Thomas McEvilley quotes

Art's primary social function is to define the communal self, which includes redefining it when the community is changing.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Change #Art #Self

It is ... possible to read Plato as if he were only discussing reason and not mystical intuition in his writings but ... in that case he seems naively over-impressed by rather ordinary thought processes.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Plato #Writing #Intuition

Plato feels that ethical abstinences and austerities are essential preconditions for the cleansing and opening of the eye of the soul.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Plato #Eye #Soul

In the Republic Plato presents a theory of personality. ... He speaks of three faculties, the appetitive, the ambitious, and the rational. ... The most dangerous faculty according to Plato is the appetitive for it bonds the soul to the senses and the realm of sense objects.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Plato #Personality #Soul

Many modern scholars have found the asceticism expressed in Plato unacceptable; it does not sound like the advice of a reasonable man in the Cartesian tradition.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Plato #Men #Advice

To Plato the desire for excessive and special foods ... is a hindrance to the soul's attainment of intelligence.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Plato #Soul #Special

Plato rarely if ever states anything about himself clearly.
-- Thomas McEvilley

#Plato #States #Ifs

Very often a change of self is needed more than a change of scene.

There is a danger of changing too much in the search for perfection.

Teaching is an instinctual art, mindful of potential, craving of realizations, a pausing, seamless process.

Poetry leads us to the unstructured sources of our beings, to the unknown, and returns us to our rational, structured selves refreshed. Having once experienced the mystery, plenitude, contradiction, and composure of a work of art, we afterward have a built-in resistance to the slogans and propaganda of oversimplification that have often contributed to the destruction of human life. Poetry is a verbal means to a nonverbal source. It is a motion to no-motion, to the still point of contemplation and deep realization.

Design should do the same thing in everyday life that art does when encountered: amaze us, scare us or delight us, but certainly open us to new worlds within our daily existence.

Art, however innocent, looks like deceiving.

We must surrender ourselves so utterly that we can never own ourselves again. We must hand over self and all its rights in an eternal covenant, and give God the absolute right to own us, control us and possess us forever.

One bright and thankful look at the cross is worth a thousand morbid, self-condemning reflections.

Just try to learn the truth by approaching a spiritual master. Inquire from him submissively and render service unto him. The self-realized soul can impart knowledge unto you because he has seen the truth.

I was once naïve enough to ask the late Duke of Devonshire why he liked the town of Eastbourne. He replied with a self-deprecating shrug that one of the things he liked was that he owned it.