“The average mind is slow in grasping a truth, but when the most thoroughly organized, centralized institution, maintained at an excessive national expense, has proven a complete social failure, the dullest must begin to question its right to exist. The time is past when we can be content with our social fabric merely because it is "ordained by divine right," or by the majesty of the law.” MindPastLawSocialDivineInstitutionsAverageOrganizedExpensesFabricProvenMajestyGraspingDivine RightAverage Minds Book:Anarchism: Top Crime Collections Source: Anarchism: Top Crime Collections
“A society like the Church, which claims to be Divine is perhaps more dangerous on account of the ersatz good which it contains then on account of the evil which sullies it. Something of the social labelled divine: an intoxicating mixture which carries with it every sort of license. Devil disguised.” EvilSocialChurchDangerousDivineDevilAccountsClaimsCarrieLicenseMixtures Book:Gravity and Grace Source: Gravity and Grace
“Those in authority within institutions and social structures attempt to justify their rule by linking it, as if it were a necessary consequence, with moral symbols, sacred emblems, or legal formulae which are widely believed and deeply internalized. These central conceptions may refer to a god or gods, the 'votes of the majority,' the 'will of the people,' the 'aristocracy of talents or wealth,' to the 'divine right of kings' or to the alleged extraordinary endowment of the person of the ruler himself.” PeopleIfsMayPersonsSocialWealthMoralTalentDivineKingsAuthorityConsequenceVoteInstitutionsSacredMajorityStructureExtraordinarySymbolsJustifyConceptionRulersAristocracyEndowmentEmblemsSocial StructureDivine RightDivine Right Of Kings Author:C. Wright Mills
“Economic man and the Calvinist Christian sing to each other like voices in a fugue. The Calvinist stands alone before an almost merciless God; no human agency can help him; his church is a means to political and social organization rather than a bridge to deity, for no priest can have greater knowledge of the divine way than he himself; no friend can console him - in fact, he should distrust all men; in the same fashion, Economic Man faces a merciless world alone and unaided, his hand against every other's.” MenWorldWayShouldHumansMeanFactsHelpingHandsChristianFacesPoliticalSocialVoiceChurchGreaterEconomicFashionDivineOrganizationBridgesAgencyPriestsDistrustDeitiesConsoleStand AloneNo FriendsSocial OrganizationFugue Author:Lionel Trilling
“Men who scorn the idea of submission to the divine Will and are outraged by the notion of a God who requires submission are among the first to demand total submission to the process in which we are involved and seem to attach a kind of moral imperative to willing participation in it. Any other attitude, so they say, is reactionary or escapist or anti-social. Perhaps, after all, they have found a divinity to worship; and, if they have, the only charitable comment must be: God help them!” IfsMenFirstsKindIdeasHelpingSeemsFoundSocialProcessAttitudeMoralDivineWillingInvolvedDemandWorshipNotionDivinityCommentParticipationSubmissionScornImperativesCharitableReactionariesGod HelpOutragedAnti SocialEscapistsDivine Will Author:Charles le Gai Eaton
“Since the early days, [the church] has thrown itself violently against every effort to liberate the body and mind of man. It has been, at all times and everywhere, the habitual and incorrigible defender of bad governments, bad laws, bad social theories, bad institutions. It was, for centuries, an apologist for slavery, as it was an apologist for the divine right of kings.” MenMindHas BeensBodyGovernmentLawSocialChurchEffortCenturyDivineTheoryKingsInstitutionsSlaveryAll TimeThrownMind And BodyHabitualDefendersBad GovernmentDivine RightIncorrigibleSocial TheoryBad LawsDivine Right Of Kings Author:H. L. Mencken
“There would be no history as we know it, no religion, no metaphysics or aesthetics as we have lived them, without an initial act of trust, of confiding, more fundamental, more axiomatic by far than any “social contract” or covenant with the postulate of the divine. This instauration of trust, this entrance of man into the city of man, is that between word and world.” KnowsMenWorldWould BeSocialCitiesDivineFundamentalsContractsMetaphysicsInitialsAestheticsCovenantEntrancesSocial ContractConfiding Book:Real Presences Source: Real Presences
“Every new social structure strives to come up with some kind of mythology of divine origin for its values and aims.” KindValuesSocialDivineAimStructureStriveCome UpMythMythologyStrifeSocial Structure Author:Zsuzsanna Budapest