... my soul stood erect, exultant, envisioning a new world where the light of justice for every individual will be unclouded.
We may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all--the apathy of human beings.
Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all--the apathy of human beings
Toleration is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycl e.
There is much in the Bible against which every instinct of my being rebels, so much that I regret the necessity which has compelle d me to read it through from beginning to end. I do not think that the knowledge which I have gained of its history and sources compensates me for the unpleasant details it has forced upon my attention.
When I try to classify my earliest impressions, I find that fact and fancy look alike across the years that link the past with the present. The woman paints the child's experience in her own fantasy.
...I have depended on books not only for pleasure and for the wisdom they bring to all who read, but also for that knowledge which comes to others through their eyes and their ears.... books have meant so much more in my education than in that of others ...
... literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourse of my book-friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness.
I have often been asked, "Do not people bore you?" I do not understand quite what that means. I suppose the calls of the stupid an d curious, especially of newspaper reporters, are always inopportune. I also dislike people who try to talk down to my understanding. They are like people who when walking with you try to shorten their steps to suit yours; the hypocrisy in both cases is equally exasperating.
Many scholars forget ... that our enjoyment of the great works of literature depends more upon the depth of our sympathy than upon our understanding. ... very few of their laborious explanations stick in the memory. The mind drops them as a branch drops its overripe fruit.
Literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourse of my book-friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness
The hands of those I meet are dumbly eloquent to me. The touch of some hands is an impertinence. I have met people so empty of joy , that when I clasped their frosty finger-tips, it seemed as if I were shaking hands with a northeast storm. Others there are whose hands have sunbeams in them, so that their grasp warms my heart.
There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his.
I sometimes wonder if the hand is not more sensitive to the beauties of sculpture than the eye. I should think the wonderful rhyth mical flow of lines and curves could be more subtly felt than seen. Be this as it may, I know that I can feel the heart- throbs of the ancient Greeks in their marble gods and goddesses.
Museums and art stores are also sources of pleasure and inspiration. Doubtless it will seem strange to many that the hand unaided by sight can feel action, sentiment, beauty in the cold marble; and yet it is true that I derive genuine pleasure from touching great works of art. As my finger tips trace line and curve, they discover the thought and emotion which the artist has portrayed.
Knowledge is happiness, because to have knowledge--broad, deep knowledge--is to know true ends from false, and lofty things from l ow. To know the thoughts and deeds that have marked man's progress is to feel the great heart-throbs of humanity through the centuries; and if one does not feel in these pulsations a heavenward striving, one must indeed be deaf to the harmonies of life.
We may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all--the apathy of human beings.
Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all--the apathy of human beings
Toleration is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycl e.
There is much in the Bible against which every instinct of my being rebels, so much that I regret the necessity which has compelle d me to read it through from beginning to end. I do not think that the knowledge which I have gained of its history and sources compensates me for the unpleasant details it has forced upon my attention.
When I try to classify my earliest impressions, I find that fact and fancy look alike across the years that link the past with the present. The woman paints the child's experience in her own fantasy.
...I have depended on books not only for pleasure and for the wisdom they bring to all who read, but also for that knowledge which comes to others through their eyes and their ears.... books have meant so much more in my education than in that of others ...
Children who hear acquire language without any particular effort; the words that fall from others' lips they catch on the wing, as it were, delightedly, while the little deaf child must trap them by a slow and often painful process. But whatever the process, the result is wonderful. Gradually from naming an object we advance step by step until we have traversed the vast distance between our first stammered syllable and the sweep of thought in a line of Shakespeare.
... literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourse of my book-friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness.
I have often been asked, "Do not people bore you?" I do not understand quite what that means. I suppose the calls of the stupid an d curious, especially of newspaper reporters, are always inopportune. I also dislike people who try to talk down to my understanding. They are like people who when walking with you try to shorten their steps to suit yours; the hypocrisy in both cases is equally exasperating.
Many scholars forget ... that our enjoyment of the great works of literature depends more upon the depth of our sympathy than upon our understanding. ... very few of their laborious explanations stick in the memory. The mind drops them as a branch drops its overripe fruit.
Literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourse of my book-friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness
The hands of those I meet are dumbly eloquent to me. The touch of some hands is an impertinence. I have met people so empty of joy , that when I clasped their frosty finger-tips, it seemed as if I were shaking hands with a northeast storm. Others there are whose hands have sunbeams in them, so that their grasp warms my heart.
There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his.
I sometimes wonder if the hand is not more sensitive to the beauties of sculpture than the eye. I should think the wonderful rhyth mical flow of lines and curves could be more subtly felt than seen. Be this as it may, I know that I can feel the heart- throbs of the ancient Greeks in their marble gods and goddesses.
Museums and art stores are also sources of pleasure and inspiration. Doubtless it will seem strange to many that the hand unaided by sight can feel action, sentiment, beauty in the cold marble; and yet it is true that I derive genuine pleasure from touching great works of art. As my finger tips trace line and curve, they discover the thought and emotion which the artist has portrayed.
Knowledge is happiness, because to have knowledge--broad, deep knowledge--is to know true ends from false, and lofty things from l ow. To know the thoughts and deeds that have marked man's progress is to feel the great heart-throbs of humanity through the centuries; and if one does not feel in these pulsations a heavenward striving, one must indeed be deaf to the harmonies of life.
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