“Under the pressure of a war to the death, all that was best, all that was most human and gentle on each side was crushed out by military necessity. On the one side, the passion for a unified world, where every individual should live a free and full life in service of the world community, was overcome by the passion to punish spies, traitors, and heretics. On the other, vague and sadly misguided yearnings for a nobler, less materialistic life were cleverly transformed by the reactionary leaders into vindictiveness against the revolutionaries.”

—  Olaf Stapledon , book Star Maker

Source: Star Maker (1937), Chapter V: Worlds Innumerable; 3. Nautiloids (p. 69)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Under the pressure of a war to the death, all that was best, all that was most human and gentle on each side was crushe…" by Olaf Stapledon?
Olaf Stapledon photo
Olaf Stapledon 113
British novelist and philosopher 1886–1950

Related quotes

C.G. Jung photo
Peter Kropotkin photo

“But side by side with these customs, necessary to the life of societies and the preservation of the race, other desires, other passions, and therefore other habits and customs, are evolved in human association.”

Peter Kropotkin (1842–1921) Russian zoologist, evolutionary theorist, philosopher, scientist, revolutionary, economist, activist, geogr…

Source: Law and Authority (1886), II
Context: The hospitality of primitive peoples, respect for human life, the sense of reciprocal obligation, compassion for the weak, courage, extending even to the sacrifice of self for others which is first learnt for the sake of children and friends, and later for that of members of the same community — all these qualities are developed in man anterior to all law, independently of all religion, as in the case of the social animals. Such feelings and practices are the inevitable results of social life. Without being, as say priests and metaphysicans, inherent in man, such qualities are the consequence of life in common.
But side by side with these customs, necessary to the life of societies and the preservation of the race, other desires, other passions, and therefore other habits and customs, are evolved in human association. The desire to dominate others and impose one's own will upon them; the desire to seize upon the products of the labor of a neighboring tribe; the desire to surround oneself with comforts without producing anything, while slaves provide their master with the means of procuring every sort of pleasure and luxury — these selfish, personal desires give rise to another current of habits and customs.

Jacques Ellul photo
John Piper photo
Yitzhak Rabin photo

“Military cemeteries in every corner of the world are silent testimony to the failure of national leaders to sanctify human life.”

Yitzhak Rabin (1922–1995) Israeli politician, statesman and general

1994 Nobel Peace Prize lecture http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1994/rabin-lecture.html (10 December 1994)

Keshub Chunder Sen photo
Nelson Mandela photo

“A fundamental concern for others in our individual and community lives would go a long way in making the world the better place we so passionately dreamt of.”

Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) President of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist

Nelson Mandela on selflessness, Kliptown, Soweto, South Africa (12 July 2008). Source: From Nelson Mandela By Himself: The Authorised Book of Quotations © 2010 by Nelson R. Mandela and The Nelson Mandela Foundation http://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/mini-site/selected-quotes

Bruce Palmer Jr. photo

Related topics