“That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.”
“Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.”
“Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn’t nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand.”
“I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself.”
“One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them.”
“There are things known and there are things unknown, and in between are the doors of perception.”
“The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior ‘righteous indignation’ — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”
“Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him.”