Civilised Society Quotes

• The permissive society has been allowed to become a dirty phrase. A better phrase is the civilised society

  Roy Jenkins

  Dirty, Phrases, Nasty

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• Civilized society is perpetually menaced with disintegration through this primary hostility of men towards one another.

  Sigmund Freud

  Peace, War, Men

  Sigmund Freud (1930). “Civilization and Its Discontents”, p.40, Courier Dover Publications

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• The vigor of civilized societies is preserved by the widespread sense that high aims are worth-while.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Vigor, Aim, Civilized Society

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• Vigorous societies harbour a certain extravagance of objectives.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Extravagance, Harbour, Certain

  Alfred North Whitehead (1967). “Adventures of Ideas”, p.288, Simon and Schuster

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• Vigorous societies harbor a certain extravagance of objectives, so that men wander beyond the safe provision of personal gratifications.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Men, Extravagance, Safe

  Alfred North Whitehead (1967). “Adventures of Ideas”, p.288, Simon and Schuster

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• A civilized society is one which tolerates eccentricity to the point of doubtful sanity.

  Robert Frost

  Crazy, Mad, Society

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• If one could only teach the English how to talk, and the Irish how to listen, society here would be quite civilized.

  Oscar Wilde

  Funny, Sarcastic, Witty

  1895 Mrs Cheveley speaking. An Ideal Husband, act 3.

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• The vigour of civilised societies is preserved by the widespread sense that high aims are worth while. Vigorous societies harbour a certain extravagance of objectives, so that men wander beyond the safe provision of personal gratifications. All strong interests easily become impersonal, the love of a good job well done. There is a sense of harmony about such an accomplishment, the Peace brought by something worth while. Such personal gratification arises from aim beyond personality.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Strong, Jobs, Men

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• Sex is probably one of the last forms of human expression to enjoy such a direct connection with nature. It might be the primary site of conflict between nature and culture. If one assumes that nature (or instinct) is repressed in a highly civilised society, then I think the conceptual dyad nature-culture is best preserved there, in the realm of sex.

  Thomas Koerfer

  Sex, Thinking, Expression

  Source: www.koerferfilm.com

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• As a civilised society, we have a duty to support those among us who are vulnerable and in need. When times are hard, that duty should be felt more than ever, not disappear or diminish.

  Justin Welby

  Support, Needs, Vulnerable

  "Archbishop of Canterbury attacks Government welfare reforms" by Edward Malnick, www.telegraph.co.uk. March 9, 2013.

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• I am a very, very strong advocate of the notion that we shouldn't equate the arts with other aspects of infrastructure. They have a unique role in any civilised society and that requires appropriate and targeted government support.

  George Brandis

  Art, Strong, Unique

  Source: www.abc.net.au

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• To play with baubles is our ambition, not to deal with grave questions in a spirit of serious energy. But while we are playing with baubles, with our Legislative Councils, our Simultaneous Examinations, our ingenious schemes for separating the judicial from the executive functions, - while we, I say, are finessing about trifles, the waters of the great deep are being stirred and that surging chaos of the primitive man over which our civilised societies are superimposed on a thin crust of convention, is being strangely and ominously agitated.

  Sri Aurobindo

  Ambition, Men, Primitive Man

  "New Lamps for Old". Nine articles by Sri Aurobindo in the "Indu Prakash" (a Bombay daily newspaper), December 4, 1893.

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• This extraordinary metal, the soul of every manufacture, and the mainspring perhaps of civilised society. Of iron.

  Samuel Smiles

  Science, Civilization, Iron

  Samuel Smiles (2010). “Men of Invention and Industry”, p.87, BoD – Books on Demand

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• I think you will agree the sign of a civilised society is a regular dining schedule.

  Philippa Ballantine

  Thinking, Dining, Schedules

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• It is so far from being natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilised society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together.

  Samuel Johnson

  Marriage, Men, Together

  Quoted in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) (entry for 31 Mar. 1772)

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