“Men of the most brilliant intelligence can be born, live and die in error and falsehood.”

— Simone Weil

Source: Simone Weil : An Anthology (1986), Human Personality (1943), p. 69
Context: If a captive mind is unaware of being in prison, it is living in error. If it has recognized the fact, even for the tenth of a second, and then quickly forgotten it in order to avoid suffering, it is living in falsehood. Men of the most brilliant intelligence can be born, live and die in error and falsehood. In them, intelligence is neither a good, nor even an asset. The difference between more or less intelligent men is like the difference between criminals condemned to life imprisonment in smaller or larger cells. The intelligent man who is proud of his intelligence is like a condemned man who is proud of his large cell.

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Simone Weil 193

French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist 1909–1943

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