... the loss of belief in future states is politically, though certainly not spiritually, the most significant distinction between... our present period and the centuries before. And this loss is definite. For no matter how religious our world may turn again, or how much authentic faith still exists in it, or how deeply our moral values may be rooted in our religious systems, the fear of hell is no longer among the motives which would prevent or stimulate the actions of a majority.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of ...belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way--in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Every generation rewrites the past. In easy times history is more or less of an ornamental art, but in times of danger we are driv...en to the written record by a pressing need to find answers to the riddles of today.... In times of change and danger when there is a quicksand of fear under men's reasoning, a sense of continuity with generations gone before can stretch like a lifeline across the scary present and get us past that idiot delusion of the exceptional Now that blocks good thinking.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Before anything else, we need a new age of Enlightenment. Our present political systems must relinquish their claims on truth, jus...tice and freedom and have to replace them with the search for truth, justice, freedom and reason.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The present century has not dealt kindly with the farmer. His legends are all but obsolete, and his beliefs have been pared away b...y the professors at colleges of agriculture. Even the farm- bred bards who twang guitars before radio microphones prefer "I'm Headin' for the Last Roundup" to "Turkey in the Straw" or "Father Put the Cows Away."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
What is it that distinguishes man from animals? It is not his upright posture. That was present in the apes long before the brain ...began to develop. Nor is it the use of tools. It is something altogether new, a previously unknown quality: self-awareness. Animals, too, have awareness. They are aware of objects; they know this is one thing and that another. But when the human being as such was born he had a new and different consciousness, a consciousness of himself; he knew that he existed and that he was something different, something apart from nature, apart from other people, too. He experienced himself. He was aware that he thought and felt. As far as we know, there is nothing analogous to this anywhere in the animal kingdom. That is the specific quality that makes human beings human.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Before and After. Yes, with a little work, they can be saved. It is the present, the immediate moment--the During--that is doomed.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Nothing ... is so ungrateful as a rising generation; yet, if there is any faintest glimmer of light ahead of us in the present, it... was kindled by the intellectual fires that burned long before us.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The present war having so long cut off all communication with Great-Britain, we are not able to make a fair estimate of the state ...of science in that country. The spirit in which she wages war is the only sample before our eyes, and that does not seem the legitimate offspring either of science or of civilization.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I am anxious to afford some alleviation of your present distress. Perfect relief is not possible, except with time. You can not no...w realize that you will ever feel better. Is not this so? And yet it is a mistake. You are sure to be happy again. To know this, which is certainly true, will make you some less miserable now. I have had experience enough to know what I say; and you need only to believe it, to feel better at once. The memory of your dear Father, instead of an agony, will yet be a sad, sweet feeling in your heart, of a purer, and holier sort than you have ever known before.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »