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Dead Smart People

When you're tired of listening to living idiots.

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Corinth had always shown a deep love for liberty, and an equally strong hatred for tyranny: it had undertaken almost all its wars [...] not to dominate peoples, [...] but in the interest of the freedom of the Greeks.

100-120 AD

He who blames the whole of the world by considering only its parts is therefore unjust; he should examine the parts in their relation to the whole, to see if they are in accord and in harmony with it.

c. 253-270 AD

One of the most considerable [laws] [...] is the law of continuity [...]. However, it serves not only for examination, but also as a very fertile principle of invention.

1697

The contradiction in the existence of God.

1841

Cypriot artist

Limestone statuette of Geryon

Limestone statuette of Geryon

probably early 5th century BCE

It is an honor and a glory to suffer for Jesus Christ. For, a Christian would never consent to suffer death [...] if his spirit were not certain that He is truly God.

1263-1264

Men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent and infinitely wise Maker, [...] His workmanship they are, made to last during His pleasure, not one another's.

1690

It is the irony of life that the most energetic feelings of gratitude and devotion [...] develop in us towards those who, having the power to annihilate our existence [...], are pleased to abstain from it.

1869

Consider the fox, the leopard. [...] they always end up perishing in a net or a trap. Why? Because of their beautiful fur, which men covet.

4th century BC

Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes)

Sebastián Martínez y Pérez (1747–1800)

Sebastián Martínez y Pérez (1747–1800)

1792

Beware of all the inventions of charlatans; worship God; be an honest person, and believe that two and two make four.

1764

Interest is indeed the least constant thing in the world. Today, it is useful for me to unite with you; tomorrow, the same reason will make me your enemy.

1893

To love an angry, capricious, unjust god [...] To love the most dreadful object the human mind could ever conceive! [...] How can one love what one fears?

1766

What patricians have most at heart is to keep the most worthy citizens out of the council and to choose as colleagues people who have no will but their own.

1677

Russian Painter

The Congregation of the Mother of God

The Congregation of the Mother of God

1570

The properties of any inorganic body are as mysterious as life in a living being.

1819

The very vigor of mind and force of eloquence [...] only make one more capable of extinguishing in disciples all ardor for new research.

1620

The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common.

1836

I can defile the entire universe with my misery and not feel it, or gather it within myself.

1947

Jean François de Troy

The Declaration of Love

The Declaration of Love

ca. 1724

[...] nothing is easier than going to hell, because the path is always downhill and one goes with one's eyes closed.

1512-1527

Gentlemen, I am not afraid of death: I solemnly swear to you [...] that if this very night I were to suddenly receive my death warrant, I would hear it calmly; I would raise my hands to heaven, and I would say: Blessed be God!

1827

There is nothing entirely in our power except our thoughts.

1637

For the first time I felt my natural pride bend beneath the yoke of necessity.

1782-1789

Jusepe de Ribera (called Lo Spagnoletto)

The Tears of Saint Peter

The Tears of Saint Peter

ca. 1612–13

Nothing good or beautiful can exist without measure.

c. 360 BC

Think [...] of death, of prison, of torture, of exile; but think of them without trembling, submissive to the one who has called you to such a fate.

c. 108 AD

Memory is nothing other than a continued, but weakened, sensation.

1758

To feel is our entire existence, and to judge is but to discern a circumstance in a prior perception, that is, to feel distinctly a part of what was at first felt confusedly.

1805

Cypriot artist

Serpentinite pendant

Serpentinite pendant

ca. 3900–2500 BCE

I think that democratic peoples have a natural taste for liberty [...]. But they have an ardent, insatiable, eternal, invincible passion for equality.

1835-1840

They had been deplorably mistaken in their choice of means.

1851-1852

My body is here, but my heart is not; [...] if I had to choose between death and perpetual enclosure, I would not hesitate to die.

1760

Sparta sustained itself as long as it waged war; and triumph was its ruin, because it did not know how to enjoy peace.

c. 350 BCE

Greek Artist, Attic

Terracotta statuette of a woman

Terracotta statuette of a woman

late 4th–early 3rd century BCE

A good [leader] never has weapons that are too short; what they lack in length, their bravery knows how to supplement.

1636

The mind [...] is ordinarily capable of recognizing and feeling all the parts of its soul only when others touch upon them and make it feel them.

1674-1675

There is no passion that so shakes the sincerity of judgment as anger.

1580

When [people], gathered in cities, mutually share the productions [...], it is natural that they all wish to enjoy all these productions.

1776

Minoan

Steatite spindle whorl

Steatite spindle whorl

ca. 2400–1900 BCE

The continuation of the righteousness of the faithful is nothing other than the continuation of the infusion of grace, and not a single grace that endures forever.

1656-1657

The copyist, unintelligent or inattentive, has lost [...] the author's meaning.

c. 1552-1553

Broad and beautiful things can please for a long time; those that are merely pretty and cute soon tire the ear, the most disdainful of our senses.

86-82 BC

I believe that the time spent on refutation in philosophy is generally time wasted. [...] What counts and what endures is the positive truth one has contributed.

1919

Roman Artist

Two marble portrait heads from a relief

Two marble portrait heads from a relief

ca. 13 BCE–5 CE

The terms sociable, good-natured, humane [...] exist in all languages, and universally express the highest merit which human nature is capable of attaining.

1751

'All that is good is light, all that is divine runs on delicate feet': the first thesis of my Aesthetics.

1888

What is presumption in the weak, is elevation in the strong.

1746

The annoyances of life affect [virtue] no more, when they rain down on it, than a light shower affects the Ocean.

63-64 AD

Nicolas Froment

The Pérussis Altarpiece

The Pérussis Altarpiece

1480