#ideals

Our ideals, laws and customs should be based on the proposition that each generation in turn becomes the custodian rather than the absolute owner of our resources - and each generation has the obligation to pass this inheritance on in the future. ↗

— Alberto Moravia

#based #becomes #custodian #customs #each

There is nothing the matter with Americans except their ideals. The real American is all right; it is the ideal American who is all wrong. ↗

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

#except #ideal #ideals #matter #nothing

They were both in their own ways earnest; they both wanted to achieve some worthy end or other, change the world for the better. Such alluring, such perilous ideals! ↗

— Margaret Atwood

#earnest #ideals #change

We like to stress the commonness of heroes. Essences seem undemocratic. We feel oppressed by the call to greatness. We regard an interest in glory or perfection as a sign of mental unhealthiness, and have decided that high achievers, who are called overachievers, owe their surplus ambition to a defect in mothering (either too little or too much). We want to admire but think we have a right not to be intimidated. We dislike feeling inferior to an ideal. So away with ideals, with essences. The only ideals allowed are healthy ones -- those everyone may aspire to, or comfortably imagine oneself possessing. ↗

— Susan Sontag

#ambition #democracy #egalitarianism #equality #essence

I am only doing now what I have ever done; and ever will continue to do - that is adapting past experience to present reform in the light of high ideals and future objects. ↗

— John Burns

#am #continue #doing #done #ever

Wherever on this planet ideals of personal freedom and dignity apply, there you will find the cultural inheritance of England. ↗

— Karel Capek

#cultural #dignity #england #find #freedom

Another example of that was that even during the economic problems of the 1945 government, we managed to carry out other aspects of our policy and other ideals. Through the establishment of national parks, for instance. ↗

— Barbara Castle

#aspects #carry #during #economic #economic problems

I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it - not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization. ↗

— Harry S. Truman

#before #believe #civilization #embodiment #established

The absolute pacifist is a bad citizen; times come when force must be used to uphold right, justice and ideals. ↗

— Alfred North Whitehead

#bad #citizen #come #force #ideals

The downfall of the industry seems to actually be good for art. I think the industry will find their way once the focus shifts from its greed-based origins, downsizes, and begins to support creative visions that speak to our times and shifting ideals. ↗

— Saul Williams

#art #begins #creative #downfall #find