Quotes about offer
page 18

Georges Bernanos photo
Maimónides photo
Heinrich Himmler photo
Vanna Bonta photo

“Penalty is different than punishment, because it offers something with which to regain honor.”

Vanna Bonta (1958–2014) Italian-American writer, poet, inventor, actress, voice artist (1958-2014)

essay "Justice vs. Punishment", Bonta recalling being reprimanded as a child, as quoted on the Waleg Celebrity News Archive. Vanna Bonta’s First Lesson in Justice http://www.waleg.com/celebrities/archives/005045.html, WALEG Celebrities, September 14, 2006. Justice vs. Punishment http://www.gurevitz.org/jim/justice.html, by Vanna Bonta

Babe Ruth photo
Arrian photo

“Next we have Obama's murderous use of America's military young for his and his party’s partisan political purposes. He kept U. S. soldiers in Iraq, a war which should never have been started, long after he had announced the war was un-winnable but just long enough to pile up heaps of dead and maimed American youngsters in order to make their withdrawal timely and useful for electoral purposes. Now we see Obama and his team keeping U. S. troops in Afghanistan long after he decided to surrender to the Islamists in that that war, and thereby knowingly enhance the strength, lethality, self-confidence, and ambitions of America’s most dangerous enemies by returning to them their key safe haven. Our troops are the cream of America's young and they ought not to be used by any president as if he was their owner. Obama, however, seems to regard them, as he does the unborn, as chattel to be disposed of as he and his advisers see fit to advance Democratic Party political prospects. Finally, we have Obama and his advisers seeking to financially enslave this generation of young Americans, and each generation that follows it, in order to pay for his health care program. Obama and his lieutenants are starting slow in this area, but the evidence of coming coercion, beyond the mandatory fine young people pay if they prove not to be servile, can be seen in West Virginia, where university students reportedly will not be allowed to matriculate unless they enroll in Obama Care This amounts to a 4-year term of indentured service for the privilege of paying extortionate tuition for a mediocre education offered by anti-American ideologues of Obama’s stripe. And make no mistake, these young people are not being threatened and ultimately coerced to forfeit their salary, savings, and future for the elderly and sick. They are being used to fund health care for the core groups, dare I say 'plantations', of the Democratic Party.”

Michael Scheuer (1952) American counterterrorism analyst

As quoted in "Obama and his party offer America's young … death, misery, and slavery" http://non-intervention.com/1143/obama-and-his-party-offer-america%E2%80%99s-young-%E2%80%A6-death-misery-and-slavery/ (2013), by M. Scheuer, Michael Scheuer's Non-Intervention.
2010s

Russell Brand photo
Leung Chun-ying photo

“If we had more land, we could provide space to non-profit organisations to offer more elderly home services … the elderly and their children could afford a better service.”

Leung Chun-ying (1954) Hong Kong politician

2015
Source: http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/education-community/article/1811121/cy-leung-saddened-absue-case-elderly-made-stand

Friedrich Engels photo

“The economist’s “demand” is not the real demand; his “consumption” is an artificial consumption. For the economist, only that person really demands, only that person is a real consumer, who has an equivalent to offer for what he receives.”

Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) German social scientist, author, political theorist, and philosopher

Die Nachfrage des Ökonomen ist nicht die wirkliche Nachfrage, seine Konsumtion ist eine künstliche. Dem Ökonomen ist nur der ein wirklich Fragender, ein wirklicher Konsument, der für das, was er empfängt, ein Äquivalent zu bieten hat.
Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy (1844)

Melanie Phillips photo
Periyar E. V. Ramasamy photo
Philip K. Dick photo
Tryon Edwards photo
James Burke (science historian) photo
Michael Crichton photo
Jürgen Klopp photo

“Mkhitaryan fits us like an arse on a bucket. What he offers is exactly what we need.”

Jürgen Klopp (1967) German association football player and manager

On signing Henrikh Mkhitaryan for Borussia Dortmund
Source: Jürgen Klopp’s best quotes: from heavy metal to hair transplants https://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/oct/08/jurgen-klopp-liverpool-manager-quotes

John Bright photo
Nicholas Wade photo
Michelangelo Buonarroti photo
Plutarch photo
Hillary Clinton photo
Brian Tyler photo
Thomas Jefferson photo
James Hudson Taylor photo
Newton Lee photo
Satoru Iwata photo

“Some argue that our success is short-lived and temporary. So, we now need to make efforts to constantly expand the player base by offering services and titles that can appeal, not only to those who have never played games, but also to those who play them hard.”

