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Ancient World Quotes

Browse 52 quotes about Ancient World.

Ancient World Quotes

“When you fear nothing, you have nothing to fear”

InspirationalWarActionRomanceAdventureAbuseArmySlaveryFeministLegacyCaptureHistorical FictionRomePrincessEgyptErotic RomancePolitical PhilosophyControversialArabiaQueenRoman EmpireImprisonmentForbidden LoveWarriorsAbuse Of PowerAncient EgyptHeroineRomance SexyAncient RomeEmpireAugustusAncient GreeceGeneralAncient WorldEpic LoveStrong Female CharacterSwordsCaesarPlottingSlavery HistoryHidden AgendaHoraceMauritaniaCleopatra SeleneExploitedCleopatra S DaughterObeliskAbuse Of WomenAncient African HistoryPhlosophicalSwordspoint
Book:We the Great Are Misthought
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“Hubbard set up the Church of Scientology in Hollywood in 1954 for a reason. He understood that celebrity was increasingly a feature of American public life, and celebrities themselves were going to be worshipped as minor deities were in the ancient world. The idea was: if you could get them, think how many people would follow.”

PeopleIfsThinkingWorldIdeasReasonChurchUnderstoodHollywoodAncientFeaturesMinorsDeitiesPublic LifeScientologyAncient World
Author:Lawrence Wright
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“Were art to redeem man, it could do so only by saving him from the seriousness of life and restoring him to an unexpected boyishness. The symbol of art is seen again in the magic flute of the Great God Pan which makes the young goats frisk at the edge of the grove. All modern art begins to appear comprehensible and in a way great when it is interpreted as an attempt to instill youthfulness into an ancient world.”

MenWorldWayArtYoungMagicModernArt IsAncientEdgesSymbolsSavingUnexpectedSeriousnessGoatsRestoringInstillModern ArtFlutesGroveYouthfulnessAncient World
Author:Jose Ortega y Gasset
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“There is an old joke about socialism as the synthesis of the highest achievements of the whole human history to date: from prehistoric societies it took primitivism; from the Ancient world it took slavery; from medieval society brutal domination; from capitalism exploitation; and from socialism the name.”

WorldHumansWholeNamesAchievementHighestJokesCapitalismSlaveryAncientSocialismBrutalExploitationDominationHuman HistoryMedievalSynthesisPrehistoricAncient WorldOld Jokes
Book:Revolution at the Gates: A Selection of Writings from February to October 1917
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“Textbooks describe DNA as a blueprint for a body. It's better seen as a recipe for making a body, because it is irreversible. But today I want to present it as something different again, and even more intriguing. The DNA in you is a coded description of ancient worlds in which your ancestors lived. DNA is the wisdom out of the old days, and I mean very old days indeed.”

WorldWantMeanDifferentWisdomBodyTodayAncientDescriptionAncestorRecipesDnaOld DaysIntriguingTextbooksBlueprintsIrreversibleAncient World
Author:Richard Dawkins
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“war with poison and chemicals was not so rare in the ancient world ... An astounding panoply of toxic substances, venomous creatures, poison plants, animals and insects, deleterious environments, virulent pathogens, infectious agents, noxious gases, and combustible chemicals were marshalled to defeat foes - and panoply is an apt term here, because it is the ancient Greek word for 'all weapons.”

WorldWarTermAnimalHistoryEnvironmentCreaturesWeaponsPlantDefeatAncientAgentsSubstanceGreekPoisonChemicalsToxicInsectsFoeAncient GreekAncient WorldVenomousPathogens
Book:Greek Fire, Poison Arrows, and Scorpion Bombs: Biological and Chemical Warfare in the Ancient World
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“Perhaps the worst example of Smithsonian contempt for Jesus Christ is seen in its 1994 publication of a coffee-table book entitled Smithsonian Time Lines of the Ancient World ... This flagrant display of religious bigotry and discrimination in a book officially sponsored by the Smithsonian is intellectually and academically dishonest.”

WorldBookChristianJesusChristReligiousLinesWorstExampleJesus ChristTablesAncientCoffeeDiscriminationBigotryContemptDisplayEntitledPublicationAncient WorldReligious BigotrySmithsonian
Author:Tim LaHaye
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“What's amazing to me is how many of the issues facing women in the ancient world still linger today. Take Odysseus' wife, Penelope, a brilliant, resourceful woman who ends up in a terrible situation: in her husband's absence, she is being held hostage in her own home by men who claim to be courting her. She tries to make them leave, but because she's a woman they refuse, blaming their bad behavior on her desirability.”

