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Is it because Westerners have come to lose their intellectuality by over-developing their capacity for action that they console themselves by inventing theories that set action above everything else, and even, as in the case of pragmatism, go so far as to deny that there exists anything of value beyond action; or is the contrary true, namely, that it is the acceptance of this point of view that has led to the intellectual atrophy we see today?

— René Guénon The Crisis of the Modern World (1927)

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More quotes by René Guénon

A philosopher's renown is increased more by inventing a new error than by repeating a truth that has already been expressed by others.

The Crisis of the Modern World (1927)

If an idea is true, it belongs equally to all who are capable of understanding it.

The Crisis of the Modern World (1927)

Dante's corpus as a whole is in certain respects like a testament to the closing medieval age; it shows what the Western world would have been had it not broken from its tradition.

Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power (1929)

It is worth noting that Protestantism suppresses the clergy, and though it claims to uphold the authority of the Bible, it in fact ruins it by 'free inquiry'.

Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power (1929)

The true function of the priesthood, then, is above all one of knowledge and teaching, and this is why, as we said above, its proper attribute is wisdom.

Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power (1929)

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