
"The Tercentenary of the 'Areopagitica'"
Two Cheers for Democracy (1951)
"The Tercentenary of the 'Areopagitica'"
Two Cheers for Democracy (1951)
As translated in A Dazzling Darkness: An Anthology of Western Mysticism (1985) by Patrick Grant
Context: The most powerful prayer, one wellnigh omnipotent, and the worthiest work of all is the outcome of a quiet mind. The quieter it is the more powerful, the worthier, the deeper, the more telling and more perfect the prayer is. To the quiet mind all things are possible. What is a quiet mind? A quiet mind is one which nothing weighs on, nothing worries, which, free from ties and from all self-seeking, is wholly merged into the will of God and dead to its own.
The Cultivation of Conspiracy (1998)
Context: Community in our European tradition is not the outcome of an act of authoritative foundation, nor a gift from nature or its gods, nor the result of management, planning and design, but the consequence of a conspiracy, a deliberate, mutual, somatic and gratuitous gift to each other. The prototype of that conspiracy lies in the celebration of the early Christian liturgy in which, no matter their origin, men and women, Greeks and Jews, slaves and citizens, engender a physical reality that transcends them. The shared breath, the con-spiratio are the "peace" understood as the community that arises from it.
Source: The Remains of the Day (1989), p. 244
Context: It is now some twenty minutes since the man left, but I have remained here on this bench to await the event that has just taken place – namely, the switching on of the pier lights. As I say, the happiness with which the pleasure-seekers gathering on this pier greeted this small event would tend to vouch for the correctness of my companion’s words; for a great many people, the evening is the most enjoyable part of the day. Perhaps, then, there is something to his advice that I should cease looking back so much, that I should adopt a more positive outlook and try to make the best of what remains of my day. After all, what can we ever gain in forever looking back and blaming ourselves if our lives have not turned out quite as we might have wished? The hard reality is, surely, that for the likes of you and I, there is little choice other than to leave our fate, ultimately, in the hands of those great gentlemen at the hub of this world who employ our services. What is the point in worrying oneself too much about what one could or could not have done to control the course one’s life took? Surely it is enough that the likes of you and I at least try to make our small contribution count for something true and worthy. And if some of us are prepared to sacrifice much in life in order to pursue such aspirations, surely that is in itself, whatever the outcome, cause for pride and contentment.
“Three blokes go into a pub. Something happens. The outcome was hilarious!
Episode 1, 1:36”
Is It Bill Bailey? (TV, 1998)
Source: Your Job-Hunt Ltd – Advice from an Award-Winning Asian Headhunter (2003), Successful Recruitment in a Week (2012) https://books.google.ae/books?idp24GkAsgjGEC&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIGjAA#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, Managing Teams in a Week (2013) https://books.google.ae/books?idqZjO9_ov74EC&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIIDAB#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, Secrets of Success at Work – 50 techniques to excel (2014) https://books.google.ae/books?id4S7vAgAAQBAJ&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIJjAC#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, Management in 4 Weeks – the Complete Guide to Success Teach Yourself series (2015) https://books.google.ae/books?idb98hBAAAQBAJ&pgPT478&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEINzAF#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, p.249
Context: Leading a group of people in a team involves so many variables including each team member’s personality, expectations, experience and ambitions. Putting a group of people together can produce all kinds of outcomes – sometimes negative... The role of a team leader or manager is to minimize any potential negative outcomes while maximizing the positive potential of the team.
The Education of Henry Adams (1907)
Context: Loving paradox, Brooks, with the advantages of ten years' study, had swept away much rubbish in the effort to build up a new line of thought for himself, but he found that no paradox compared with that of daily events. The facts were constantly outrunning his thoughts. The instability was greater than he calculated; the speed of acceleration passed bounds. Among other general rules he laid down the paradox that, in the social disequilibrium between capital and labor, the logical outcome was not collectivism, but anarchism; and Henry made note of it for study.