Satoru Iwata (1959–2015) Japanese video game programmer and businessman

Japan's Nintendo wins exclusive deal for Capcom's Monster Hunter 3 title http://www.sharewatch.com/story.php?storynumber=49593

“One bleeding-heart type asked me in a recent interview if I did not agree that ‘violence begets violence.’ I told him that it is my earnest endeavor to see that it does. I would like very much to ensure—and in some cases I have—that any man who offers violence to his fellow citizen begets a whole lot more in return than he can enjoy.”

Jeff Cooper (1920–2006) American journalist

Cooper vs. Terrorism https://www.sightm1911.com/lib/ccw/Cooper_vs_Terrorism.htm
Variant: One bleeding-heart type asked me in a recent interview if I did not agree that "violence begets violence." I told him that it is my earnest endeavor to see that it does. I would like very much to ensure — and in some cases I have — that any man who offers violence to his fellow citizen begets a whole lot more in return than he can enjoy.

James A. Garfield photo
Richard Stallman photo

“You see, some people have a talent for programming. At ten to thirteen years old, typically, they're fascinated, and if they use a program, they want to know: “How does it do this?” But when they ask the teacher, if it's proprietary, the teacher has to say: “I'm sorry, it's a secret, we can't find out.” Which means education is forbidden. A proprietary program is the enemy of the spirit of education. It's knowledge withheld, so it should not be tolerated in a school, even though there may be plenty of people in the school who don't care about programming, don't want to learn this. Still, because it's the enemy of the spirit of education, it shouldn't be there in the school.
But if the program is free, the teacher can explain what he knows, and then give out copies of the source code, saying: “Read it and you'll understand everything.” And those who are really fascinated, they will read it! And this gives them an opportunity to start to learn how to be good programmers.
To learn to be a good programmer, you'll need to recognize that certain ways of writing code, even if they make sense to you and they are correct, they're not good because other people will have trouble understanding them. Good code is clear code that others will have an easy time working on when they need to make further changes.
How do you learn to write good clear code? You do it by reading lots of code, and writing lots of code. Well, only free software offers the chance to read the code of large programs that we really use. And then you have to write lots of code, which means you have to write changes in large programs.
How do you learn to write good code for the large programs? You have to start small, which does not mean small program, oh no! The challenges of the code for large programs don't even begin to appear in small programs. So the way you start small at writing code for large programs is by writing small changes in large programs. And only free software gives you the chance to do that.”

Richard Stallman (1953) American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project

A Free Digital Society - What Makes Digital Inclusion Good or Bad? http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-digital-society.html#education; Lecture at Sciences Po in Paris (19 October 2011)]
2010s

Frederick Seitz photo

“The trouble is that you won't get the scientists to agree on a course of action. It is almost instinctive in science to accept contrary views, because disagreeing gives you guidance to experimental tests of ideas — your own and those offered by others….”

Frederick Seitz (1911–2008) American physicist

Explaining his opinion on why "the most beneficial kinds of research won't get done because the most politically attractive research will get the funding instead", in an interview for the George C. Marshall Institute http://www.marshall.org/article.php?id=21, (3 September 1997)

Harriet Harman photo

“Hague: I'd like to congratulate the Leader of the House on being the first female Labour member ever to answer Prime Minister's Questions. She must be proud, three decades on, to be following in the footsteps of Margaret Thatcher, who we on this side of the House and the Prime Minister so admire.
Harman: Well I thank him for his congratulations but I would ask him, why is he asking the questions today? Because he is not the Shadow Leader of the House - the Shadow Leader of the House is sitting next to him! Is this the situation in the modern Conservative Party; that women should be seen but not heard? And if I may, perhaps I could offer the Shadow Leader of the House a bit of sisterly advice: she should not let him get away with it!
Hague: Turning to domestic issues, I was going to be nice to the Rt. Hon. Lady - she has had a difficult week and she had to explain yesterday that she dresses in accordance with wherever she goes; she wears a helmet to a building site; wears Indian clothes to Indian parts of her constituency; presumably, when she goes to a Cabinet meeting, she dresses as a clown.
Harman: Well I would just start by saying that if I'm looking for advice on what to wear and what not to wear, the very last man I would look to for advice would be the man in the baseball cap!”

Harriet Harman (1950) British politician

During Prime Minister's Questions, 2 April 2008 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AsiKI7uCog&feature=related, with Deputy Conservative Party Leader, William Hague

Max Tegmark photo
Henry Scott Holland photo
Max Beerbohm photo

“In every human being one or the other of these two instincts is predominant: the active or positive instinct to offer hospitality, the negative or passive instinct to accept it. And either of these instincts is so significant of character that one might as well say that mankind is divisible into two great classes: hosts and guests.”

