Affairs Quotes - page 43
This statistical regularity in moral affairs fully establishes their being under the presidency of law. Man is now seen to be an enigma only as an individual; in the mass he is a mathematical problem. It is hardly necessary to say, much less to argue, that mental action, being proved to be under law, passes at once into the category of natural things. Its old metaphysical character vanishes in a moment, and the distinction usually taken between physical and moral is annulled, as only an error in terms. This view agrees with what all observation teaches, that mental phenomena flow directly from the brain.
Robert Chambers (publisher born 1802)
I can offer you no final truths, complete and unchallengeable. But it's possible this one effort will provoke other efforts - both in support and contradiction of my position - that will help all of us understand our differences and perhaps even discover some basic agreement.
In the end, I'm convinced we will all benefit if suspicion is replaced by discussion, innuendo by dialogue; if the emphasis in our debate turns from a search for talismanic criteria and neat but simplistic answers to an honest - more intelligent - attempt at describing the role religion has in our public affairs, and the limits placed on that role.
And if we do it right - if we're not afraid of the truth even when the truth is complex - this debate, by clarification, can bring relief to untold numbers of confused - even anguished - Catholics, as well as to many others who want only to make our already great democracy even stronger than it is.
Mario Cuomo
Until you can clearly make up your mind, you are better off not doing something. Make a habit of being decisive in your daily affairs. Some people can be heard to say, "what will I do if I get killed?!" If you die, there is nothing you can do. Whatever you have to do, do it now, while you are still living. You must practice to be able to return to essential principles at any moment.
Koichi Tohei
People with intelligence will use it to fashion things both true and false and will try to push through whatever they want with their clever reasoning. This is injury from intelligence. Nothing you do will have effect if you do not use truth.
In affairs like law suits or even in arguments, by losing quickly one will lose in fine fashion. It is like sumo. If one thinks only of winning, a sordid victory will be worse than a defeat. For the most part, it becomes a squalid defeat.
Yamamoto Tsunetomo
Although it is unfitting for someone like me to say this, in dying it is my hope not to become a Buddha. Rather, my will is permeated with the resolution to help manage the affairs of the province, though I be reborn as a Nabeshima samurai seven times. One needs neither vitality nor talent. In a word, it is a matter of having the will to shoulder the clan by oneself.
Yamamoto Tsunetomo
The level of historical ignorance and/or jingostic American exceptionalism necessary to believe this is impossible to describe. Compared to what the CIA has done to dozens of other countries since the end of World War II, and what it continues to do, watching Americans cast Russian interference in the 2016 election through online bots and email hacking (even if one believes every claim made about it) as some sort of unique and unprecedented crime against democracy is staggering. Set against what the CIA has done and continues to do to "interfere” in the domestic affairs of other countries - including Russia - the 2016 election was, at most, par for the course for international affairs and, more accurately, a trivial and ordinary act in the context of CIA interference.
Glenn Greenwald
Shakespeare said: "There comes a tide in the affairs of men which, if taken at the flood, moves on to fortune.” Shakespeare was initiate. He knew all about this, and throughout his works are the answers. The aim is to recognize the window of opportunity, to be so skilled and so in the rhythm of your work, that when it opens, you are there. If there is no rhythm, you could be asleep. If you set a rhythm and never sleep - I do not mean never go to sleep in bed - but if you are not mentally asleep, and do not turn off your consciousness, if you keep your consciousness alive and aware all the time, then when the window of opportunity comes you recognize it because you are in that rhythm. If you are not in the rhythm, you could miss it. This is the importance of rhythm, which of course has nothing to do with time. It is to do with awareness, a rhythmic awareness of setting, not goals, but a pattern of action, so you are always ready, "brush in hand”.
Benjamin Creme
I cannot conceive that Britain would be an ordinary member of a Federal Union limited to Europe in any period which can at present be foreseen. We should in my opinion favour and help forward all developments on the Continent which arise naturally from a removal of barriers, from the process of reconciliation, and blessed oblivion of the terrible past, and also from our common dangers in the future and present. Although a hard-and-fast concrete federal constitution for Europe is not within the scope of practical affairs, we should help, sponsor and aid in every possible way the movement towards European unity. We should seek steadfastly for means to become intimately associated with it.
