9 quotes
It is lack of confidence, more than anything else, that kills a civilisation. We can destroy ourselves by cynicism and disillusion, just as effectively as by bombs.
Civilisation (1969)
Heroes do not easily tolerate the company of other heroes.
Civilisation (1969)
Opera, next to Gothic architecture, is one of the strangest inventions of western man. It could not have been foreseen by any logical process.
Civilisation (1969)
One musn't overrate the culture of what used to be called "top people" before the wars. They had charming manners, but they were as ignorant as swans.
Civilisation (1969)
I wonder if a single thought that has helped forward the human spirit has ever been conceived or written down in an enormous room.
Civilisation (1969)
As for the Messiah, it is, like Michelangelo's Creation of Adam, one of those rare works that appeal immediately to everyone, and yet is indisputably a masterpiece of the highest order.
Civilisation (1969)
The great artist takes what he needs.
Civilisation (1969)
People sometimes tell me that they prefer barbarism to civilisation. I doubt if they have given it a long enough trial. Like the people of Alexandria, they are bored by civilisation; but all the evidence suggests that the boredom of barbarism is infinitely greater.
Civilisation (1969)
We have no idea where we are going, and sweeping, confident articles on the future seem to me, intellectually, the most disreputable of all forms of public utterance. The scientists who are best qualified to talk have kept their mouths shut.
Civilisation (1969)