As quoted in "World Series Prediction: 'Pirates in Six Games,' Says Clemente" by Bill Nunn, Jr. in The New Pittsburgh Courier (October 8, 1960), p. 25
Baseball-related, <big><big>1960s</big></big>, <big>1960</big>
Context: "The Yankees aren't going to frighten this club. Except for power, we are a better all-round club than the Yankees and this is going to pay off in a world championship for Pittsburgh in six games." Clemente [... ] isn't worried about the Pirates being affected by Series jitters. "We don't have that kind of a club. We've been a relaxed team all season and I expect us to be the same in the Series. Pressure didn't get us down during the National League race. We fought off Milwaukee, St. Louis and Los Angeles without cracking. Now that we have come this far, we aren't going to look back now. As a team I would have to rate the Braves over the Yankees. If the Braves had won the pennant, I believe they would have been good enough to beat the Yankees, too. We have a better field club and better pitching than they do. We'll get our share of runs, too." Clemente, who played in Yankee Stadium during the All-Star Game, admitted the late afternoon shadows in the New York park could be a disadvantage to the Pirates outfielders. "The ball is hard to follow and it may give us some trouble. I really don't think it will make a difference in the outcome of the Series though."
Edinburgh University Union (1969)
The Environmental Revolution: Speeches on Conservation, 1962–77 (1978)
Context: The sheer weight of numbers of the human population, our habitations, our machinery and our ruthless exploitation of the living and organic resources of the earth; together these are changing our whole environment. This is what we call progress and much of this development is naturally to the direct and welcome benefit of mankind. However, we cannot at the same time ignore the awkward consequences and the most direct and menacing, but not the only consequence of this change, is pollution... Pollution is a direct outcome of man's ruthless exploitation of the earth's resources. Experience shows that the growth of successful organic populations is eventually balanced by the destruction of its own habitat. The vast man-made deserts show that the human population started this process long ago. There are two important differences today. In the first place the process has gone from a walking pace to a breakneck gallop. Secondly we know exactly what is happening. If not exactly in all cases, we know enough to appreciate what is happening and the need to take care... Pollution is no longer a matter of local incidents, today it has the whole biosphere in its grip. The processes which devastated the Welsh valleys a hundred years ago are now at work, over, on and under the earth and the oceans. Even if we bury all this waste underground there still remains the risk that toxic materials through chemical reactions will be washed out and into underground water courses. If ever there was an area of research more closely related to human welfare it is the problem of the safe disposal of waste and effluents... The fact is that we have got to make a choice between human prosperity on the one hand and the total well-being of the planet Earth on the other. Even then it is hardly a choice because if we only look for human prosperity we shall certainly destroy by pollution the earth and the human population which has existed on it for millions of years... If the world pollution situation is not critical at the moment it is as certain as anything can be that the situation will become increasingly intolerable within a very short time. The situation can be controlled and even reversed but it demands co-operation on a scale and intensity beyond anything achieved so far... I realise that there are any number of vital causes to be fought for, I sympathise with people who work up a passionate concern about the all too many examples of inhumanity, injustice, and unfairness, but behind all this hangs a really deadly cloud. Still largely unnoticed and unrecognised, the process of destroying our natural environment is gathering speed and momentum. If we fail to cope with this challenge, all the other problems will pale into insignificance.
Source: 1890s, The Principles of Psychology (1890), Ch. 28
Context: This world might be a world in which all things differed, and in which what properties there were were ultimate and had no farther predicates. In such a world there would be as many kinds as there were separate things. We could never subsume a new thing under an old kind; or if we could, no consequences would follow. Or, again, this might be a world in which innumerable things were of a kind, but in which no concrete thing remained of the same kind long, but all objects were in a flux. Here again, though we could subsume and infer, our logic would be of no practical use to us, for the subjects of our propositions would have changed whilst we were talking. In such worlds logical relations would obtain, and be known (doubtless) as they are now, but they would form a merely theoretic scheme and be of no use for the conduct of life. But our world is no such world. It is a very peculiar world, and plays right into logic's hands. Some of the things, at least, which it contains are of the same kind as other things; some of them remain always of the kind of which they once were; and some of the properties of them cohere indissolubly and are always found together. Which things these latter things are we learn by experience in the strict sense of the word, and the results of the experience are embodied in 'empirical propositions.' Whenever such a thing is met with by us now, our sagacity notes it to be of a certain kind; our learning immediately recalls that kind's kind, and then that kind's kind, and so on; so that a moment's thinking may make us aware that the thing is of a kind so remote that we could never have directly perceived the connection. The flight to this last kind over the heads of the intermediaries is the essential feature of the intellectual operation here. Evidently it is a pure outcome of our sense for apprehending serial increase; and, unlike the several propositions themselves which make up the series (and which may all be empirical), it has nothing to do with the time- and space-order in which the things have been experienced.
