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Sport is linked with the technical world because sport itself is a technique. The enormous contrast between the athletes of Greece and those of Rome is well known. For the Greeks, physical exercise was an ethic for developing freely and harmoniously the form and strength of the human body. For the Romans, it was a technique for increasing the legionnaire’s efficiency. The Roman conception prevails today.

— Jacques Ellul The Technological Society (1954)

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More quotes by Jacques Ellul

I describe a world with no exit, convinced that God accompanies man throughout his history.

Interview in Le Monde (1981)

Hate, hunger, and pride make better levers of propaganda than do love or impartiality.

Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes (1962)

What seems to be one of the disasters of our time is that we all appear to agree that the nation-state is the norm.

Anarchy and Christianity [Anarchie et Christianisme (1988)

In a society such as ours, it is almost impossible for a person to be responsible.

The Betrayal by Technology (1993)

The will of the world is always a will to death, a will to suicide. We must not accept this suicide, and we must so act that it cannot take place.

The Presence of the Kingdom (1948)

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Many more people in the world are concerned with sports than with human rights.

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Michel de Montaigne Essais (1571)

By sports like these are all their cares beguil'd;
The sports of children satisfy the child.

Oliver Goldsmith The Traveller (1764)

The shame is not in having sported, but in not having broken off the sport.

Horace

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Jacques Ellul (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.