With two thousand years of Christianity behind him ... a man can't see a regiment of soldiers march past without going off the dee...p end. It starts off far too many ideas in his head.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The dangers of mass culture are much easier to define than the ideals. The foremost one, which may negate all the ideals, is an ov...erpowering narcotic effect, relaxing the tired mind and tranquilizing the anxious. Genuine art is demanding and difficult, often unpleasant, nagging at the mind and stretching the nerves taut. So much of mass culture envelops the audience in a warm bath, making no demands except that we all glow with pleasure and comfort. It is this that may negate the range of possibility (the bath is warmer at the shallow end), keep taste static or even deteriorate it a little, muffle the few critical and ironic sounds being made. That premature cultural critic Homer knew all about this effect, at various times calling it Lotus Eaters, Calypso, Circe, and the Sirens, and he just barely got our hero through intact.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
This Duncan Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been... So clear in his great office, that his virtues Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against The deep damnation of his taking-off.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
And such the trust that still were mine, Though stormy winds swept o'er the brine,... Or though the tempest's fiery breath Roused me from sleep to wreck and death. In ocean cave, still safe with Thee The germ of immortality! And calm and peaceful shall I sleep, Rocked in the cradle of the deep.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Rocked in the cradle of the deep I lay me down in peace to sleep;... Secure I rest upon the wave, For Thou, O Lord! hast power to save.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Then again, do not tell me, as a good man did to-day, of my obligation to put all poor men in good situations. Are they my poor? I... tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent I give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong. There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual affinity I am bought and sold; for them I will go to prison if need be; but your miscellaneous popular charities; the education at college of fools; the building of meetinghouses to the vain end to which many now stand; alms to sots, and the thousand-fold Relief Societies;Mthough I confess with shame I sometimes succumb and give the dollar, it is a wicked dollar, which by and by I shall have the manhood to withhold.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Books are the best things, well used; abused, among the worst. What is the right use? What is the one end, which all means go to e...ffect? They are for nothing but to inspire. I had better never see a book, than to be warped by its attraction clean out of my own orbit, and made a satellite instead of a system.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Connie, all my life I kept trying to go up in society where everything was legal, straight.... But the higher I go the crookeder i...t becomes. Where the hell does it end?LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »