I think it's only in a crisis that Americans see other people. It has to be an American crisis, of course. If two countries fight ...that do not supply the Americans with some precious commodity, then the education of the public does not take place. But when the dictator falls, when the oil is threatened, then you turn on the television and they tell you where the country is, what the language is, how to pronounce the names of the leaders, what the religion is all about, and maybe you can cut out recipes in the newspaper of Persian dishes.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Ermined and minked and Persian-lambed, Be-puffed (be-painted, too, alas!)... Be-decked, be-diamonded--be-damned! The Women of the Better Class.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Boy, I hate their empty shows, Persian garlands I detest,... Bring me not the late-blown rose Lingering after all the rest: Plainer myrtle pleases me Thus outstretched beneath my vine, Myrtle more becoming thee, Waiting with thy master's wine.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Come, give thy soul a loose, and taste the pleasures of the poor. Sometimes 'tis grateful for the rich to try... A short vicissitude, and fit of poverty: A savory dish, a homely treat, Where all is plain, where all is neat, Without the stately spacious room, The Persian carpet, or the Tyrian loom, Clear up the cloudy foreheads of the great.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
persian pussy from over the sea demure and lazy and smug and fat... none of your ribbons and bells for me ours is the zest of the alley catLESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Oh! thou clear spirit of clear fire, whom on these seas I as Persian once did worship, till in the sacramental act so burned by th...ee, that to this hour I bear the scar; I now know thee, thou clear spirit, and I now know that thy right worship is defiance. To neither love nor reverence wilt thou be kind; and e'en for hate thou canst but kill; and all are killed. No fearless fool now fronts thee.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I have not been asked, as I should have been asked, what the name of Zarathustra means in my mouth, the mouth of the first immoral...ist: for what constitutes the tremendous historical uniqueness of that Persian is just the opposite of this. Zarathustra was the first to consider the struggle between good and evil as the very wheel in the machinery of things: a translation of morals into the metaphysical, as force, cause, and end-in-itself, is his work. But this question itself is at bottom its own answer. Zarathustra created this most calamitous error, morality: as a result, he must also be the first to recognize it. Not only has he more experience in this matter, for a longer time, than any other thinker--all history is after all the refutation by experiment of the principle of this so-called "moral world order"Mwhat is more important is that Zarathustra is more truthful than any other thinker. His doctrine, and his alone, posits truthfulness as the supreme virtue--this means exactly the opposite of the cowardice of the "idealist" who flees from reality; Zarathustra has more intestinal fortitude than all other thinkers put together. To speak the truth and to shoot well with arrows, that is Persian virtue.--Am I understood?--The self- overcoming of morality, out of truthfulness, the self-overcoming of the moralist, into his opposite--into me--that is what the name of Zarathustra means in my mouth.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
If one doubts whether Grecian valor and patriotism are not a fiction of the poets, he may go to Athens and see still upon the wall...s of the temple of Minerva the circular marks made by the shields taken from the enemy in the Persian war, which were suspended there. We have not far to seek for living and unquestionable evidence. The very dust takes shape and confirms some story which we had read.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It had not a New England but an Oriental character, reminding us of trim Persian gardens, of Haroun Al-raschid, and the artificial... lakes of the East.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The threadbare trees, so poor and thin, They are no wealthier than I;... But with as brave a core within They rear their boughs to the October sky. Poor knights they are which bravely wait The charge of Winter's cavalry, Keeping a simple Roman state, Discumbered of their Persian luxury.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »