“You will never have perfect men, Plato says, till you have perfect circumstances.”

— James Anthony Froude , book The Nemesis of Faith

Confessions Of A Sceptic
The Nemesis of Faith (1849)
Context: You will never have perfect men, Plato says, till you have perfect circumstances. Perhaps a true saying! — but, till the philosopher is born who can tell us what circumstances are perfect, a sufficiently speculative one. At any rate, one finds strange enough results — often the very best coming up out of conditions the most unpromising. Such a bundle of odd contradictions we human beings are, that perhaps full as many repellent as attracting influences are acquired, before we can give our hearts to what is right.

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James Anthony Froude 111

English historian, novelist, biographer, and editor of Fras… 1818–1894

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