Winston Churchill
No body of men have ever been so "un-English" as the great Englishmen, Nelson, Shelley, Gladstone: supreme in war, in literature, in practical affairs; yet with no single evidence in the characteristics of their energy that they possess any of the qualities of the English blood. But in submitting to the leadership of such perplexing variations from the common stock, the Englishman is merely exhibiting his general capacity for accepting the universe, rather than for rebelling against it.
Horatio Nelson
The only certain fact about Russian affairs under the Soviet regime with regard to which all people agree is: that the standard of living of the Russian masses is much lower than ... the paragon of capitalism, the United States of America. If we were to regard the Soviet regime as an experiment, we would have to say that the experiment has clearly demonstrated the superiority of capitalism and the inferiority of socialism.
Ludwig von Mises
The present critical state of international human affairs requires security and safety from nuisance interferences with efforts toward full, honest, determined clarification of man's relationship to nature within and without himself; in other words, his relationship to the Law of Nature. It is not permissible, either morally, legally, or factually, to force a natural scientist to expose his scientific results and methods of basic research in court. This point is accentuated in a world crisis where biopathic men hold in their hands power over ruined, destitute multitudes.
Wilhelm Reich
Through all the years that I have been in business I have never yet found our business bad as a result of any outside force. It has always been due to some defect in our own company, and whenever we located and repaired that defect our business became good again - regardless of what anyone else might be doing. And it will always be found that this country has nationally bad business when business men are drifting, and that business is good when men take hold of their own affairs, put leadership into them, and push forward in spite of obstacles. Only disaster can result when the fundamental principles of business are disregarded and what looks like the easiest way is taken. These fundamentals, as I see them, are:.
Henry Ford
I do not often venture to talk to you about public affairs, but surely you will agree with me in deprecating this war with China, which really seems to me so wicked as to be a national sin of the greatest possible magnitude, and it distresses me very deeply. Cannot any thing be done by petition or otherwise to awaken men's minds to the dreadful guilt we are incurring? I really do not remember, in any history, of a war undertaken with such combined injustice and baseness. Ordinary wars of conquest are to me far less wicked, than to go to war in order to maintain smuggling, and that smuggling consisting in the introduction of a demoralizing drug, which the government of China wishes to keep out, and which we, for the lucre of gain, want to introduce by force; and in this quarrel are going to burn and slay in the pride of our supposed superiority.
Thomas Arnold
Franklin Roosevelt once said, "Too many who prate about saving democracy are really only interested in saving things as they were. Democracy should concern itself also with things as they should be." So in this campaign we face those who are interested in destroying things as they are. These fellows are not conservatives in the American tradition. They are just interested in tearing down institutions, not in preserving them. They are dedicated to extreme ideas, not to old values. They advocate aggressive interference with other nations, not increased reliance on others to order their own affairs. This is not a conservative philosophy. This is not even a Republican philosophy. This is not a philosophy ever embraced by any major American leader. "Conservative" may be written on their banner and in their books, but "radical" is in their hearts.
Lyndon B. Johnson
The author is quite aware of the monstrous relations in human and international affairs brought forth by the egotistical principle of capital when it is not under pressure from socialist and progressive forces. He also thinks, however, that progressives in the West understand this better than he does and are waging a struggle against these manifestations. The author is concentrating his attention on what is before his eyes and on what is obstructing, from his point of view, a worldwide overcoming of estrangement, obstructing the struggle for democracy, social progress, and intellectual freedom.
Our country has started on the path of cleansing away the foulness of Stalinism. "We are squeezing the slave out of ourselves drop by drop" (an expression of Anton Chekhov). We are learning to express our opinions, without taking the lead from the bosses and without fearing for our lives.
Andrei Sakharov
