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Middle Ages Quotes

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Middle Ages Quotes

“Those who like to interpret historical facts symbolically may recognize in this the spirit of a specifically "modern" conception of the world which permits the subject to assert itself against the object as something independent and equal; whereas classical antiquity did not as yet permit the explicit formulation of this contrast; and whereas the Middle Ages believed the subject as well as the object to be submerged in a higher unity.”

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Book:Meaning in the Visual Arts
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“زندگی سخت بود. در سراسر قرون وسطی قسمت قابل توجهی از هر زندگی صرف تلاش برای زنده ماندن می شد. وقتی در سالی محصول کم بود، همچنان که به طور متوسط یک سال در هر چهارسال چنین بود، گرسنگی در پیش بود. وقتی در سالی محصول کافی برداشت نمی شد، گرسنگی قطعی حتمی بود.”

PovertyHistoryMiddle AgesBritish Historyتاریختاریخ اروپاEurope Historyتاریخ بریتانیافقرقرون وسطی
Book:At Home: A Short History of Private Life
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“A school’s purpose wasn’t to enlighten anybody or to make them into a critical thinker. Schools existed only to train people for jobs, dulling their ability for critical thinking in the process, so that they could readily accept authority and mindless routine. In fact, when I read about the history of the school system that was commonly used in the world, I discovered that it came from the Middle Ages and was originally designed to teach people religion. And what did religious people do? They accepted absurd ideas without questioning. The same system that was designed to brainwash them—full of rote learning, non-questioning, conformity, and punishment—was the same one that was still being used today. Why? Because it worked. At least most of the time. For some reason, it hadn’t worked on me.”

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Book:The Nihilist
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“Experiments in limiting reproduction to the undesirable classes were unconsciously made in mediæval Europe under the guidance of the church. After the fall of Rome social conditions were such that all those who loved a studious and quiet life were compelled to seek refuge from the violence of the times in monastic institutions and upon such the church imposed the obligation of celibacy and thus deprived the world of offspring from these desirable classes. In the Middle Ages, through persecution resulting in actual death, life imprisonment and banishment, the free thinking, progressive and intellectual elements were persistently eliminated over large areas, leaving the perpetuation of the race to be carried on by the brutal, the servile and the stupid. It is now impossible to say to what extent the Roman Church by these methods has impaired the brain capacity of Europe, but in Spain alone, for a period of over three centuries from the years 1471 to 1781, the Inquisition condemned to the stake or imprisonment an average of 1,000 persons annually. During these three centuries no less than 32,000 were burned alive and 291,000 were condemned to various terms of imprisonment and other penalties and 17,000 persons were burned in effigy, representing men who had died in prison or had fled the country. No better method of eliminating the genius producing strains of a nation could be devised and if such were its purpose the result was eminently satisfactory, as is demonstrated by the superstitious and unintelligent Spaniard of to-day. A similar elimination of brains and ability took place in northern Italy, in France and in the Low Countries, where hundreds of thousands of Huguenots were murdered or driven into exile.”

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Book:The Passing of the Great Race or the Racial Basis of European History
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“The Greeks made Space the subject-matter of a science of supreme simplicity and certainty. Out of it grew, in the mind of classical antiquity, the idea of pure science. Geometry became one of the most powerful expressions of that sovereignty of the intellect that inspired the thought of those times. At a later epoch, when the intellectual despotism of the Church, which had been maintained through the Middle Ages, had crumbled, and a wave of scepticism threatened to sweep away all that had seemed most fixed, those who believed in Truth clung to Geometry as to a rock, and it was the highest ideal of every scientist to carry on his science 'more geometrico.”

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Author:Hermann Weyl
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“The more formidable the contradiction between inexhaustible life-joy and inevitable fate, the greater the longing which reveals itself in the kingdom of poetry and in the self-created world of dreams hopes to banish the dark power of reality. The gods enjoy eternal youth, and the search for the means of securing it was one of the occupations of the heroes of mythology and the sages, as it was of real adventurers in the middle ages and more recent times. . . . But the fountain of youth has not been found, and can not be found if it is sought in any particular spot on the earth. Yet it is no fable, no dream-picture; it requires no adept to find it: it streams forth inexhaustible in all living nature.”

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Author:Ferdinand Cohn
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“The medieval church imposed fast days on which sexual intercourse and the eating of flesh were forbidden, but eating "cold" foods was permitted. because fish came from water, it was deemed cold, as were waterfowl and whale, but meat was considered hot food.”

