Symbol Quotes - page 16
In the school of Pythagoras, taciturnity was the symbol of abstracted and superlative knowledge, and the silence of the Egyptians was agnited as an expressive manner of divine adoration; this caused the pontiffs of Hierapolis to sacrifice to the great deity in silence, impercussively, without any vociferous or obstreperous sound.
François Rabelais
You Europeans know nothing about America. Because we amass large fortunes you think we care for nothing but money. We are nothing for it; the moment we have it we spend it, sometimes well, sometimes ill, but we spend it. Money is nothing to us; it's merely the symbol of success. We are the greatest idealists in the world; I happen to think that we've set our ideal on the wrong objects; I happen to think that the greatest ideal man can set before himself is self-perfection.
W. Somerset Maugham
The puzzle gets solved when one contemplates the character of Indian Secularism and finds that is no more than a smokescreen used by the Muslim-Christian-Communist combine in order to keep India's national society and culture at bay. ... They are simply projecting their self-images on to those whom they view as their enemies. .... I have documented elsewhere how Pandit Nehru hounded out or silenced everyone... whom he suspected of having some Hindu feeling or sympathy for some Hindu cause... and how he objected to every Hindu symbol in India's public life. The country had been partitioned by the remnants of Islamic imperialism. But he blamed it on "communalism", a word by which he always meant Hinduism.
Sita Ram Goel
Were art to redeem man, it could do so only by saving him from the seriousness of life and restoring him to an unexpected boyishness. The symbol of art is seen again in the magic flute of the Great God Pan which makes the young goats frisk at the edge of the grove.
All modern art begins to appear comprehensible and in a way great when it is interpreted as an attempt to instill youthfulness into an ancient world.
José Ortega y Gasset
When we are reminded that modern men find it difficult to believe in the divinity of Jesus, we urge a search for realities that are far greater than words. If Jesus gives us our clearest vision of the nature of God; if he reveals the godlike qualities in man; if he secures penitence, restitution, joyous allegiance, and heroic sacrifice; if he leads to deliverance for individuals and groups-he becomes a symbol for all that is noblest in the universe, whatever may be the title by which he is characterized.
Kirby Page
Concern for the symbol has completely disappeared from our science. And yet, if one were to give oneself the trouble, one could easily find, in certain parts at least of contemporary mathematics... symbols as clear, as beautiful, and as full of spiritual meaning as that of the circle and mediation. From modern thought to ancient wisdom the path would be short and direct, if one cared to take it.
Simone Weil
Mosby, Rhett, Davis, Stephens, and other Confederates had no difficulty conceding what their descendants go to enormous lengths to deny, that the raison d'être of the Confederacy was the defense of slavery. It follows that, as the paramount symbol of the Confederate nation and as the flag of the armies that kept the nation alive, the St. Andrew's cross is inherently associated with slavery. This conclusion is valid whether or not secession was constitutional. It is valid whether or not most southern soldiers consciously fought to preserve slavery. It is valid even though racism and segregation prevailed among nineteenth-century white northerners.
Jefferson Davis
In a strict usage the same symbol should never represent the act of sincerely asserting something and the content of what is asserted. For the symbolic distinction between the two, Frege has introduced the 'signpost' symbol. ... \vdash p is to signify the actual assertion of p, while the bare symbol p must henceforth be used only as part of a sentence. ... It should be clear from the modality of a sentence whether it is a question, a command, an invective, a complaint or an allegation of fact.
Michael Polanyi
Even in the greatest Westerns, the woman is imposed on the action, as a star, and is generally destined to be "had” by the male lead. But she does not exist as a woman. If you cut her out of the film, in a version which you can imagine, the film becomes much better. In the desert, the essential problem was to survive. Women were an obstacle to survival! Usually, the woman not only holds up the story, but she has no real character, no reality. She is a symbol. She is there without having any reason to be there, simply because one must have a woman, and because the hero must prove, in some way or another, that he has "sex-appeal."
Sergio Leone
