Society and the World

Sentimentality is the error of supposing that quarter can be given or taken in moral conflicts.

Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself.

If you injure your neighbor, better not do it by halves.

Political Economy and Social Economy are amusing intellectual games; but Vital Economy is the Philosopher Stone.

Political Economy and Social Economy are amusing intellectual games; but Vital Economy is the Philosopher Stone.

When a heretic wishes to avoid martyrdom he speaks of "Orthodoxy, True and False" and demonstrates that the True is his heresy.

When a heretic wishes to avoid martyrdom he speaks of "Orthodoxy, True and False" and demonstrates that the True is his heresy.

The Chinese tame fowls by clipping their wings, and women by deforming their feet. A petticoat round the ankles serves equally well.

The Chinese tame fowls by clipping their wings, and women by deforming their feet. A petticoat round the ankles serves equally well.

Acquired notions of propriety are stronger than natural instincts. It is easier to recruit for monasteries and convents than to induce an Arab woman to uncover her mouth in public, or a British officer to walk through Bond Street in a golfing cap on an afternoon in May.

Acquired notions of propriety are stronger than natural instincts. It is easier to recruit for monasteries and convents than to induce an Arab woman to uncover her mouth in public, or a British officer to walk through Bond Street in a golfing cap on an afternoon in May.

Compassion is the fellow-feeling of the unsound.

Compassion is the fellow-feeling of the unsound.

Those who understand evil pardon it: those who resent it destroy it.

If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience!

If the wicked flourish and the fittest survive, Nature must be the God of rascals.

The reformer for whom the world is not good enough finds himself shoulder to shoulder with him that is not good enough for the world.

The reformer for whom the world is not good enough finds himself shoulder to shoulder with him that is not good enough for the world.

Do not mistake your objection to defeat for an objection to fighting, your objection to being a slave for an objection to slavery, your objection to not being as rich as your neighbor for an objection to poverty. The cowardly, the insubordinate, and the envious share your objections.

In moments of progress the noble succeed, because things are going their way: in moments of decadence the base succeed for the same reason: hence the world is never without the exhilaration of contemporary success.

Decadence can find agents only when it wears the mask of progress.

No man dares say so much of what he thinks as to appear to himself an extremist.

Do not waste your time on Social Questions. What is the matter with the poor is Poverty: what is the matter with the rich is Uselessness.

Do not waste your time on Social Questions. What is the matter with the poor is Poverty: what is the matter with the rich is Uselessness.