“A perfect life is a contradiction in terms.”
Swâmi Vivekânanda on Râja Yoga (1899), Ch. VI : Pratyâhâra and Dhâraṇâ
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Swami Vivekananda 261
Indian Hindu monk and phylosopher 1863–1902Related quotes
“For eudaimonism, an ethics of prohibition is a contradiction in terms.”
Source: Personal Destinies: A Philosophy of Ethical Individualism (1976), p. 30
“The phrase itself is a pompous contradiction in terms.”
1970s, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 (1973)
Context: So much for Objective Journalism. Don't bother to look for it here — not under any byline of mine; or anyone else I can think of. With the possible exception of things like box scores, race results, and stock market tabulations, there is no such thing as Objective Journalism. The phrase itself is a pompous contradiction in terms.
“You cannot have humane Zionism, it is a contradiction in terms.”
"An Interview with Israel Shahak" in Journal of Palestine Studies Vol. IV, No. 3 (1975), p. 3.
““Free competition enforced by law” is a grotesque contradiction in terms.”
The Objectivist Newsletter “Antitrust: The Rule of Unreason,” The Objectivist Newsletter, Feb. 1962, 1
Source: Pedagogia do oprimido (Pedagogy of the Oppressed) (1968, English trans. 1970), Chapter 1
1790s, The Age of Reason, Part I (1794)
Context: It is a contradiction in terms and ideas to call anything a revelation that comes to us at second hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation is necessarily limited to the first communication. After this, it is only an account of something which that person says was a revelation made to him; and though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it cannot be incumbent on me to believe it in the same manner, for it was not a revelation made to me, and I have only his word for it that it was made to him.
Rampart Institute, (Society for Libertarian Life edition), from 1977 speech, p. 14.
Good Government: Hope or Illusion? (1978)
“The freedom of affluence opposes and contradicts the freedom of community life.”
Source: The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays