“I am told this is farfetched idealism, to paint this happy, povertyless, crimeless, diseaseless world; I have been told I "ought to be behind the bars" for it.”
The Economic Tendency of Freethought (1890)
Context: "For it must needs that offences come, but woe to him through whom the offence cometh." The crimes of the future are the harvests sown of the ruling classes of the present. Woe to the tyrant who shall cause the offense!
Sometimes I dream of this social change. I get a streak of faith in Evolution, and the good in man. I paint a gradual slipping out of the now, to that beautiful then, where there are neither kings, presidents, landlords, national bankers, stockbrokers, railroad magnates, patentright monopolists, or tax and title collectors; where there are no over-stocked markets or hungry children, idle counters and naked creatures, splendor and misery, waste and need. I am told this is farfetched idealism, to paint this happy, povertyless, crimeless, diseaseless world; I have been told I "ought to be behind the bars" for it.
Remarks of that kind rather destroy the white streak of faith. I lose confidence in the slipping process, and am forced to believe that the rulers of the earth are sowing a fearful wind, to reap a most terrible whirlwind. When I look at this poor, bleeding, wounded World, this world that has suffered so long, struggled so much, been scourged so fiercely, thorn-pierced so deeply, crucified so cruelly, I can only shake my head and remember:
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Voltairine de Cleyre 78
American anarchist writer and feminist 1866–1912Related quotes
“I'm not a very happy person," I told him."But sometimes I can trick myself into thinking I am.”
Source: Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd
in his letter (1939) to his late model Dina Vierny; as quoted in Dictionary of artists’ models, Jill Berk Jiminez, Taylor and Francis 2001, p. 550
Variant: When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.
“Better that we leave the paint behind," Hans told her, "than ever forget the music.”
Source: The Book Thief
As quoted in R.v.R. : Being an Account of the Last Years and the Death of One Rembrandt Harmenszoon Van Rijn (1930) by Hendrik Willem van Loon
undated quotes
“I am not sick. I am broken. But I am happy to be alive as long as I can paint.”
Quoted in Time Magazine, "Mexican Autobiography" (27 April 1953)
1946 - 1953
“I would do anything to put him behind bars for life. I am glad he is no longer alive.”
On her father after discovering he raped her older sister, as quoted in Malta Biss, Jetzt spricht Nastassja http://www.bild.de/unterhaltung/leute/klaus-kinski/jetzt-spricht-nastassja-kinski-ueber-ihren-vater-28071840.bild.htm, Bild, January 13, 2013
“What I know of this world is what my senses have told me.”
[2001-10-11, http://museandamuse3.free.fr/press/articles_nme2.html, Vengence is ours (History of the band), NME, museandamuse3.free.fr, 2018-06-08, https://archive.li/J2FiB, no, 2018-06-08]