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Tradition Quotes
"Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence."
79
"The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato."
72
"That's why we're doing this, to defend our traditions a little. I don't have anything against it (Halloween), but it's not our tradition."
67
"Preserving tradition has become a nice hobby, like stamp collecting."
56
"Christmas can be celebrated in the school room with pine trees, tinsel and reindeers, but there must be no mention of the man whose birthday is being celebrated. One wonders how a teacher would answer if a student asked why it was called Christmas."
51
"It was a very proper wedding. The bride was elegantly dressed--the two bridemaids were duly inferior--her father gave her away--her mother stood with salts in her hand expecting to be agitated--her aunt tried to cry-- and the service was impressively read by Dr. Grant."
50
"If I have smashed the traditions, it was because I knew no traditions."
46
"The despotism of custom is everywhere the standing hindrance to human advancement."
46
"I like the catholicity in time: our tradition is one of 2,000 years."
44
"I prefer to choose which traditions to keep and which to let go."
43
"There was an honorable tradition of using anonymous sources that was ruined by Jayson Blair."
42
"Tradition demands that we not speak poorly of the dead."
41
"I respect traditional people - they have the eyes which see value in the tarnished. This is a gift in itself. Tradition requires a wealth of discipline in order to be adhered to, hence it is rarely found in youth."
39
"Traditions are the guideposts driven deep in our subconscious minds. The most powerful ones are those we can't even describe, aren't even aware of."
39
"In the villages in Europe, there are still healers who tell stories."
36
"What is morality but immemorial custom? Conscience is the chief of conservatives."
35
"If I belong to a tradition, it is a tradition that makes the masterpiece tell the performer what to do, and not the performer telling the piece what it should be like, or the composer what he ought to have composed."
35
"Odd that a festival to celebrate the most austere of births should end up being all about conspicuous consumption."
35
"The turkey has a destiny which ends on San Martino's day."
35
"It is often said by the critics of Christian origins that certain ritual feasts, processions or dances are really of pagan origin. They might as well say that our legs are of pagan origin. Nobody ever disputed that humanity was human before it was Christian; and no Church manufactured the legs with which men walked or danced, either in a pilgrimage or a ballet. What can really be maintained, so as to carry not a little conviction, is this: that where such a Church has existed it has preserved not only the processions but the dances; not only the cathedral but the carnival. One of the chief claims of Christian civilisation is to have preserved things of pagan origin."
34
"Adults are tempted to produce and perform Christmas for their kids and their families, and they arrive at Christmas Day weary and disillusioned."
34
"Defenders of the status quo will argue that this system has served us well over the centuries, that our parliamentary traditions have combined stability and flexibility and that we should not cast away in a minute what has taken generations to build."
33
"I think it's a Blondie tradition that all of our albums sort of have a wide spread of styles."
33
"Virtually every tribe in the march towards civilization developed its tailored made initiation practices. In America, sports are part of the test for a young man's initiation into manhood."
33
"There is something about Christmas that requires a rug rat. Little kids make Christmas fun. I wonder if could rent one for the holidays. When I was tiny we would by a real tree and stay up late drinking hot chocolate and finding just the right place for the special decorations. It seems like my parents gave up the magic when I figured out the Santa lie. Maybe I shouldn't have told them I knew where the presents really came from. It broke their hearts."
33
"They say fingers were made before forks and hands before knives."
33
"For I who hold sage Homer's rule the best Welcome the coming speed the going guest."
31
"The customs are as formalised as an eighteenth-century minuet, and a child at the race's knee learns the moves and twirls by osmosis and observation."
31
"Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about."
31
"It seems there's confusion at this time of yearregarding the reason for Christmas.From shopping for presents to spreading good cheer,the world makes an overly huge fuss.But Christmas is not for the gifts we exchange.It's not about sleigh rides or sweet candy canes.Nay, Christmas is simple. A time to recallChrist's gift of atonement He gave to us all."
30
"(in response to the question: what do you think of e-books and Amazon's Kindle?) Those aren't books. You can't hold a computer in your hand like you can a book. A computer does not smell. There are two perfumes to a book. If a book is new, it smells great. If a book is old, it smells even better. It smells like ancient Egypt. A book has got to smell. You have to hold it in your hands and pray to it. You put it in your pocket and you walk with it. And it stays with you forever. But the computer doesn't do that for you. I'm sorry."
29
"Plato forbids children wine till eighteen years of age, and to get drunk till forty; but, after forty, gives them leave to please themselves, and to mix a little liberally in their feasts the influence of Dionysos, that good deity who restores to younger men their gaiety and to old men their youth...fit to inspire old men with mettle to divert themselves in dancing and music; things of great use, and that they dare not attempt when sober."
27
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