Max Beerbohm (1872–1956) English writer

Hosts and Guests (1918), Harper's Monthly ( August 1919 http://books.google.com/books?id=H2Q2AQAAMAAJ&q=%22Mankind+is+divisible+into+two+great+classes+hosts+and+guests%22&pg=PA425#v=onepage)
And Even Now http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext99/evnow10.txt (1920)

N. Gregory Mankiw photo
David Ben-Gurion photo
Antoine François Prévost photo

“Only experience or example can rationally determine which way the heart should incline. Now experience is not an advantage that it is open to everyone to acquire, since it depends on the various situations in which, by chance, we find ourselves. For many people, then, this leaves only example that can offer any guidance as to how they should exercise virtue.”

Antoine François Prévost (1697–1763) French novelist

Il n'y a que l'expérience ou l'exemple qui puisse déterminer raisonnablement le penchant du cœur. Or l'expérience n'est point un avantage qu'il soit libre à tout le monde de se donner; elle dépend des situations différentes où l'on se trouve placé par la fortune. Il ne reste donc que l'exemple qui puisse servir de règle à quantité de personnes dans l'exercice de la vertu.
Avis de l'auteur, p. 32; translation pp. 4-5.
L'Histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut (1731)

Isaac Asimov photo

“Inspect every piece of pseudoscience and you will find a security blanket, a thumb to suck, a skirt to hold. What does the scientist have to offer in exchange? Uncertainty! Insecurity!”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

Asimov's Guide to Science (1972), p. 15
General sources

Katharine Chang photo

“We don't give them fish. However, we teach them fishing. In that way throughout your life you always have fish to eat. That is Taiwan's way in our joint co-operation in offering assistance to Taiwan's diplomatic allies in the Pacific. All these countries value their relationship with us very much.”

Katharine Chang (1953) Taiwanese diplomat

Katharine Chang (2013) cited in " Taiwan rejects chequebook diplomacy tag over Pacific aid http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-02/an-taiwan-reject-chequebook-diplomacy-tag/4928456" on ABC, 2 September 2013

Frances Kellor photo
Johnny Cash photo

“The hairs on your arm will stand up.
At the terror in each sip and in each sup.
Will you partake of that last offered cup,
Or disappear into the potter's ground.
When the man comes around.”

Johnny Cash (1932–2003) American singer-songwriter

Song lyrics, American IV: The Man Comes Around (2002), The Man Comes Around

Margrethe II of Denmark photo
Muhammad bin Qasim photo

“Muhammad took the fort [of Rawar] and stayed there for two or three days. He put six thousand fighting men, who were in the fort, to the sword, and shot some with arrows. The other dependents and servants were taken prisoners, with their wives and children… When the number of the prisoners was calculated, it was found to amount to thirty thousand persons, amongst whom thirty were the daughters of chiefs, and one of them was Rai Dahir's sister's daughter, whose name was Jaisiya. They were sent to Hajjaj. The head of Dahir and the fifth part of the prisoners were forwarded in charge of Ka'ab, son of Mharak. When the head of Dahir, the women, and the property all reached Hajjaj, he prostrated himself before Allah, offered thanksgivings and praises… Hajjaj then forwarded the head, the umbrellas, and wealth, and the prisoners to Walid the Khalifa. When the Khalifa of the time had read the letter, he praised Almighty Allah. He sold some of those daughters of the chiefs, and some he granted as rewards. When he saw the daughter of Rai Dahir’s sister he was much struck with her beauty and charms, and began to bite his finger with astonishment…. It is said that after the conquest was effected and the affairs of the country were settled and the report of the conquest had reached Hajjaj, he sent a reply to the following effect. 'O my cousin! I received your life-inspiring letter. I was much pleased and overjoyed when it reached me. The events were recounted in an excellent and beautiful style, and I learnt that the ways and rules you follow are conformable to the Law. Except that you give protection to all, great and small alike, and make no difference between enemy and friend. God says, - Give no quarter to Infidels, but cut their throats. Then know that this is the command of the great God [Allah]. You shall not be too ready to grant protection, because it will prolong your work. After this, give no quarter to any enemy except to those who are of rank.”

