Great Throughts Treasury

"The ultimate tendency of civilization is towards barbarism." - Julius Charles Hare (1795-1855) and his brother Augustus William Hare

"It is to labor, and to labor only, that man owes everything possessed of exchangeable value. Labor is the talisman that has raised him from the condition of the savage; that has changed the desert and the forest into cultivated fields; that has covered the earth with cities, and the ocean with ships that has give us plenty, comfort, and elegance, instead of want, misery, and barbarism." - William M’Culloch

"Extremes produce reaction. Beware that our boasted civilization does not lapse into barbarism." - Antoine de Rivarol, also known as Comte de Rivarol

"Beneath the yoke of barbarism one must not keep silence; one must fight. Whoever is silent at such a time is a traitor to humanity." - Stefan Zweig

"There is the moral of all human tales, `tis but the same rehearsal of the past, first freedom, and then glory – when that fails, wealth, vice, corruption – barbarism at last." -

"There is no enlightenment in questions, but only barbarism in belief." - Louis Dudek

"It is only an ethical movement which can rescue us from the slough of barbarism, and the ethical comes into existence only in individuals." - Albert Schweitzer

"Without nonviolence - mind states of loving kindness and compassion - at the core of our societal construct, however, even the desire to protect and preserve can be manipulated in service to barbarism masquerading as idealism." - Charlene Spretnak

"All the progress humanity has made appears to be endangered by the very technological skills that humans have achieved. We live in an age in which the evils that humans inflict on others have reached unparalleled extremes of barbarism." - P. D. Premasiri, fully Pahalawattage Don Premasiri

"The verbal Christian belief in the sanctity of life has not been affected by the impersonal barbarism of twentieth century war." -

"What a vast difference there is between the barbarism that precedes culture and the barbarism that follows it." - Christian Friedrich Hebbel

"Under every social skin there lurks some barbarism." - Eugenio Maria de Hostos (y Bonilla)

"The period of time covered by history is far too short to allow any perceptible progress in the popular sense of Evolution of the Human Species. The notion that there has been any such Progress since Caesar’s time (less than 20th centuries ago) is too absurd for discussion. All the savagery, barbarism, dark ages and the rest of it of which we have any record as existing in the past exists at the present moment." - George Bernard Shaw

"War is on its last legs; and a universal peace is as sure as is the prevalence of civilization over barbarism, of liberal governments over feudal forms. The question for us is only how soon?" - Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The verbal Christian belief in the sanctity of life has not been affected by the impersonal barbarism of twentieth century war." - C. Wright Mills, fully Charles Wright Mills

"There is the moral of all human tales, `tis but the same rehearsal of the past, first freedom, and then glory – when that fails, wealth, vice, corruption – barbarism at last." -

"While I have not lost faith in its potentialities, my views have changed since. War can not be avoided until the physical cause for its recurrence is removed and this, in the last analysis, is the vast extent of the planet on which we live. Only though annihilation of distance in every respect, as the conveyance of intelligence, transport of passengers and supplies and transmission of energy will conditions be brought about some day, insuring permanency of friendly relations. What we now want most is closer contact and better understanding between individuals and communities all over the earth and the elimination of that fanatic devotion to exalted ideals of national egoism and pride, which is always prone to plunge the world into primeval barbarism and strife. No league or parliamentary act of any kind will ever prevent such a calamity. These are only new devices for putting the weak at the mercy of the strong." - Nikola Tesla

"What we now want is closer contact and better understanding between individuals and communities all over the earth, and the elimination of egoism and pride which is always prone to plunge the world into primeval barbarism and strife... Peace can only come as a natural consequence of universal enlightenment." - Nikola Tesla

"If a young girl is being forced into a brothel she will not talk about her rights. In such a situation the word would sound ludicrously inadequate." - Simone Weil

"Every undistorted relationship, perhaps indeed the conciliation that is part of organic life itself, is a gift. He who through consequential logic becomes incapable of it, makes himself a thing and freezes." - Theodor W. Adorno, born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund

"In life, as in a football game, the principle to follow is: hit the line hard." - Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt

"And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor." - Thomas Jefferson

"The secret of Happiness is Freedom, and the secret of Freedom, Courage." - Thucydides NULL

"Woman must be given her true place in society by the working class." - Eugene V. Debs, fully Eugene Victor Debs

"Yes and no rule the world." -