1850s, Latter-Day Pamphlets (1850), Downing Street (April 1, 1850)
Context: What a People are the poor Thibet idolaters, compared with us and our "religions," which issue in the worship of King Hudson as our Dalai-Lama! They, across such hulls of abject ignorance, have seen into the heart of the matter; we, with our torches of knowledge everywhere brandishing themselves, and such a human enlightenment as never was before, have quite missed it. Reverence for Human Worth, earnest devout search for it and encouragement of it, loyal furtherance and obedience to it: this, I say, is the outcome and essence of all true "religions," and was and ever will be. We have not known this. No; loud as our tongues sometimes go in that direction, we have no true reverence for Human Intelligence, for Human Worth and Wisdom: none, or too little,—and I pray for a restoration of such reverence, as for the change from Stygian darkness to Heavenly light, as for the return of life to poor sick moribund Society and all its interests. Human Intelligence means little for most of us but Beaver Contrivance, which produces spinning-mules, cheap cotton, and large fortunes. Wisdom, unless it give us railway scrip, is not wise. True nevertheless it forever remains that Intellect is the real object of reverence, and of devout prayer, and zealous wish and pursuit, among the sons of men; and even, well understood, the one object.
“No outcome was preordained, but nothing would come easily. Few things of value do.”
Source: My Share Of The Task (2013), p. 278
Context: As the story unfolds many things appear: extraordinary sacrifice and teamwork, often alongside an atmosphere of mistrust, uncertainty, media scrutiny, and politics. There is a temptation to seek a single hero or culprit- a person, group, or policy- that emerges as the decisive factor. This makes for better intrigue, but it's a false drama. To do so is to oversimplify the war, the players, and Afghanistan itself. Because despite their relevance as contributing factors, I found no single personality, decision, relationship, or event that determined the outcome or even dominated the direction of events. Afghanistan did that. Only Afghanistan, with her deep scars and opaque complexity, emerged as the essential reality and dominant character. On her brutal terrain, and in the minds of her people, the struggle was to be waged and decided. No outcome was preordained, but nothing would come easily. Few things of value do.
When I look at the overall diplomacy of the free world, particularly of the U.S., I can only see a repeat pattern of the same attempts made while hoping to obtain a different result. Something's got to change.
As quoted by Felice Friedson, Iranian Crown Prince: Ahmadinejad's regime is "delicate and fragile" http://www.rezapahlavi.org/details_article.php?article=459&page=2, August 12, 2010.
Interviews, 2010
As quoted in Damien McElroy, Exiled Crown Prince campaigns to bring Arab Spring to Iran http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9117525/Exiled-Crown-Prince-campaigns-to-bring-Arab-Spring-to-Iran.html. The Telegraph. March 2, 2012.
Interviews, 2012
Page 107.
Thinking in Systems: A Primer (2008), Part two: systems and us
Source: Democracy for the Few (2010 [1974]), sixth edition, Chapter 17, p. 320
Source: Discriminations and Disparities (2018), p. 17.
Plaid Cymru needs to earn trust of voters, Leanne Wood says https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-41679247, BBC News, 20 October 2017
2017
Jeremy Corbyn risks helping case for hard Brexit, Plaid leader warns https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-38572882 BBC News (10 January 2017)
2017
Brexit: MPs reject Theresa May's deal for a second time https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47547887 BBC News (13 March 2019)
2010s, On Brexit
Letter to Friedrich Ebert after the Treaty of Versailles was presented to Germany (17 June 1919), quoted in Andreas Dorpalen, Hindenburg and the Weimar Republic (Princeton University Press, 1964), p. 39 and John W. Wheeler-Bennett, The Nemesis of Power: The German Army in Politics 1918-1945 (London: Macmillan, 1964), p. 52
Chief of the German General Staff
On the subject violence and power. Source: On Violence, published in 1970. As quoted by Scroll Staff (December 04, 2017): Ideas in literature: Ten things Hannah Arendt said that are eerily relevant in today’s political times https://web.archive.org/web/20191001213756/https://scroll.in/article/856549/ten-things-hannah-arendt-said-that-are-eerily-relevant-in-todays-political-times. In: Scroll.in. Archived from the original https://scroll.in/article/856549/ten-things-hannah-arendt-said-that-are-eerily-relevant-in-todays-political-times on October 1, 2019.
