“The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding.”
“Purely historical thought is nihilistic; it wholeheartedly accepts the evil of history.”
“There was a time when I didn’t at any minute have the slightest idea how I could reach the next one. Yes, one can wage war in this world, ape love, torture one’s fellow man, or merely say evil of one’s neighbour while knitting. But, in certain cases, carrying on, merely continuing, is superhuman.”
“Virtue cannot separate itself from reality without becoming a principle of evil.”
“The rebel can never find peace. He knows what is good and, despite himself, does evil. The value which supports him is never given to him once and for all - he must fight to uphold it, unceasingly.”
“What’s true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves.”
“By giving too much importance to fine actions one may end by paying an indirect but powerful tribute to evil, because in so doing one implies that such fine actions are only valuable because they are rare, and that malice or indifference are far more common motives in the actions of men.”
“Metaphysical rebellion is a claim, motivated by the concept of a complete unity, against the suffering of life and death and a protest against the human condition both for its incompleteness, thanks to death, and its wastefulness, thanks to evil.”
“None of the evils which totalitarianism ... claims to remedy is worse than totalitarianism itself.”
“We do not know how to eliminate evil, but we do know how to feed some of the hungry and heal some of the infirmed.”
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