Norman Mailer (1923–2007) American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, film maker, actor and political candidate
Superman Comes to the Supermarket (1960)
Source: The Margarets (2007), Chapter 53, “We Margarets Walk” (p. 507)
Norman Mailer (1923–2007) American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, film maker, actor and political candidate
Superman Comes to the Supermarket (1960)
Henri-Frédéric Amiel (1821–1881) Swiss philosopher and poet
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Journal
Context: The efficacy of religion lies precisely in what is not rational, philosophic or eternal; its efficacy lies in the unforeseen, the miraculous, the extraordinary. Thus religion attracts more devotion according as it demands more faith,—that is to say, as it becomes more incredible to the profane mind. The philosopher aspires to explain away all mysteries, to dissolve them into light. Mystery on the other hand is demanded and pursued by the religious instinct; mystery constitutes the essence of worship, the power of proselytism. When the "cross" became the "foolishness" of the cross, it took possession of the masses.
“All those [events in history] were such dramas as we see now, only with different actors.”
Marcus Aurelius book Meditations
X, 27
Meditations (c. 121–180 AD), Book X
“All those whom history calls great
Left only empty names for us to venerate.”
Cao Xueqin book Dream of the Red Chamber
Source: Dream of the Red Chamber (c. 1760), Chapter 5
“Example is always more efficacious than precept.”
Samuel Johnson book The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia
Source: The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (1759), Chapter 29
Douglas Hurd (1930) British Conservative politician and novelist
Speech in Berlin http://www.kas.de/grossbritannien/en/publications/6555/ (18 April 2005)