Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer
"To the Indianapolis Clergy." The Iconoclast (Indianapolis, IN) (1883)
Part IV “Home” chapter 5 (p. 501)
Adulthood Rites (1988)
Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer
"To the Indianapolis Clergy." The Iconoclast (Indianapolis, IN) (1883)
Colum McCann book Let the Great World Spin
Let the Great World Spin (2009), The Ringing Grooves of Change
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist
On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense (1873)
Context: Are designations congruent with things? Is language the adequate expression of all realities?
It is only by means of forgetfulness that man can ever reach the point of fancying himself to possess a "truth" of the grade just indicated. If he will not be satisfied with truth in the form of tautology, that is to say, if he will not be content with empty husks, then he will always exchange truths for illusions.
Rajneesh (1931–1990) Godman and leader of the Rajneesh movement
Never Born, Never Died (2002)
Context: Tao mystics never talk about God, reincarnation, heaven, hell. No, they don't talk about these things. These are all creations of human mind: explanations for something which can never be explained, explanations for the mystery. In fact, all explanations are against God because explanation de-mystifies existence. Existence is a mystery, and one should accept it as a mystery and not pretend to have any explanation. No, explanation is not needed — only exclamation, a wondering heart, awakened, surprised, feeling the mystery of life each moment. Then, and only then, you know what truth is. And truth liberates.
Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism
7 July 1838
1830s, The Journals of Søren Kierkegaard, 1830s
Source: The Journals of Kierkegaard
James Blish (1921–1975) American author
Source: Short fiction, Midsummer Century (1972), Chapter 9 (p. 61)
Graham Greene (1904–1991) English writer, playwright and literary critic
New York Times (October 9, 1985)
Leo Strauss (1899–1973) Classical philosophy specialist and father of neoconservativism
Seminar on Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil (1971–1972)
“Whenever the truth threatens, he hides behind a thought.”
Elias Canetti (1905–1994) Bulgarian-born Swiss and British jewish modernist novelist, playwright, memoirist, and non-fiction writer
J. Agee, trans. (1989), p. 22
Das Geheimherz der Uhr [The Secret Heart of the Clock] (1987)