“He was a poor weak human being like themselves, a human soul, weak and helpless in suffering, shivering in the toils of the eternal struggle of the human soul with pain.”
The Informer (1925; London: New English Library, 1971) p. 139
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Liam O'Flaherty 4
Irish writer 1896–1984Related quotes
What Must We Do To Be Saved? (1880) http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38801/38801-h/38801-h.htm Section X, "The Evangelical Alliance."
Alternative translation:
The children of Adam are limbs of a whole
Having been created of one essence.
When the calamity of time afflicts one limb
The other limbs cannot remain at rest.
If you have no sympathy for the troubles of others
You are not worthy to be called by the name of "man".
Source: Gulistan (1258), Chapter 1, story 10
The Never-Ending Wrong (1977)
Context: In 1935 in Paris, living in that thin upper surface of comfort and joy and freedom in a limited way, I met this most touching and interesting person, Emma Goldman, sitting at a table reserved for her at the Select, where she could receive her friends and carry on her conversations and sociabilities over an occasional refreshing drink. She was half blind (although she was only sixty-six years old), wore heavy spectacles, a shawl, and carpet slippers. She lived in her past and her devotions, which seemed to her glorious and unarguably right in every purpose. She accepted the failure of that great dream as a matter of course. She finally came to admit sadly that the human race in its weakness demanded government and all government was evil because human nature was basically weak and weakness is evil. She was a wise, sweet old thing, grandmotherly, or like a great-aunt. I said to her, "It's a pity you had to spend your whole life in such unhappiness when you could have had such a nice life in a good government, with a home and children."
She turned on me and said severely: "What have I just said? There is no such thing as a good government. There never was. There can't be."
I closed my eyes and watched Nietzsche's skull nodding.
(1834-1, page 303) The Future. Re-used in Ethel Churchill (or The Two Brides) Vol. I, Chapter 31
The Monthly Magazine
“Amiable weaknesses of human nature.”
Vol. 1, Chap. 14. Compare: "Amiable weakness", Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Book x, Chapter viii.
The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire: Volume 1 (1776)