It was characteristic of the rise of the Nazi movement in Germany and of the Communist movements in Europe after 1930 that they re...cruited their members from this mass of apparently indifferent people whom all other parties had given up as too apathetic or too stupid for their attention. The result was that the majority of their membership consisted of people who never before had appeared on the political scene. This permitted the introduction of entirely new methods into political propaganda, and indifference to the arguments of political opponents; these movements not only placed themselves outside and against the party system as a whole, they found a membership that had never been reached, never been "spoiled" by the party system. Therefore they did not need to refute opposing arguments and consistently preferred methods which ended in death rather than persuasion, which spelled terror rather than conviction.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
In his genial way he proceeded to say (Forgetting all laws of propriety,... And that giving instruction, without introduction, Would have caused quite a thrill in Society),LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
We used chamber-pots a good deal.... My mother ... loved to repeat: "When did the queen reign over China?" This whimsical and harm...less scatological pun was my first introduction to the wonderful world of verbal transformations, and also a first perception that a joke need not be funny to give pleasure.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
If I were asked what are the greatest obstacles to the speedy enfranchisement of women I should answer: There are three; the first... is militarism.... The second obstacle is the unconscious, unmeasured influence upon the estimate in which women as a whole are held that emanates from that most debasing of our evil institutions, prostitution.... [ellipsis in source] The third great cause is the inertia in the growth of democracy which has come as a reaction following the aggressive movements that with possibly ill-advised haste enfranchised the foreigner, the Negro and the Indian. Perilous conditions, seeming to follow from the introduction into the body politic of vast numbers of irresponsible citizens, have made the nation timid.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The museum is full of interesting things. All kinds of paintings are there. And then paintings too thick to put in a frame, that t...hey call sculpture. And then there are spectators. with their scorecards, rooting for culture. And spectators of the spectators, looking for love's introduction. And art students taking notes. And old women trying to remember the past. And old men with too much to forget. And tourists, thinking that a museum represents a city. And loafers so poor, they study their soberness here.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
My objection to Liberalism is this--that it is the introduction into the practical business of life of the highest kind--namely, p...olitics--of philosophical ideas instead of political principles.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The secret of success in society, is a certain heartiness and sympathy. A man who is not happy in the company, cannot find any wor...d in his memory that will fit the occasion. All his information is a little impertinent. A man who is happy there, finds in every turn of the conversation equally lucky occasions for the introduction of that which he has to say.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
A tattered copy of Johnson's large Dictionary was a great delight to me, on account of the specimens of English versifications whi...ch I found in the Introduction. I learned them as if they were so many poems. I used to keep this old volume close to my pillow; and I amused myself when I awoke in the morning by reciting its jingling contrasts of iambic and trochaic and dactylic metre, and thinking what a charming occupation it must be to "make up" verses.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The study of error is not only in the highest degree prophylactic, but it serves as a stimulating introduction to the study of tru...th.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »