#tory

I would say that my ideal of writing history is to give the reader vicarious experience. You’re born in one particular century at a particular time, and the only experience you can have directly is of the place you live and the time you live in. History is a way of giving you experience that you would otherwise be cut off from. ↗

— Edmund S. Morgan

#experience

Too much faith is the worst ally. When you believe in something literally, through your faith you'll turn it into something absurd. One who is a genuine adherent, if you like, of some political outlook, never takes its sophistries seriously, but only its practical aims, which are concealed beneath these sophistries. Political rhetoric and sophistries do not exist, after all, in order that they be believed; rather, they have to serve as a common and agreed upon alibi. Foolish people who take them in earnest sooner or later discover inconsistencies in them, begin to protest, and finish finally and infamously as heretics and apostates. No, too much faith never brings anything good... ↗

— Milan Kundera

#dogma #faith #history #machiavellian #moderation

We know of no spectacle more ridiculous—or more contemptible—than that of the religious reactionaries who dare to re-write the history of our republic. Or who try to do so. Is it possible that, in their vanity and stupidity, they suppose that they can erase the name of Thomas Jefferson and replace it with the name of some faith-based mediocrity whose name is already obscure? If so, we cheerfully resolve to mock them, and to give them the lie in their teeth. ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#history #thomas-jefferson #united-states #faith

The ragamuffin gospel says we can't lose, because we have nothing to lose. ↗

— Brennan Manning

#gospel #risk #victory #faith

He's a gypsy killer. He has a special gypsy killing knife. ↗

— Coco J. Ginger

#breaking-up #breakups #broken-heart #broken-hearted #broken-hearted-quotes

Stories are verbal acts of hospitality. ↗

— Eugene H. Peterson

#story #faith

Before God and high heaven, is there a law for one man which is not a law for every other man? ↗

— Howard Zinn

#equality #faith #government #history #equality

The history of American politics is littered with bodies of people who took so pure a position that they had no clout at all. ↗

— Benjamin C. Bradlee

#american politics #bodies #clout #had #history

A Shakespearean tragedy as so far considered may be called a story of exceptional calamity leading to the death of a man in high estate. But it is clearly much more than this, and we have now to regard it from another side. ↗

— Andrew Coyle Bradley

#calamity #called #clearly #considered #death

Nothing will get you into trouble so deep or as sad as faith. ↗

— Rick Bass

#juggernaut-short-story #faith