MenWorldTryingStillsEndsHomeTodaySituationIssuesWifeTerribleHusbandBehaviorClaimsBlameAncientRefuseBrilliantAbsenceHostageResourcefulBad BehaviorOdysseusAncient WorldDesirability
Author:Madeline Miller
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“Even today, some opt for the comforts of mystification, preferring to believe that the wonders of the ancient world were built by Atlanteans, gods, or space travelers, instead of by thousands toiling in the sun. Such thinking robs our forerunners of their due, and us of their experience. Because then one can believe whatever one likes about the past - without having to confront the bones, potsherds, and inscriptions which tell us that people all over the world, time and again, have made similar advances and mistakes.”

PeopleThinkingWorldBelieveMadeTodayPastSpaceMistakeWonderSunComfortBuiltAncientBonesDuesLikesTravelerSpace TravelInscriptionsToilingAncient WorldForerunners
Book:An Illustrated Short History of Progress
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“Eratosthenes was the director of the great library of Alexandria, the Centre of science and learning in the ancient world. Aristotle had argued that humanity was divided into Greeks and everybody else, whom he called barbarians and that the Greeks should keep themselves racially pure. He thought it was fitting for the Greeks to enslave other peoples. But Erathosthenes criticized Aristotle for his blind chauvinism, he believed there was good and bad in every nation.”

WorldShouldHumanityNationsPureDirectorsBlindLibraryAncientGreekDividedCentreGood And BadFittingBarbariansChauvinismAncient WorldAlexandria
Author:Carl Sagan
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“There's a huge amount of work on Adam and Eve, from the ancient world to the present. Saint Augustine was obsessed with them.I don't know if it helps my research, but I get a big kick out of Mark Twain, who wrote "The Diaries of Adam and Eve." He wrote very funny stuff on them. I sometimes read things that are loosely related to what I'm thinking and writing about.”

IfsThinkingKnowsWorldWritingSometimesHelpingBigsStuffHugeAmountResearchMarkAncientSaintObsessedRelatedKicksAdamDiariesAdam And EveAugustineAncient WorldFunny Stuff
Author:Stephen Greenblatt
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“I think a lot of these terms, nationalistic things, somebody is an American, or somebody is a Frenchman, or somebody is a Jew, I don't know, it doesn't mean anything to me. You really should start augmenting these words, saying what kind. If you want to say somebody is a Jew, what do you mean by that? Does he have blonde hair? I think a lot of these ancient nationalistic and ethnic terms have kind of lost their meaning, or their meaning is so broad, it's nothing. It's like he's connected to the ancient world. Everybody is.”

IfsThinkingKnowsWorldWantShouldKindMeanDoeLostTermHairAncientJewConnectedBroadsBlondeFrenchmenBlonde HairNationalisticAncient World
Author:Ben Katchor
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“Many theories of the ancient world seem terribly childish today, a hodge-podge of fables and false comparisons.But our theories will seem childish five-hundred years from now.Every theory is based on some analogy, and sooner or later the theory fails because the analogy turns out to be false. A theory in its day helps to solve the problems of the day.”

WorldYearsHelpingProblemSeemsTodayTurnsFiveFailingTheoryHundredAncientSolveComparisonSooner Or LaterAnalogiesFablesAncient World
Author:Jacob Bronowski
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“Human consciousness arose but a minute before midnight on the geological clock. Yet we mayflies try to bend an ancient world to our purposes, ignorant perhaps of the messages buried in its long history. Let us hope that we are still in the early morning of our April day.”

WorldTryingHumansLongStillsPurposeConsciousnessMorningMinutesMankindMessagesAncientIgnorantClockBuriedMidnightAprilEarly MorningHuman ConsciousnessEcoSave Mother EarthAncient WorldMayflies
Book:The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History
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“What Art was to the ancient world, Science is to the modern: the distinctive faculty. In the minds of men the useful has succeeded to the beautiful. Instead of the city of the Violet Crown, a Lancashire village has expanded into a mighty region of factories and warehouses. Yet, rightly understood, Manchester is as great a human exploit; as Athens.”

