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Civilization Quotes
"The center of Western culture is Greece, and we have never lost our ties with the architectural concepts of that ancient civilization."
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"There is precious little in civilization to appeal to a Yeti."
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"If civilization had been left in female hands we would still be living in grass huts."
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"Right now, there's the illusion of order and civilization, but there's a tremendous amount of economic tension in this country and the educational system is constantly eroding."
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"Culture is the tacit agreement to let the means of subsistence disappear behind the purpose of existence. Civilization is the subordination of the latter to the former."
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"The market is not an invention of capitalism. It has existed for centuries. It is an invention of civilization."
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"A civilized man is one who will give a serious answer to a serious question. Civilization itself is a certain sane balance of values."
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"Civilization in its present form hasn't got long."
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"What I am more concerned about is whether our whole civilization will be around in the next 25 years."
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"The collective consciousness of mankind defines the existence and sustainability of this civilization."
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"Instead of the former divinely appointed aims of the Jewish, Greek, or Roman nations, which ancient historians regarded as representing the progress of humanity, modern history has postulated its own aims- the welfare of the French, German, or English people, or, in its highest abstraction, the welfare and civilization of humanity in general, by which is usually meant that of the peoples occupying a small northwesterly portion of a large continent."
50
"Wherever an altar is found, there civilization exists."
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"From first to last the civilization of America has been bound up with its physical environment."
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"A civilization is destroyed only when its gods are destroyed."
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"My play is the ultimate expression of my feeling of the twilight of Western civilization."
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"The liberty of the individual is no gift of civilization. It was greatest before there was any civilization."
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"The sovereign state has in our times become a lethal danger to human civilization because technical developments enable it to employ an infinite number and variety of means of destruction."
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"Here the Frenchman, Spaniard, and Englishman all passed, leaving each his legend; and a brilliant and more or less feudal civilization with its aristocracy and slaves has departed with the economic system upon which it rested."
48
"We may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrial civilization to collapse."
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"In our rich consumers' civilization we spin cocoons around ourselves and get possessed by our possessions."
48
"No doubt Western civilization has in the past been full of wars and revolutions, and the national elements in our culture, even when they were ignored, always provided an unconscious driving force of passion and aggressive self-assertion."
48
"Our civilization is still in a middle stage, scarcely beast, in that it is no longer wholly guided by instinct; scarcely human, in that it is not yet wholly guided by reason."
48
"The Lincoln Memorial is related to the toga and the civilization that wore it."
48
"The destiny of world civilization depends upon providing a decent standard of living for all mankind."
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"New York... when civilization falls apart, remember, we were way ahead of you."
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"It is what you do from now on that will either move our civilization forward a few tiny steps, or else... begin to march us steadily backward."
48
"A slight daily unconscious luxury is hardly ever wanting to the dwellers in civilization; like the gentle air of a genial climate, it is a perpetual minute enjoyment."
47
"Back through the ages of barbarism and civilization, in all tongues, we find this instinctive pleasure in the imitative action that is the very essence of all drama."
47
"Civilization had too many rules for me, so I did my best to rewrite them."
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"A new civilization was not to be improvised by a single mind."
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"Hold fast to the Bible. To the influence of this Book we are indebted for all the progress made in true civilization and to this we must look as our guide in the future."
47
"We must not try to force him to take civilization immediately in its complete form, but under just laws, guaranteeing to Indians equal civil laws, the Indian question, a source of such dishonor to our country and of shame to true patriots, will soon be a thing of the past."
47
"Tolerance is held to be a condition of mind which is encouraged by, and is necessary for, civilization."
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"Civilization is unbearable, but it is less unbearable at the top."
46
"The papacy again, representing the traditional unity of European civilization, has also shown itself unable to limit effectively the push of nationalism."
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"If the battle for civilization comes down to the wimps versus the barbarians, the barbarians are going to win."
46
"It's just a show. It's not the end of Western Civilization. It's chewing gum."
46
"The evidence of a Jewish civilization going back more than two millennia is overwhelmingly borne out in the archaeology of the region. The heritage of the Jews in Palestine is documented."
46
"Civilization... wrecks the planet from seafloor to stratosphere."
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"Beware how you trifle with your marvelous inheritance, this great land of ordered liberty, for if we stumble and fall, freedom and civilization everywhere will go down in ruin."
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"The salt of any interesting civilization is mixture."
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"Civilization and profit go hand in hand."
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"Barbarians always think of themselves as the bringers of civilization."
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"Anglo-Saxon civilization has taught the individual to protect his own rights; American civilization will teach him to respect the rights of others."
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"The last struggle for our rights, the battle for our civilization, is entirely with ourselves."
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"Never had there been such an attempt to make conquest the servant of civilization. About keeping India there is no question. England has a real duty there."
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"Each new generation born is in effect an invasion of civilization by little barbarians, who must be civilized before it is too late."
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"In the cold, shivering twilight, preceding the daybreak of civilization, the dominating emotion of man was fear."
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"Advanced weaponry, victories in battle and space travel do not an advanced species or civilization make."
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"The line of least resistance in the progress of civilization is to make that theoretical postulate real by the continually increasing force of the world's public opinion."
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