Consequences: Expanded Edition

“No society is healthy which tells its members to take no thought of the morrow because the state underwrites their future.”

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Author:Richard M. Weaver

“The modern state does not comprehend how anyone can be guided by something other than itself. In its eyes pluralism is treason.”

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Book:Ideas Have Consequences

Source: Ideas Have Consequences

“The scientists have given [modern man] the impression that there is nothing he cannot know, and false propagandists have told him that there is nothing he cannot have.”

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Author:Richard M. Weaver

“Piety is a discipline of the will through respect. It admits the right to exist of things larger than the ego, of things different from the ego.”

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Book:Ideas Have Consequences: Expanded Edition

Source: Ideas Have Consequences: Expanded Edition

“The typical modern has the look of the hunted.”

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Book:Ideas Have Consequences

Source: Ideas Have Consequences

“Respecters of private property are really obligated to oppose much that is done today in the name of private enterprise, for corporate organization and monopoly are the very means whereby property is casting aside its privacy.”

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Book:Ideas Have Consequences: Expanded Edition

Source: Ideas Have Consequences: Expanded Edition

“The hero can never be a relativist.”

Book:Ideas Have Consequences

Source: Ideas Have Consequences

“The disappearance of the heroic ideal is always accompanied by the growth of commercialism. There is a cause-and-effect relationship here, for the man of commerce is by the nature of things a relativist; his mind is constantly on the fluctuating values of the marketplace, and there is no surer way to fail than to dogmatize and moralize about things.”

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Author:Richard M. Weaver

“The United States has lost her unique position as a leader in the progress of civilization and has taken up her place simply as one of the grasping and selfish nations of the present day.”

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Book:Letters of Charles Eliot Norton

Source: Letters of Charles Eliot Norton