“[Human]] history is the story of that 'Good Fight', of the effort of man to attain that universal liberty to which, he feels himself born. All wars are but battles in this war. It is fought by the tongue and pen as earnestly as with the sword and shell. It is called by various names. The combatants rally under various banners. Whatever in human nature is hopeful, generous, aspiring, the love of God and trust in man, is arrayed on one side. The meaner passions, the baser purpose, stand upon the other.”

— George William Curtis

1860s, The Good Fight (1865)

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 "[Human]] history is the story of that 'Good Fight', of the effort of man to attain that universal liberty to which, he …" by George William Curtis?

George William Curtis 78

American writer 1824–1892

Related quotes

“All that we call human history—money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery—the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.”

Clive Staples Lewis book Mere Christianity

Book II, Chapter 3, "The Shocking Alternative"
Mere Christianity (1952)

“It is you, O God, who is being sought in various religions in various ways, and named with various names. For you remain as you are, to all incomprehensible and inexpressible. When you will graciously grant it then sword, jealous hatred and evil will cease and all will come to know that there is but one religion in the variety of religious rites.”

Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464) German philosopher, theologian, jurist, and astronomer

Great Thoughts Treasury http://www.greatthoughtstreasury.com/author/nicholas-cusa-also-nicholas-kues-and-nicolaus-cusanus?page=4

“Patronage is the sword and cannon by which war may be made on the liberty of the human race.”

John Tyler (1790–1862) American politician, 10th President of the United States (in office from 1841 to 1845)

Speech in Congress (24 February 1834) against the policies of Andrew Jackson.

“Of all the creatures that man kills for his amusement there is only one that he kills out of hatred—other men. Man hates nothing as much as himself. That is why war is called the leprosy of the human soul.”

Halldór Laxness book Kristnihald undir Jökli (bók)

Saknússemm II
Kristnihald undir Jökli (Under the Glacier/Christianity at Glacier) (1968)

“If humans fight the last war, nature fights the next one.”

Nassim Nicholas Taleb book Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder

Source: Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder (2012), p. 46

“For my part, I spent three years reading the history and literature of the Civil War, with special attention to that of the losing side. The people who emerged were human, all-too-human, but there was still the mystery of the encompassing passion which held them together, and this I have not yet penetrated. But in a dozen various ways I came to recognize myself in the past, which is at least an important piece of self-knowledge.”

Richard M. Weaver (1910–1963) American scholar

"Up from Liberalism” Modern Age Vol. 3, No. 1 (Winter 1958-1959), p. 25, col. 2.

“The liberty of man consists solely in this: that he obeys natural laws because he has himself recognized them as such, and not because they have been externally imposed upon him by any extrinsic will whatever, divine or human, collective or individual.”

Mikhail Bakunin book God and the State

God and the State (1871; publ. 1882)

“Empedocles tried to address the problem of change by saying that there is not one fundamental arche but four—earth, water, air, and fire—which generate all the material substances in nature by mixing together in various ways under the influence of forces he called Love and Strife.”

John Freely (1926–2017) American physicist

Source: Before Galileo, The Birth of Modern Science in Medieval Europe (2012), p. 287

“Another powerful principle of our nature, which is the spring of war, is the passion for superiority, for triumph, for power. The human mind is aspiring, impatient of inferiority, and eager for preeminence and control.”

William Ellery Channing (1780–1842) United States Unitarian clergyman

War (1816)

“The origin of our passions, the root and spring of all the rest, the only one which is born with man, which never leaves him as long as he lives, is self-love; this passion is primitive, instinctive, it precedes all the rest, which are in a sense only modifications of it. In this sense, if you like, they are all natural. But most of these modifications are the result of external influences, without which they would never occur, and such modifications, far from being advantageous to us, are harmful. They change the original purpose and work against its end; then it is that man finds himself outside nature and at strife with himself.”

Jean Jacques Rousseau book Emile, or On Education

Emile, or On Education (1762), Book IV

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

George William Curtis 78

Related quotes

Related topics