Muhammad bin Qasim (695–715) Umayyad general

The Chach Nama, in: Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, Volume I, p. 172-173. Also partially quoted in B.R. Ambedkar, Pakistan or The Partition of India (1946)
Quotes from The Chach Nama

John S. Mosby photo
Sarah McLachlan photo
Pope Benedict XVI photo
Clive Barker photo
Henri Nouwen photo
Ken Ham photo

“We at Answers in Genesis have been saddened by recent news of a devastating earthquake that rocked Nepal on April 25. This earthquake and its aftershocks have killed thousands, levelled buildings, and left countless thousands homeless and hungry. It even triggered an avalanche on Mount Everest that resulted in fatalities. Now, the headline of an article in the New York Times declares, “Ancient Collision Made Nepal Earthquake Inevitable.” The author writes, “More than 25 million years ago, India, once a separate island on a quickly sliding piece of the Earth’s crust, crashed into Asia. The two land masses are still colliding, pushed together at a speed of 1.5 to 2 inches a year. The forces have pushed up the highest mountains in the world, in the Himalayas, and have set off devastating earthquakes.” But starting from the history recorded in God’s Word we know that this earthquake is not the result of a crash 25 million years ago and slow and gradual processes ever since. Instead, when we start with the history recorded in God’s Word, we know that this earthquake is one of the tragic consequences of the Fall and the global Flood of Noah’s day… Please be in prayer for Nepal and especially for our brothers and sisters in that country who are reaching out to victims with the love of Christ. Also, as they watch the news, many people will be asking how God could allow such a tragedy. I encourage you to equip yourself with the biblical answer to why there is death and suffering—because of Adam and Eve’s rebellion—so that you can answer their questions and point them toward the hope that we can have even in the midst of tragedy because of the sacrifice of Jesus and the salvation that He offers. It’s important to know that such tragedy is not God’s fault—it’s our fault because of our sin in Adam. God stepped into history in the person of His Son to rescue us from the problem we caused and the resulting separation from our God.”

Ken Ham (1951) Australian young Earth creationist

"Nepal Suffering After Major Earthquake" https://answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2015/04/30/nepal-suffering-after-major-earthquake/, Around the World with Ken Ham (April 30, 2015)
Around the World with Ken Ham (May 2005 - Ongoing)

Firuz Shah Tughlaq photo
Rob Enderle photo
Arthur Schopenhauer photo

“If from the wilderness the righteous and honest John were actually to come who, clothed in skins and living on locusts and untouched by all the terrible mischief, were meanwhile to apply himself with a pure heart and in all seriousness to the investigation of truth and to offer the fruits thereof, what kind of reception would he have to expect from those businessmen of the chair, who are hired for State purposes and with wife and family have to live on philosophy, and whose watchword is, therefore, Primum vivere, deinde philosophari [first live and then philosophize]? These men have accordingly taken possession of the market and have already seen to it that here nothing is of value except what they allow; consequently merit exists only in so far as they and their mediocrity are pleased to acknowledge it. They thus have on a leading rein the attention of that small public, such as it is, that is concerned with philosophy. For on matters that do not promise, like the productions of poetry, amusement and entertainment but only instruction, and financially unprofitable instruction at that, that public will certainly not waste its time, effort, and energy, without first being thoroughly assured that such efforts will be richly rewarded. Now by virtue of its inherited belief that whoever lives by a business knows all about it, this public expects an assurance from the professional men who from professor’s chairs and in compendiums, journals, and literary periodicals, confidently behave as if they were the real masters of the subject. Accordingly, the public allows them to sample and select whatever is worth noting and what can be ignored. My poor John from the wilderness, how will you fare if, as is to be expected, what you bring is not drafted in accordance with the tacit convention of the gentlemen of the lucrative philosophy? They will regard you as one who has not entered in the spirit of the game and thus threatens to spoil the fun for all of them; consequently, they will regard you as their common enemy and antagonist. Now even if what you bring were the greatest masterpiece of the human mind, it could never find favor in their eyes. For it would not be drawn up ad normam conventionis [according to the current pattern]; and so it would not be such as to enable them to make it the subject of their lectures from the chair in order to make a living from it. It never occurs to a professor of philosophy to examine a new system that appears to see whether it is true; but he at once tests it merely to see whether it can be brought into harmony with the doctrines of the established religion, with government plans, and with the prevailing views of the times.”

Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 5, pp. 160-161, E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, pp. 148-149
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), On Philosophy in the Universities

John Derbyshire photo
Pushyamitra Shunga photo
Murray N. Rothbard photo
Ai Weiwei photo
Michael Moorcock photo
Jean Paul Sartre photo

“To whomever gives a kiss or a blow
Render a kiss or blow
But to whomever gives when you are unable to return
Offer all the hatred in your heart
For you were slaves and he enslaves you”

À celui qui donne un baiser ou un coup
Rendez un baiser ou un coup
Mais à celui qui donne sans que vous puissiez rendre
Offrez toute la haine de votre coeur
Car vous étiez esclaves et il vous asservit
Acts 8 & 9
The Devil and the Good Lord (1951)

Sri Chinmoy photo

“There is no human being on earth who does not have the capacity to offer the message of peace to the world at large. But what is needed now is the soulful willingness.”

