“Has any man, or any society of men, a truth to speak, a piece of spiritual work to do; they can nowise proceed at once and with the mere natural organs, but must first call a public meeting, appoint committees, issue prospectuses, eat a public dinner; in a word, construct or borrow machinery, wherewith to speak it and do it. Without machinery, they were hopeless, helpless.”

— Thomas Carlyle

1820s, Signs of the Times (1829)

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Thomas Carlyle 481

Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian… 1795–1881

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