“Life is occupied in both perpetuating itself and in surpassing itself; if all it does is maintain itself, then living is only not dying.”

— Simone de Beauvoir

Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Simone de Beauvoir 152

French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher, po… 1908–1986

Sheri S. Tepper (1929–2016) American fiction writer

Arnole, in Ch. 45 : not in conclusion
The Visitor (2002)
Context: Ignorance perpetuates itself just as knowledge does. Men write false documents, they preach false doctrine, and those beliefs survive to inspire wickedness in later generations.... Conversely, some men write and teach about the truth, only to be declared heretic by the wicked. In such cases evil has the advantage, for it will do anything to suppress truth, but the good man limits what he will do to suppress falsehood.
One might almost make a rule of it: "Whoever declares another heretic is himself a devil. Whoever places a relic or artifact above justice, kindness, mercy, or truth is himself a devil and the thing elevated is a work of evil magic."

“Evil does not question itself. Only Hope questions itself.”

Craig Ferguson book Between the Bridge and the River

Between the Bridge and the River (2006)

“In accepting the bourgeois form of reason as Reason itself, Roszak does his bit to perpetuate its reign.”

Russell Jacoby (1945) American historian

Source: Social Amnesia: A Critique of Conformist Psychology from Adler to Laing (1975), p. 10

“The wise man reads both books and life itself.”

Lin Yutang book The Importance of Living

Source: The Importance of Living (1937), p. 388

“Above all, maintain the line of demarcation between parties; for it is only by maintaining the independence of party that you can maintain the integrity of public men, and the power and influence of Parliament itself.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Source: Speech in the House of Commons (22 January 1846), quoted in Selected Speeches of the Late Right Honourable the Earl of Beaconsfield, Volume I, ed. T. E. Kebbel (1882), p. 110