Sri Chinmoy (1931–2007) Indian writer and guru

#18991, Part 190
Twenty Seven Thousand Aspiration Plants Part 1-270 (1983)

Norman Mailer photo

“Everyone from the meanest starving cripple to an ambitious young man could expand to the optimism of an improving future because the man offered an unspoken promise of a future which would be rich.”

Norman Mailer (1923–2007) American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, film maker, actor and political candidate

Superman Comes to the Supermarket (1960)

Laisenia Qarase photo
Charles Boarman photo
Robert Boyle photo
John Fante photo
Ethan Hawke photo

“One of the things that most surprises me about my honourable Friend’s remarks is that he characterizes his proposal for state intervention in, and control of, industry as “innovation and a spirit of adventure” and condemns free private enterprise as “prosaic precedent”. This is a strange paradox. I would put it precisely the other way round. What he advocates is based on the “prosaic precedent” of many of our rivals who have to resort to wooing industry with artificial aids and have had remarkably little success at it. Recent events have shown that enterprising spirits still prefer our economic freedom to the restrictive swaddling clothes offered elsewhere. Possibly I am a romantic in this but I, for one, do not believe that our spirit of adventure is in need of artificial stimulation — nor do I believe that we can afford the wasteful application of our scarce resources which they would entail—we are neither desperate enough, nor rich enough, for such expedients to make economic sense. It is, of course, all the fashion today to cry in any commercial difficulty, “why doesn’t the Government do something about it.””

John James Cowperthwaite (1915–2006) British colonial administrator

But I would rather go back to the old days when even the most modest attempt by Government to intervene in commerce and industry was rudely rebuffed.
March 27, 1968, page 213.
Official Report of Proceedings of the Hong Kong Legislative Council

Ryū Murakami photo
John Steinbeck photo
Johannes Grenzfurthner photo
John McCain photo
André Maurois photo
Jacques Barzun photo

“Great works of art are great by virtue of being syntheses of the world; they qualify as art by fusing form and contents into an indivisible whole; what they offer is not "discourse about," nor a cipher to be decoded, but a prolonged incitement to finesse.”

Jacques Barzun (1907–2012) Historian

"Culture High and Dry" (1984), p. 14
The Culture We Deserve (1989)
Context: Scholarship has yielded to the irresistible pull that science exerts on our minds by its self-confidence and the promise of certified knowledge. But, to repeat, the objects of culture are not analyzable, not graspable by the geometric mind. Great works of art are great by virtue of being syntheses of the world; they qualify as art by fusing form and contents into an indivisible whole; what they offer is not "discourse about," nor a cipher to be decoded, but a prolonged incitement to finesse. So it is paradoxical that our way of introducing young minds to such works should be the way of scholarship.

Susan Sontag photo

“Literature offers not only myths but counter-myths, just as life offers counter-experiences — experiences that confound what you thought you thought, or felt, or believed.”

Susan Sontag (1933–2004) American writer and filmmaker, professor, and activist

Frankfurt Book Fair speech (2003)
Context: Literature is dialogue; responsiveness. Literature might be described as the history of human responsiveness to what is alive and what is moribund as cultures evolve and interact with one another.
Writers can do something to combat these clichés of our separateness, our difference — for writers are makers, not just transmitters, of myths. Literature offers not only myths but counter-myths, just as life offers counter-experiences — experiences that confound what you thought you thought, or felt, or believed.

John Ruskin photo

“The natural and right system respecting all labour is, that it should be paid at a fixed rate, but the good workman employed, and the bad workman unemployed. The false, unnatural, and destructive system is when the bad workman is allowed to offer his work at half-price, and either take the place of the good, or force him by his competition to work for an inadequate sum.”

Essay I: "The Roots of Honour," section 29.
Unto This Last (1860)
Context: “I choose my physician and my clergyman, thus indicating my sense of the quality of their work.” By all means, also, choose your bricklayer; that is the proper reward of the good workman, to be “chosen.” The natural and right system respecting all labour is, that it should be paid at a fixed rate, but the good workman employed, and the bad workman unemployed. The false, unnatural, and destructive system is when the bad workman is allowed to offer his work at half-price, and either take the place of the good, or force him by his competition to work for an inadequate sum.

