“Human nature: vindictiveness lightly coated with dishonesty.”

—  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 "Human nature: vindictiveness lightly coated with dishonesty." by Celia Green?
Celia Green photo
Celia Green 50
British philosopher 1935

Related quotes

Allan Kardec photo

“They are the human hypocrites who represent a just God as being cruel and vindictive, and who imagine that they make themselves agreeable to Him by the abominations they commit in His name.”

Allan Kardec (1804–1869) systematizer of Spiritism

Source: The Spirits' Book, p. 105.
Context: If demons existed, they would be the work of God; but would it he just on the part of God to have created beings condemned eternally to evil and to misery? If demons exist, it is in your low world, and in other worlds of similar degree that they are to be found. They are the human hypocrites who represent a just God as being cruel and vindictive, and who imagine that they make themselves agreeable to Him by the abominations they commit in His name.

Joanne K. Rowling photo

“I mean, is ‘fat’ really the worst thing a human being can be? Is ‘fat’ worse than ‘vindictive’, ‘jealous’, ‘shallow’, ‘vain’, ‘boring’ or ‘cruel’? Not me.”

Joanne K. Rowling (1965) British novelist, author of the Harry Potter series

from Pansy Hermiones, 2006
2010s

Patricia A. McKillip photo

“He kissed her anyway, lightly on the cheek, before she turned to get her coat, thinking how long he had known her and how little he knew her and how little he knew of how much or little there was in her to know.”

Patricia A. McKillip (1948) American fantasy writer

The Snow Queen in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling (eds.) Snow White, Blood Red (1993), p. 363
Short fiction

George Orwell photo

“War damages, the fabric of civilisation not by the destruction it causes (the net effect of a war may even be to increase the productive capacity of the world as a whole) nor even by the slaughter of human beings, but by the stimulated hatred and dishonesty.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

Source: "As I Please," Tribune (4 August 1944)
http://alexpeak.com/twr/orwell/quotes/

George Orwell photo

“Although no doubt he was shrewd enough in detecting dishonesty, he seems wherever possible to have believed that other people were acting in good faith and had a better nature through which they could be approached.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"Reflections on Gandhi" (1949)
Context: I could see even then that the British officials who spoke of him with a mixture of amusement and disapproval also genuinely liked and admired him, after a fashion. Nobody ever suggested that he was corrupt, or ambitious in any vulgar way, or that anything he did was actuated by fear or malice. In judging a man like Gandhi one seems instinctively to apply high standards, so that some of his virtues have passed almost unnoticed. For instance, it is clear even from the autobiography that his natural physical courage was quite outstanding: the manner of his death was a later illustration of this, for a public man who attached any value to his own skin would have been more adequately guarded. Again, he seems to have been quite free from that maniacal suspiciousness which, as E. M. Forster rightly says in A Passage to India, is the besetting Indian vice, as hypocrisy is the British vice. Although no doubt he was shrewd enough in detecting dishonesty, he seems wherever possible to have believed that other people were acting in good faith and had a better nature through which they could be approached.

Orson Welles photo

“Race hate isn't human nature; race hate is the abandonment of human nature.”

Orson Welles (1915–1985) American actor, director, writer and producer

Orson Welles, "Race hate must be outlawed" (an editorial), Free World (July, 1944). http://www.wellesnet.com/orson-welles-race-hate-must-outlawed/
Source: [Higham, Charles, Orson Welles: The Rise and Fall of an American Genius, St. Martin's Press, New York, NY, 1985, 216, 0-312-31280-6, https://books.google.com/books?id=pJBlaIC-VG4C&lpg=PA216&dq=%22race%20hate%20isn't%20human%20nature%22&pg=PA216#v=onepage&q=%22race%20hate%20isn't%20human%20nature%22&f=false]

“Silence is a protective coating over pain.”

E. Lockhart book We Were Liars

Source: We Were Liars

Abu Sa'id Abu'l-Khayr photo

“There is nothing inside this coat except Allah.”

Abu Sa'id Abu'l-Khayr (967–1049) poet

Source: The Sayings and Teachings of the Great Mystics of Islam (2004), p. 97

“The domination of nature leads to the domination of human nature.”

Edward Abbey (1927–1989) American author and essayist

"A Walk in the Desert Hills", page 44
Beyond the Wall: Essays from the Outside (1984)
Context: If the life of natural things, millions of years old, does not seem sacred to us, then what can be sacred? Human vanity alone? Contempt for the natural world implies contempt for life. The domination of nature leads to the domination of human nature.

Related topics