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Precarious Quotes

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Precarious Quotes

“As a matter of principle, humanity is precarious: each person can only believe what he recognizes to be true internally and, at the same time, nobody thinks or makes up his mind without already being caught up in certain relationships with others, which leads him to opt for a particular set of opinions.”

ThinkingMindBelievePersonsMatterCertainHumanityOpinionPrinciplesParticularCaughtBeing TrueCaught UpPrecariousRelationships With Others
Author:Maurice Merleau-Ponty
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“My hold on the past and the future is precarious and my possession of my own time is always postponed until a stage when I may fully understand it, yet this stage can never be reached, since it would be one more moment bounded by the horizon of its future, and requiring in its turn, further developments in order to be understood.”

MayMomentsWould BePastOrderTurnsMy OwnStageDevelopmentUnderstoodPossessionHorizonPrecarious
Book:Phenomenology of Perception
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“I should esteem it the extreme of imprudence to prolong the precarious state of our national affairs, and to expose the Union to the jeopardy of successive experiments, in the chimerical pursuit of a perfect plan. I never expect to see a perfect work from imperfect man. The result of the deliberations of all collective bodies must necessarily be a compound, as well of the errors and prejudices, as of the good sense and wisdom, of the individuals of whom they are composed.”

MenShouldWellsStatesBodyIndividualPerfectResultsPlansPrejudiceUnionsErrorsAffairExtremesPursuitExperimentsEsteemCollectivesImperfectGood SenseCompoundsPrecariousJeopardyDeliberationPerfect ManNever ExpectPerfect WorkImperfect Man
Book:The federalist papers
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“One good Man may take another's Word, if they so agree, but a whole Nation ought never to trust to any Honesty, but what is built upon Necessity; for unhappy is the People, and their Constitution will be ever precarious, whose Welfare must depend upon the Virtues and Consciences of Ministers and Politicians.”

PeopleIfsMenMayWholeNationsVirtueHonestyDependsOughtPoliticianConscienceBuiltConstitutionAgreeUnhappyMinistersWelfareGood ManPrecarious
Author:Bernard de Mandeville
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“In the wars against Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, as in so many later conflicts, British women seem to have been no more markedly pacifist than men. Instead, and exactly like so many of their male countrymen, some women found ways of combining support for the national interest with a measure of self-promotion. By assisting the war effort, women demonstrated that their concerns were by no means confined to the domestic sphere. Under cover of a patriotism that was often genuine and profound, they carved out for themselves a real if precarious place in the public sphere.”

IfsMenWayMeanHas BeensWarRealSelfSeemsFoundInterestEffortSupportConflictConcernProfoundMalesBritishGenuineFranceRevolutionarySpheresPromotionConfinedCountrymenPacifistCombiningPrecariousBritish HistoryNational InterestsAssistingSelf PromotionNapoleonic
Author:Linda Colley
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“[...] a morass of despair violence death with a thin layer of glass spread upon the surface where Love, a tiny crab with pincers and rainbow shell, walked delicately ever sideways but getting nowhere, while the sun [...] rose higher in the sky its tassels dropping with flame threatening every moment to melt the precarious highway of glass. And the people: giant pathworks of colour with limbs missing and parts of their mind snipped off to fit them into the outline of the free pattern.”

PeopleMindMomentsSunViolenceSkyMissingHigherFitDespairRoseGlassesPatternsSpreadSurfaceTinyFlamesGiantsColourLayersRainbowShellsThreateningLimbsHighwaysDroppingOutlinesPrecariousSidewaysCrabsTassels
Author:Janet Frame
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“In much the same way, motherhood has become the essential female experience, valued above all others: giving life is where it's at. Give birth in cities where accommodation is precarious, schools have surrendered the fight and children are subject to the most vicious mental assault through advertising, TV, internet, fizzy drink manufacturers and so on. Without children you will never be fulfilled as a woman, but bringing up kids in decent conditions is almost impossible.”

WayGivingChildrenKidsSchoolLife IsFightingCitiesImpossibleConditionsSubjectsTvsBirthInternetDrinkEssentialsFemaleMotherhoodAdvertisingDecentFulfilledAssaultViciousPrecariousAccommodations
Author:Virginie Despentes
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“Whether we are aware of it or not, every act of trust carries with it a shiver of fear. A favorable situation can become dangerous. Deep down we know that life is insecure and precarious. However, if we do trust, the shiver carries with it a philosophical optimism: Life, with all its traps and horrors, is good The bet is implicit in trust itself. If we could be sure of everyone and everything, trust would have no value - like money, if it were suddenly limitless, or sunshine, if there were always fine weather, or life, if we were to live forever”

IfsKnowsLife IsValuesSituationForeverDangerousFineHorrorOptimismPhilosophicalWeatherSunshineCarrieTrapsInsecureLimitlessDeep DownLive ForeverShiverImplicitPrecariousFine Weather
Author:Piero Ferrucci
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“Interference is a terrific page-turner, but it's also a haunting, powerful look at the way families and friendships entangle us all. Berry is a sharp-eyed, engaging writer, and she deftly captures the terrors, ruptures and intimacies of one seemingly ordinary neighborhood, always finding a precarious beauty in her characters' lives. This is a book that is terrifying, startling, and very hard to put down.”

WayLooksBookHardCharacterPowerfulFindingsPagesOrdinaryTerrorIntimacyNeighborhoodCaptureFamily And FriendsEngagingTerrificHauntingInterferenceBerriesPrecariousTurnerRuptureThis Is A Book
Author:Rebecca Godfrey
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“As our president bears no resemblance to a king so we shall see the Senate has no similitude to nobles. First, not being hereditary, their collective knowledge, wisdom, and virtue are not precarious. For by these qualities alone are they to obtain their offices, and they will have none of the peculiar qualities and vices of those men who possess power merely because their father held it before them.”

MenFirstsPoliticalFatherPoliticsPresidentQualityVirtueBearsKingsOfficeVicesCollectivesPeculiarSenateResemblancePrecariousKnowledge WisdomHereditaryCollective Knowledge
Author:Tench Coxe
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“I know truth is more like a mountain that has to be scaled. The peak of the mountain pierces the clouds and can only rarely be seen, and has never been reached. And what you see of it, moreover, depends upon the flank of the mountain you stand upon, and how exhausted getting even so far has made you. Virtue lies in looking upwards, toiling upwards, and sometimes joyously leaping from one precarious crag of fact and feeling to the next.”

KnowsMadeSometimesFactsFeelingsLyingNextVirtueDependsTruth IsMountainCloudsExhaustedPiercePrecariousToiling
Book:The President’s Child
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“Inclined to peace by his temper and situation, it was easy for [Augustus] to discover that Rome, in her present exalted situation, had much less to hope than to fear from the chance of arms; and that, in the prosecution of remote wars, the undertaking became every day more difficult, the event more doubtful, and the possession more precarious and less beneficial.”

WarEasyDifficultChanceSituationEventsArmsPossessionRomeTemperBeneficialExaltedUndertakingsDoubtfulPrecariousProsecutionAugustus
Book:The Modern Library Essential World History 4-Book Bundle: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Abridged); Montcalm and Wolfe; History of the Conquest of Mexico; The Naval War of 1812
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