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Book:Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World
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“We should alco recall the music with which all education begins. We have seen how our civilization, from the musical point of view, still remains indebted to the "Dark Ages' that invented the scale! [......] Up until the thirteenth century, there was no separation between musical language and poetic language: there was no poetry without melody; the poet was at the same time a musician. It is important to remember that at that time, if not everyone learned to read, everyone did learn to sing.”

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Book:Those Terrible Middle Ages[Debunking the Myths] [THOSE TERRIBLE MIDDLE AGES] [Paperback]
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“We should also recall the music with which all education begins. We have seen how our civilization, from the musical point of view, still remains indebted to the "Dark Ages' that invented the scale! [......] Up until the thirteenth century, there was no separation between musical language and poetic language: there was no poetry without melody; the poet was at the same time a musician. It is important to remember that at that time, if not everyone learned to read, everyone did learn to sing.”

PoetryEducationMusicMiddle Ages
Book:Those Terrible Middle Ages!: Debunking the Myths
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“By far the highest type of religious thought among the Ancients was that of their philosophers. With Saint Augustine, on the contrary, a new age was beginning, in which by far the highest type of philosophical thinking would be that of the theologians. True enough, even the faith of an Augustinian presupposes a certain exercise of natural reason. We cannot believe something, be it the word of God Himself, unless we find some sense in the formulas which we believe. And it can hardly be expected that we will believe in God's Revelation, unless we be given good reasons to think that such a Revelation has indeed taken place.”

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Book:Reason and Revelation in the Middle Ages
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“Magic begins in superstition, and ends in science. ... At every step the history of civilization teaches us how slight and superficial a structure civilization is, and how precariously it is poised upon the apex of a never-extinct volcano of poor and oppressed barbarism, superstition and ignorance. Modernity is a cap superimposed upon the Middle Ages, which always remain.”

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Author:Will Durant
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“The rising influence of lay piety is particularly marked upon the Mariological controversies of the late medieval period. Two rival positions developed: the maculist position, which held that Mary was subject to original sin, in common with every other human being; and the immaculist position, which held that contrary view that Mary was in some way preserved from original sin, and was thus to be considered sinless. The maculist position was regarded as firmly established within the High Scholasticism of the thirteenth century. The veneration of the Virgin within popular piety, however, proved to have an enormously creative power that initially challenged, and subsequently triumphed over, the academic objections raised against it by university theologians.”

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Book:The Intellectual Origins of the European Reformation
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“Eliza focuses on Christ’s expression, appalling in a serenity as disproportionate to the scene as the weeping Marys. Where is your anger? Eliza questions. Sunday by Sunday she asks and receives no answer. I am angry, I am furious! She knows the impropriety of these feelings; she knows Christ suffers for her immortal soul. Can I not be both grateful for the miracle and angry at the injustice? Who can look at Christ’s face, his jutting ribs, the discoloration of rot rising on the skin of his dying feet, his dying hands – who can look upon this man and lack fury?”

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Book:Aulisyn A Gothic Sci-Fi Novel
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“...Prophecy is like a treacherous woman. She takes your member in her mouth, and you moan with the pleasure of it and think, how sweet, how fine, how good this is... and then her teeth snap shut and your moans turn to screams... Prophecy will bite your prick off everytime,”

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Book:A Feast for Crows
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“Один із розділів «De Amore» розповідає про «любовні справи», а також про двори Марії та інших знатних леді - зібрання, які тепер здаються лише витонченою вигадкою: В однієї леді був цілком підхожий коханий. Проте згодом вона, не зі своєї вини, вступила у шлюб з іншим знатним чоловіком, після чого стала уникати свого коханого й відмовляти йому у звичних утіхах. Проте леді Ерменгарда Нарбонська описала погану вдачу леді такими словами: «Подальше укладання шлюбу не виключає попередньої любові, хіба в тих випадках, коли жінка цілком відкидає любов і рішуче налаштована взагалі більше не любити...».”

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Book:Life in a Medieval Castle
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“I saw in 'the wandering Jew' the personification of the Jewish people, exiled in the Middle Ages. Nevertheless, they are once again extremely rich, owing to their unfailing rude greediness and their indefatigable activity. With their hard-heartedness that they extend toward people of other faiths and races they are at the point of making themselves kings of the world. This people can thank its obstinacy that France will be Judized within fifty years. Already some wise Jews prophesy this frankly.”

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Author:George Sand
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“Like childhood, old age is irresponsible, reckless, and foolhardy. Children and old people have everything to gain and nothing much to lose. It's middle-age which is cursed by the desperate need to cling to some finger-hold halfway up the mountain, to conform, not to cause trouble, to behave well.”

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Book:Murderers and Other Friends: Another Part of Life
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