" What I Believe http://www.unz.org/Pub/Forum-1930sep-00133" in The Forum 84 (September 1930), p. 136
1930s
Context: Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt. The more stupid the man, the larger his stock of adamantine assurances, the heavier his load of faith.
Eminent Indians (1947)
“Miracles occur in direct proportion to our willingness to have them.”
[Jerry Jerome, Instant Inspiration: Using Quotes to Guide You to Your Goals, Instant Wisdom Publishing, February 1, 2003, 35, 097261690X]
Attributed
Letter to a Member of the National Assembly (1791)
Context: Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites, — in proportion as their love to justice is above their rapacity, — in proportion as their soundness and sobriety of understanding is above their vanity and presumption, — in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.
“To me Moses is all men grown to gigantic proportions.”
Los Angeles Times interview (1956)
Context: To me Moses is all men grown to gigantic proportions.
He was a man of immense ability, immense emotions, immense humanness and immense dedication. There is something of Moses in each of us — the more there is, the better we are.
It is interesting to note that once Moses climbs Mt. Sinai and talks to God there is never contentment for him again. That is the way it is with us. Once we talk to God, once we get his commission to us for our lives we cannot be again content. We are happier. We are busier. But we are not content because then we have a mission — a commission, rather.
Lecture II, section 35.
The Eagle's Nest (1872)
Context: We shall be remembered in history as the most cruel, and therefore the most unwise, generation of men that ever yet troubled the earth: — the most cruel in proportion to their sensibility, — the most unwise in proportion to their science. No people, understanding pain, ever inflicted so much: no people, understanding facts, ever acted on them so little.
Source: The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression
“Heaven and hell seem out of proportion to me: the actions of men do not deserve so much.”
El infierno y el paraíso me parecen desproporcionados. Los actos de los hombres no merecen tanto.
As quoted in Borges Verbal (1999) edited by Pilar Bravo and Mario Paoletti, p. 156