Peter Bernus and Laszlo Nemes (1996) "A framework to define a generic enterprise reference architecture and methodology." Computer Integrated Manufacturing Systems Vol 9 (3) p. 179
E. M. Forster, "Ronald Firbank", in Abinger Harvest (1936; London: Edward Arnold, 1961) p. 139.
Genesis 18: 23-25 http://www.jw.org/en/publications/bible/nwt/books/genesis/18/, NWT
Bible
" Nobel Prize 2005 Press Release http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/2005/press.html" 10 October 2005
1840s, Heroes and Hero-Worship (1840), The Hero as Prophet
Already, in the state of emergency that the crisis has unleashed, we are seeing extraordinary measures emerge that reveal that much of the neoliberal regime’s claims to necessity and austerity were transparent lies. The God-like market has fallen, again. In different places a variety of measures are being introduced that would have been unimaginable even weeks ago. These have included the suspension of rents and mortgages, the free provision of public transit, the deployment of basic incomes, a hiatus in debt payments, the commandeering of privatized hospitals and other once-public infrastructure for the public good, the liberation of incarcerated people, and governments compelling private industries to reorient production to common needs. We hear news of significant numbers of people refusing to work, taking wildcat labor action, and demanding their right to live in radical ways. In some places, the underhoused are seizing vacant homes. We are discovering, against the upside-down capitalist value paradigm which has enriched the few at the expense of the many, whose labor is truly valuable: care, service, and frontline public sector workers. There has been a proliferation of grassroots radical demands for policies of care and solidarity not only as emergency measures, but in perpetuity.
No return to normal: for a post-pandemic liberation (March 23, 2020)
My cousins and I were kind of raised in a pack together—all girls. They always wanted to be princesses. I always wanted to be a witch. Or a killer. My head just went in that direction. Maybe because my father was a film professor, I developed a taste for Alfred Hitchcock. Films like Psycho scared me just the right amount. They didn’t haunt my dreams in a terrible way. I like that sensation of being scared. I’ve always been one of those people who wants to know what’s underneath the rock, what’s down the corner, what’s down the blind alley.
On processing fear as a child in “GILLIAN FLYNN BRINGS HER MID-WESTERN NOIR TO A BOIL” https://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/gillian-flynn-brings-her-mid-western-noir-to-a-boil-in-widows in Interview (2018 Nov 12)
In a message to German soldiers at the start of the Battle of Kursk, 5 July 1943, as quoted in Kursk by Rupert Matthews
1940s
Quoted in Jon Ossoff Talks With Rasheeda About What Dems Can Achieve If They Win Georgia Runoffs, By Jon Blistein, Rolling Stone (magazine), (4 January 2020)
New Year Message 2020 https://nationalparty.ie/new-year-message-2020/ (January 1, 2020)
20 May 2021 https://twitter.com/patriottakes/status/1395227279748255745/photo/1
World Day of the Sick https://www.archsaintboniface.ca/media/Archeveque-Archbishop/World-Day-of-the-Sick-2015_1.pdf (February 11, 2015)
2021
Source: Rahul Gandhi on Twitter, also quoted in https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/rahul-gandhi-rising-covid-19-numbers-worrying-govt-busy-with-sales/articleshow/85649532.cms
Source: Vatican Observatory examines theological implications of finding alien life https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/17651/vatican-observatory-examines-theological-implications-of-finding-alien-life (10 November 2009)
Source: The Day After Judgment (1971), Chapter 13 (p. 161)
We need to talk about an injustice https://www.ted.com/talks/bryan_stevenson_we_need_to_talk_about_an_injustice|