MenWorldMindHumansArtBeautifulScienceCitiesModernUnderstoodAncientRegionsFacultyVillageFactoriesCrownsVioletExploitsManchesterDistinctiveAthensWarehouseAncient WorldLancashire
Book:Coningsby, Or, The New Generation
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“There is no justification for the common claim that Christianity was responsible for the abolition of slavery. The Negro slave trade - a far more infamous practice than slavery in the ancient world - was initiated, carried on and defended by Christian men in Christian countries.”

MenWorldCountryChristianReligionCommonChristianityPracticeAtheismClaimsResponsibleSlaveryTradeSlaveAncientJustificationAbolitionInfamousSlave TradeAncient WorldAbolition Of Slavery
Author:Margaret E. Knight
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“Gratitude is not a spiritual or moral dessert which we may take or push away according to the whims of the moment, and in either case without material consequences. Gratitude is the very bread and meat of spiritual and moral health, individually and collectively. What was the seed of disintegration that corrupted the heart of the ancient world beyond the point of divine remedy...? What was it but ingratitude?”

WorldHeartMayMomentsSpiritualMoralCasesDivineMaterialsGratitudeConsequenceAncientSeedsBreadMeatRemedyBe GratefulThanksgivingDessertWhimIngratitudeThanksgiving DayDisintegrationAncient World
Author:Noel 'Razor' Smith
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“For all the casual slurs about 'cultural imperialism', British imperialists were more interested in other cultures than anybody before or since, and, if they hadn't dug it up and taken care of it, we'd know hardly anything about the ancient world. What's important about a nation's past is not what it keeps walled up in the museum but what it keeps outside, living and breathing as every citizen's inheritance.”

IfsKnowsWorldImportantCarePastCultureNationsTakenCitizensAncientBritishBreathingMuseumsImperialismInheritanceCasualWhat's ImportantOther CulturesSlursAncient World
Author:Mark Steyn
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“While many have doubted the accuracy of the Bible, time and continued research have consistently demonstrated that the Word of God is better informed than its critics. In fact, while thousands of finds from the ancient world support in broad outline and often in detail the biblical picture, not one incontrovertible find has ever contradicted the Bible.”

WorldFactsSupportResearchCriticsAncientDetailsBroadsWord Of GodBiblicalConsistentlyAccuracyOutlinesDoubtedArchaeologyAncient World
Author:Norman Geisler
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“Astronomy is ... the only progressive Science which the ancient world produced.”

WorldScienceAccountsAncientAstronomyProgressiveAncient World
Book:History of the Inductive Sciences: I. The Greek school philosophy, with reference to physical science. II. The physical sciences in ancient Greece. III. Greek astronomy. IV. Physical science in the middle ages. V. Formal astronomy after the stationary period
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“In the ancient world individuals have sold themselves as slaves, in order to eat. So in society. Here is a witch-doctor who can save us from the sorcerers - a war-lord who can save us from the barbarians - a Church that can save us from Hell. Give them what they ask, give ourselves to them bound and blindfold, if only they will! Perhaps the terrible bargain will be made again. We cannot blame men for making it. We can hardly wish them not to. Yet we can hardly bear that they should.”

IfsMenWorldGivingShouldMadeWarGovernmentOrderAsksIndividualWishChurchLordHellBearsTerribleDoctorsBlameSlaveBoundsAncientWitchDoctor WhoBargainsBarbariansBlame MeAncient WorldBlindfoldsWitch Doctors
Author:C. S. Lewis
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“We who have lived before railways were made belong to another world. It was only yesterday, but what a gulf between now and then! Then was the old world. Stage-coaches, more or less swift, riding-horses, pack-horses, highwaymen, knights in armor, Norman invaders, Roman legions, Druids, Ancient Britons painted blue, and so forth -- all these belong to the old period. But your railroad starts the new era, and we of a certain age belong to the new time and the old one. We who lived before railways, and survive out of the ancient world, are like Father Noah and his family out of the Ark.”

WorldMadeAgeCertainFatherStagePeriodsHorseBlueAncientCoachesYesterdayErasRidingNow And ThenPacksKnightsArmorAnother WorldRailroadsRailwayLegionOld WorldNew EraArkInvadersDruidsAncient WorldBritonsHighwaymen
Author:William Makepeace Thackeray
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