Human Nature

"Aretino, like Rabelais and Cervantes, proclaimed the meaning of Typography as Gargantuan, Fantastic, Supra-human."

"People want to forget the impossible. It makes their world safer."

"People don't forget, do they?"

"Modem mainstream economic theory bravely assumes that people make their decisions in such a way as to maximize their utility. Accepting this assumption enables economics to predict a great deal of beh…"

"Islamic terrorism is the handiwork of people who’ve heeded, not hijacked, Islam."

"Finally, to those nations who would make themselves our adversary, we offer not a pledge but a request: that both sides begin anew the quest for peace, before the dark powers of destruction unleashed …"

"There were two reasons why contemporary Jews were inclined to celebrate Spinoza. The first is Spinoza's assumed merit about mankind and only secondarily about the Jews; the second is his assumed merit…"

"The human desire for food and sex is relatively equal. If there are armed rapes, why should there not be armed hot dog thefts?"

"Human rights are very often spoken of, but we must also speak of humanity's rights. Why should some people go barefoot that others may travel in expensive cars? Why should some live only 35 years that…"

"There's some entertainment value in watching people juggle nitroglycerin."

"But such is the nature of the human mind, that it always lays hold on every mind that approaches it; and as it is wonderfully fortified by an unanimity of sentiments, so is it shocked and disturbed by…"

"I go down to Blooms for kosher food. I can go anywhere. People don’t notice you if you go about your business. It’s only if you make a big scene."

"Our merchants and master-manufacturers complain much of the bad effects of high wages in raising the price, and thereby lessening the sale of their goods both at home and abroad. They say nothing conc…"

"The sun and the moon and the stars would have disappeared long ago...had they happened to be within the reach of predatory human hands."

"The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual: the pleasure of putting other people in the wrong, of bossing and patronising and s…"

"The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing…"

"I never trust people with no appetite. It's like they're always holding something back on you."

"I am for a form of art, that sees itself as one of the many means through which human society can be changed."

"They have an engine called the Press whereby the people are deceived."

"Poetry is the mother-tongue of the human race."