W. H. Auden photo

“What the mass media offers is not popular art, but entertainment which is intended to be consumed like food, forgotten, and replaced by a new dish.”

"The Poet & The City", p. 83
The Dyer's Hand, and Other Essays (1962)
Context: What the mass media offers is not popular art, but entertainment which is intended to be consumed like food, forgotten, and replaced by a new dish. This is bad for everyone; the majority lose all genuine taste of their own, and the minority become cultural snobs.

Henry George photo

“Why should charity be offered the unemployed?”

Henry George (1839–1897) American economist

Source: How to Help the Unemployed (1894), p. 179
Context: Why should charity be offered the unemployed? It is not alms they ask. They are insulted and embittered and degraded by being forced to accept as paupers what they would gladly earn as workers. What they ask is not charity, but the opportunity to use their own labor in satisfying their own wants. Why can they not have that? It is their natural right. He who made food and clothing and shelter necessary to man's life has also given to man, in the power of labor, the means of maintaining that life; and when, without fault of their own, men cannot exert that power, there is somewhere a wrong of the same kind as denial of the right of property and denial of the right of life — a wrong equivalent to robbery and murder on the grandest scale.
Charity can only palliate present suffering a little at the risk of fatal disease. For charity cannot right a wrong; only justice can do that. Charity is false, futile, and poisonous when offered as a substitute for justice.

Abdullah Öcalan photo

“As long as it adheres to the democratic system and its state structure, every party can offer a solution without resorting to violence. There is no question here of either imposing a religion by force or breaking and shattering the structure of the state.”

Abdullah Öcalan (1949) Founder of the PKK

Translation of his defense testimony at his 1999 trial http://web.archive.org/20020203190623/www.geocities.com/kurdifi/ocelan.html.
Context: Every ideology and mode of belief can, if true, implement itself by using the resources of technology and above all those of the media without having to resort to violence. In other words, violence has become unnecessary. In fact things have got to the point where violence cannot be afforded. The rich variety of institutions and practices the democratic system offers is built on this social and scientific-technological development, and whatever problem it tackles, it offers a certain solution. It itself is the solution.
To go through the examples, the solution to religious wars is secularism. Here the standard and the implementation involve taking the approach that everyone is free to follow their religious beliefs and democratic criteria will apply to all of them. Democracy offers definite freedom of belief and this is the antidote to religious wars.
Again the same applies to the fields of thought and ideology. There is freedom of thought and conviction. It is allowed to work as one wants and implement one's beliefs as long as one does not infringe the rights of others in this respect. This also applies to political ideas and their expression in the form of parties. As long as it adheres to the democratic system and its state structure, every party can offer a solution without resorting to violence. There is no question here of either imposing a religion by force or breaking and shattering the structure of the state. Religion, thought and the parties based on them know to meet the standards of the democratic system of the state because they are based on them. If they don't know how to do this, then democracy gets the right to defend itself.
It is clear here that regardless of the social group they are based on (which might be a nation or an ethnic or religious group), beliefs, ideas and the parties through which they are expressed cannot, in the name of these beliefs and ideas, force the limits on which the state is based. There is no need for this, because it will render the problem they claim to be solving even worse. Consequently, there is no need for it, and, in any case, there are solutions within the system. These are the democratic rights of those groups. They are their freedoms of belief and thought. They are the parties. They are all types of coalitions. In the area of language and culture, the democratic solution is even more striking. This is the area where the greatest successes have been achieved. Because the intermingling of language and culture, these values that many national groups have assimilated together for centuries, do not want to separate and get weak and monotonous, but prefer to stay together to get enriched and achieve variety, strength and life. And the school and laboratory for this is democracy and its implementation with conviction.
Democracy is almost a garden of language and culture. The most developed and powerful principles of our day once again express this clearly. All European countries and North America are clear proofs of it. The attempt to suppress new religious, linguistic, cultural, intellectual and political developments during past centuries was the cause of all major wars, and resistance against suppression gave to wars which could be seen as understandable. Particularly in European countries this experience led to the development of a determined democracy in the wake of all these wars and led to the supremacy of the West. Western civilisation can, in this sense, be termed democratic civilisation. The democratic system is at least as important as scientific and technological superiority. Feeding off each other, they both became strong and achieved the status of world civilisation.

Al Gore photo

“President Bush offered a brief and half-hearted apology to the Arab world — but he should apologize to the American people for abandoning the Geneva Conventions.”

