Collages (1964), p. 116
Context: Human beings can reach such desperate solitude that they may cross a boundary beyond which words cannot serve, and at such moments there is nothing left for them but to bark.
“I scarcely know myself which is most to be deprecated, a consolidation, or dissolution of the states. The horrors of both are beyond the reach of human foresight.”
Letter to William B. Giles (26 December 1825)
1820s
Context: An opinion prevails that there is no longer any distinction, that the republicans & Federalists are completely amalgamated but it is not so. The amalgamation is of name only, not of principle. All indeed call themselves by the name of Republicans, because that of Federalists was extinguished in the battle of New Orleans. But the truth is that finding that monarchy is a desperate wish in this country, they rally to the point which they think next best, a consolidated government. Their aim is now therefore to break down the rights reserved by the constitution to the states as a bulwark against that consolidation, the fear of which produced the whole of the opposition to the constitution at its birth. Hence new Republicans in Congress, preaching the doctrines of the old Federalists, and the new nick-names of Ultras and Radicals. But I trust they will fail under the new, as the old name, and that the friends of the real constitution and union will prevail against consolidation, as they have done against monarchism. I scarcely know myself which is most to be deprecated, a consolidation, or dissolution of the states. The horrors of both are beyond the reach of human foresight.
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Thomas Jefferson 456
3rd President of the United States of America 1743–1826Related quotes
Enoch Powell
(1912–1998) British politician
The Daily Telegraph (9 June 1975), from Enoch Powell on 1992 (Anaya, 1989), p. 144
1970s
J. B. Bury
(1861–1927) Irish historian and freethinker
Introduction<!-- pp. 3-4 -->
The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry Into Its Origin and Growth (1921)
Context: Science has been advancing without interruption during the last three of four hundred years; every new discovery has led to new problems and new methods of solution, and opened up new fields for exploration. Hitherto men of science have not been compelled to halt, they have always found ways to advance further. But what assurance have we that they will not come up against impassable barriers?... Take biology or astronomy. How can we be sure that some day progress may not come to a dead pause, not because knowledge is exhausted, but because our resources for investigation are exhausted... It is an assumption, which cannot be verified, that we shall not reach a point in our knowledge of nature beyond which the human intellect is unqualified to pass.
George Washington
(1732–1799) first President of the United States
Letter to Edward Newenham (20 October 1792) http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=WasFi32.xml&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=155&division=div1, these statements and one from a previous letter to Newenham seem to have become combined and altered into a misquotation of Washington's original statements to read:
1790s
Context: Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought most to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society.
Edmund Burke
(1729–1797) Anglo-Irish statesman
Source: A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful
“O mouths humanity seeks a new language
Beyond the reach of grammarians”
Ô bouches l'homme est a la recherche d'un nouveau langage
Auquel le grammairien d'aucune langue n'aura rien à dire
"Victoire" (Victory), line 21; p. 125.
Calligrammes (1918)
“All we know of the truth is that the absolute truth, such as it is, is beyond our reach.”
De Docta Ignorantia (On Learned Ignorance) (1440)