“In the country of the blind the one-eyed man is lucky to escape with his life.”

—  Celia Green

The Decline and Fall of Science (1976)

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 "In the country of the blind the one-eyed man is lucky to escape with his life." by Celia Green?
Celia Green photo
Celia Green 50
British philosopher 1935

Related quotes

Desiderius Erasmus photo

“In the country of the blind the one-eyed man is king.”
In regione caecorum rex est luscus.

Desiderius Erasmus book Adagia

Adagia (first published 1500, with numerous expanded editions through 1536), III, IV, 96
Also in the same passage of the Adagia is a variant: Inter caecos regnat strabus (Among the blind, the squinter rules).

Caitlín R. Kiernan photo

“In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man will poke out his eye to fit in.”

Caitlín R. Kiernan (1964) writer

12 December 2010
Unfit for Mass Consumption (blog entries), 2010

“In the valley of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.”

August Wilson Gem of the Ocean

Source: Gem of the Ocean

Guy De Maupassant photo

“In the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king.”

Guy De Maupassant Bel-Ami

Source: Bel-Ami

Niccolo Machiavelli photo

“In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king.”

Niccolo Machiavelli (1469–1527) Italian politician, Writer and Author

In terra di ciechi chi vi ha un occhio è signore.
Act III, scene ix
The Mandrake (1524)

“In the country of the blind, who are not as unobservant as they look, the one-eyed is not king, he is spectator.”

Clifford Geertz (1926–2006) American anthropologist

Clifford Geertz, Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology (1983) Basic Books, 2000, p. 58.

Colin Wilson photo

“In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. But his kingship is kingship over nothing. It brings no powers and privileges, only loss of faith and exhaustion of the power to act. Its world is a world without values.”

Colin Wilson book The Outsider

Source: The Outsider (1956), Chapter one, The Country of the Blind, referencing a quote by Desiderius Erasmus.
Context: He alone is aware of the truth, and if all men were aware of it, there would be an end of life. In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. But his kingship is kingship over nothing. It brings no powers and privileges, only loss of faith and exhaustion of the power to act. Its world is a world without values.

John Kenneth Galbraith photo

“Who is king in the world of the blind when there isn't even a one eyed man?”

John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006) American economist and diplomat

Source: The Age of Uncertainty (1977), Chapter 6, p. 180

Victor Hugo photo

“A one-eyed man is much more incomplete than a blind man, for he knows what it is that's lacking.”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Related topics