Al Gore (1948) 45th Vice President of the United States

Quotes, NYU Speech (2004)
Context: President Bush offered a brief and half-hearted apology to the Arab world — but he should apologize to the American people for abandoning the Geneva Conventions.
He also owes an apology to the U. S. Army for cavalierly sending them into harm's way while ignoring the best advice of their commanders.
Perhaps most importantly of all, he should apologize to all those men and women throughout our world who have held the ideal of the United States of America as a shining goal, to inspire their hopeful efforts to bring about justice under a rule of law in their own lands.
Of course, the problem with all these legitimate requests is that a sincere apology requires an admission of error, a willingness to accept responsibility and to hold people accountable.
And President Bush is not only unwilling to acknowledge error. He has thus far been unwilling to hold anyone in his administration accountable for the worst strategic and military miscalculations and mistakes in the history of the United States of America.

Florence Nightingale photo

“The offering is not to buy anything by suffering, but — If only the suppliant can do anything for God's children!”

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) English social reformer and statistician, and the founder of modern nursing

Notes from Devotional Authors of the Middle Ages (1873-1874)
Context: These old Mystics whom we call superstitious were far before us in their ideas of God and of prayer (that is of our communion with God). "Prayer," says a mystic of the 16th century, "is to ask not what we wish of God, but what God wishes of us." "Master who hast made and formed the vessel of the body of Thy creature, and hast put within so great a treasure, the Soul, which bears the image of Thee": so begins a dying prayer of the 14th century. In it and in the other prayers of the Mystics there is scarcely a petition. There is never a word of the theory that God's dealings with us are to show His "power"; still less of the theory that "of His own good pleasure" He has " predestined" any souls to eternal damnation. There is little mention of heaven for self; of desire of happiness for self, none. It is singular how little mention there is either of "intercession " or of " Atonement by Another's merits." True it is that we can only create a heaven for ourselves and others "by the merits of Another," since it is only by working in accordance with God's Laws that we can do anything. But there is nothing at all in these prayers as if God's anger had to be bought off, as if He had to be bribed into giving us heaven by sufferings merely "to satisfy God's justice." In the dying prayers, there is nothing of the "egotism of death." It is the reformation of God's church—that is, God's children, for whom the self would give itself, that occupies the dying thoughts. There is not often a desire to be released from trouble and suffering. On the contrary, there is often a desire to suffer the greatest suffering, and to offer the greatest offering, with even greater pain, if so any work can be done. And still, this, and all, is ascribed to God's goodness. The offering is not to buy anything by suffering, but — If only the suppliant can do anything for God's children!
These suppliants did not live to see the " reformation" of God's children. No more will any who now offer these prayers. But at least we can all work towards such practical " reformation." The way to live with God is to live with Ideas — not merely to think about ideals, but to do and suffer for them. Those who have to work on men and women must above all things have their Spiritual Ideal, their purpose, ever present. The "mystical " state is the essence of common sense.

Richard Rodríguez photo

“The scholarship boy does not straddle, cannot reconcile, the two great opposing cultures of his life. His success is unromantic and plain. He sits in the classroom and offers those sitting beside him no calming reassurance about their own lives. He sits in the seminar room—a man with brown skin, the son of working-class Mexican immigrant parents.”

Richard Rodríguez (1944) American journalist and essayist

Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez (1982)
Context: To many persons around him, he appears too much the academic. There may be some things about him that recall his beginnings—his shabby clothes; his persistent poverty; or his dark skin (in those cases when it symbolizes his parents’ disadvantaged condition)—but they only make clear how far he has moved from his past. He has used education to remake himself. They expect—they want—a student less changed by his schooling. If the scholarship boy, from a past so distant from the classroom, could remain in some basic way unchanged, he would be able to prove that it is possible for anyone to become educated without basically changing from the person one was. The scholarship boy does not straddle, cannot reconcile, the two great opposing cultures of his life. His success is unromantic and plain. He sits in the classroom and offers those sitting beside him no calming reassurance about their own lives. He sits in the seminar room—a man with brown skin, the son of working-class Mexican immigrant parents.

“If I were asked what education should give, I would say it should offer a breadth of view, ease of understanding, tolerance for others, and a background from which the mind can explore in any direction.”

Louis L'Amour (1908–1988) Novelist, short story writer

Source: Education of a Wandering Man (1989), Ch. 1
Context: As can be guessed from the title, this book is about education, but not education in the accepted sense. No man or woman had a greater appreciation for schools than I, although few have spent less time in them. No matter how much I admire our schools, I know that no university exists that can provide an education; what a university can provide is an outline, to give the learner a direction and guidance. The rest one has to do for oneself.
If I were asked what education should give, I would say it should offer a breadth of view, ease of understanding, tolerance for others, and a background from which the mind can explore in any direction.
Education should provide the tools for widening and deepening of life, for increased appreciation of all one sees or experiences. It should equip a person to live life well, to understand what is happening about him, for to live life well one must live with awarenes.
No one can get an education, for of necessity education is a continuing process. If it does nothing else, it should provide students with the tools for learning, acquaint them with the methods of study and research, methods of pursuing and idea. We can only hope they come upon an issue they wish to pursue.

