Source: Book of a Thousand Days
“Nothing so aggravates an earnest person as a passive resistance.”
—
Herman Melville
,
book
Bartleby, the Scrivener
Bartleby, the Scrivener (1853)
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Herman Melville 144
American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet 1818–1891Related quotes
“Passivity writhes in resistance to the progressive impulse of revolution.”
Práxedis Guerrero
(1882–1910) Mexican journalist and anarchist revolutionary
La resistencia del pasivismo se revuelve ahora contra el impulso progresista de la revolución.
Passivity and Rebellion (29 de Agosto 1909), Punto Rojo, N° 3, El Paso, Texas, translated by Javier Sethness-Castro. http://blackrosefed.org/i-am-action-praxedis-guerrero/
“Passive resistance and boycotting are now prominent features of every great national movement.”
Benjamin Ricketson Tucker
(1854–1939) American journalist and anarchist
Individual Liberty (1926), Passive Resistance
The Last Lecture (2007)
Context: How do you get people to help you? You can’t get there alone. People have to help you and I do believe in karma. I believe in paybacks. You get people to help you by telling the truth; by being earnest. I'll take an earnest person over a hip person every day, because hip is short-term, earnest is long term.
“It is possible to imagine a person so entirely that the image resists attempts to dislodge it.”
Amy Hempel
(1951) Short story writer
Source: The Collected Stories
“A person who knows all that is good and all that is true — as much as can be known — but does not resist evils, knows nothing.”
Homo qui scit omnia bona et omnia vera, quotcunque sciri possunt, et non fugit mala, nihil scit
Emanuel Swedenborg
(1688–1772) Swedish 18th century scientist and theologian
Apocalypse Explained #1180
“Women oppose change, receive passively, and add nothing of their own.”
Sigmund Freud
(1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis
Alledgedly written in 'The Psychical Consequences of the Anatomic Distinction Between the Sexes', but Freud neither says this nor argues this exact sentiment. Possible originates from Donna Stewart https://psychnews.psychiatryonline.org/doi/full/10.1176/pn.36.14.0009
Misattributed
Mahatma Gandhi
(1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India
This may be derived from lines in the movie Gandhi (1982); such statements have not been located among published sources.
Disputed
“I am a lover of my own liberty and so I would do nothing to resist yours.”
Mahatma Gandhi
(1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India
As quoted Quote in Justice and Democracy (1997), edit., Ron Bontekoe and Marietta Stepaniants, University of Hawai’i Press, p. 233.
1930s