“The wise quickly dispense gossip, and the truth leads it to perish.”

1972

Last update Oct. 14, 2023. History

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“Gossip is charming! History is merely gossip. But scandal is gossip made tedious by morality.”

Cecil Graham http://books.google.com/books?id=8SzYgCNz-vwC&q="Gossip+is+charming+History+is+merely+gossip+But+scandal+is+gossip+made+tedious+by+morality"&pg=PT52#v=onepage, Act III
Variant: Scandal is gossip made tedious by morality.
Source: Lady Windermere's Fan (1892)

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“The truth of the matter is no society, not even our severely secularized technocracy, can ever dispense with mystery and magical ritual.”

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“Truth shall be firmly established, while aught else besides it is sure to perish.”

Báb (1819–1850) Iranian prophet; founder of the religion Bábism; venerated in the Bahá'í Faith

XVII, 11
The Kitáb-I-Asmá
Context: Should a person lay claim to a cause and produce his proofs, then those who seek to repudiate him are required to produce proofs like unto his. If they succeed in doing so, his words will prove vain and they will prevail; otherwise neither his words will cease nor the proofs he hath set forth will become void. I admonish you, O ye who are invested with the Bayán, if ye would fain assert your ascendancy, confront not any soul unless ye give proofs similar to that which he hath adduced; for Truth shall be firmly established, while aught else besides it is sure to perish.

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“It is wrong to think that belief in freedom always leads to victory; we must always be prepared for it to lead to defeat. If we choose freedom, then we must be prepared to perish along with it.”

Karl Popper (1902–1994) Austrian-British philosopher of science

Source: On Freedom (1958)
Context: It is wrong to think that belief in freedom always leads to victory; we must always be prepared for it to lead to defeat. If we choose freedom, then we must be prepared to perish along with it. Poland fought for freedom as no other country did. The Czech nation was prepared to fight for its freedom in 1938; it was not lack of courage that sealed its fate. The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 — the work of young people with nothing to lose but their chains — triumphed and then ended in failure. … Democracy and freedom do not guarantee the millennium. No, we do not choose political freedom because it promises us this or that. We choose it because it makes possible the only dignified form of human coexistence, the only form in which we can be fully responsible for ourselves. Whether we realize its possibilities depends on all kinds of things — and above all on ourselves.

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“Oh, be wise, Thou!
Instructed that true knowledge leads to love.”

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Romantic poet

Quote reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 419-23.
Lines (1795)

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