Ursula Goodenough photo

“I love traditional religions. Whenever I wander into distinctive churches or mosques or temples, or visit museums of religious art, or hear performances of sacred music, I am enthralled by the beauty and solemnity and power they offer.”

Source: The Sacred Depths of Nature (1998), p. 173
Context: I love traditional religions. Whenever I wander into distinctive churches or mosques or temples, or visit museums of religious art, or hear performances of sacred music, I am enthralled by the beauty and solemnity and power they offer. Once we have our feelings about Nature in place, then I believe that we can also find important ways to call ourselves Jews, or Muslims, or Taoists, or Hopi, or Hindus, or Christians, or Buddhists. Or some of each. The words in the traditional texts may sound different to us than they did to their authors, but they continue to resonate with our religious selves. We know what they are intended to mean.

Russell Brand photo

“I feel some guilt about my lack of enthusiasm for acting, like it’s a bit ungrateful. Like I’ve let my teenage self down. Mind you, he let himself down a fair bit, the dirty little pervert. The dreams of my adolescent self were entangled with silvery screens and limousines, and I still feel that I need to offer up superficial sacrifices to his misguided altar. The fact is, though, I find filmmaking a boring process and its ends dubious. This could, of course, be due to the quality of the stuff I’ve done so far, as opposed to an essential rejection of an art form. Maybe if I’d been “R. P. McMurphy” or “The Elephant Man” or “Brian,” I’d feel different. It just wasn’t what I thought it would be. It’s not just the entertainment industry that has seemed like a mirage on arrival. What about clubs and parties? When I’m there I think, “Is this it? Is this all there is? Is this what all the fuss is about?” This feeling of disillusionment perhaps climaxed around the time of my divorce and the making of this subsequent film.”

Revolution (2014)
Context: Diablo and I fashioned my beard together in my trailer, together, as cautiously as you’d sculpt a peace treaty between two nations that prefer war to peace. The reality was that my identity outside of filmmaking had become more important to me. I was doing hours of yoga and meditation each day, I was going through a divorce, and the result was a kind of hirsute intransigence. I looked like the cliché of a terrorist and I behaved like one. Except the beard wasn’t the symbol, it was the cause. I feel some guilt about my lack of enthusiasm for acting, like it’s a bit ungrateful. Like I’ve let my teenage self down. Mind you, he let himself down a fair bit, the dirty little pervert. The dreams of my adolescent self were entangled with silvery screens and limousines, and I still feel that I need to offer up superficial sacrifices to his misguided altar. The fact is, though, I find filmmaking a boring process and its ends dubious. This could, of course, be due to the quality of the stuff I’ve done so far, as opposed to an essential rejection of an art form. Maybe if I’d been “R. P. McMurphy” or “The Elephant Man” or “Brian,” I’d feel different. It just wasn’t what I thought it would be. It’s not just the entertainment industry that has seemed like a mirage on arrival. What about clubs and parties? When I’m there I think, “Is this it? Is this all there is? Is this what all the fuss is about?” This feeling of disillusionment perhaps climaxed around the time of my divorce and the making of this subsequent film.

James Anthony Froude photo

“I know that in early ages men did form degraded notions of the Almighty, painting Him like themselves, extreme only in all their passions : they thought He could he as lightly irritated as themselves, and that they could appease His anger by wretched offerings of innocent animals.”

Letter X
The Nemesis of Faith (1849)
Context: I know that in early ages men did form degraded notions of the Almighty, painting Him like themselves, extreme only in all their passions : they thought He could he as lightly irritated as themselves, and that they could appease His anger by wretched offerings of innocent animals. From such a feeling as this to the sense of the value of a holy and spotless life and death — from the sacrifice of an animal to that of a saint — is a step forward out of superstition quite immeasurable. That between the earnest conviction of partial sight, and the strong metaphors of vehement minds, the sacrificial language should have been transferred onwards from one to the other, seems natural to me; perhaps inevitable. On the other hand, through all history we find the bitter fact that mankind can only be persuaded to accept the best gifts which Heaven sends them, in persecuting and destroying those who are charged to be their bearers.