Barbarians Quotes - Page 9

• Read properly, fewer books than a hundred would suffice for a liberal education. Read superficially, the British Museum Library might still leave the student a barbarian.

  Alfred Richard Orage

  Book, Museums, Library

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• But [the Arabs'] friendship was venal, their faith inconstant, their enmity capricious: it was an easier task to excite than to disarm these roving barbarians; and, in the familiar intercourse of war, they learned to see, and to despise, the splendid weakness both of Rome and of Persia.

  Edward Gibbon

  War, Rome, Weakness

  Edward Gibbon (2013). “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire: The Modern Library Collection (Complete and Unabridged)”, p.894, Modern Library

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• It was the mark of a barbarian to destroy something one could not understand.

  Arthur C. Clarke

  Mark

  Arthur C. Clarke (2012). “2001: A Space Odyssey”, p.95, RosettaBooks

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• Four thousand years ago, we, the people of the Indus River basin, had cities that were laid out on grids and boasted underground sewers, while the ancestors of those who would invade and colonize America were illiterate barbarians.

  Mohsin Hamid

  Years, Cities, Rivers

  Mohsin Hamid (2007). “The Reluctant Fundamentalist”, p.34, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Rugby is a game for barbarians played by gentlemen. Football is a game for gentlemen played by barbarians.

  Oscar Wilde

  Football, Games, Gentleman

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• Youths of the Pellaians and of the Macedonians and of the Hellenic Amphictiony and of the Lakedaimonians and of the Corinthians... and of all the Hellenic peoples, join your fellow-soldiers and entrust yourselves to me, so that we can move against the barbarians and liberate ourselves from the Persian bondage, for as Greeks we should not be slaves to barbarians.

  Alexander the Great

  Moving, Army, Greek

  "Historia Alexandri Magni". Pseudo-Kallisthenes,

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• Now you fear punishment and beg for your lives, so I will let you free, if not for any other reason so that you can see the difference between a Greek king and a barbarian tyrant, so do not expect to suffer any harm from me. A king does not kill messengers.

  Alexander the Great

  Kings, Army, Punishment

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• From the failure of the humanist tradition to participate fully or to act decisively, civilizations may perhaps crumble or perish at the hands of barbarians. But unless the humanist tradition itself in some form survives, there can really be no civilization at all.

  Louis Kronenberger

  Philosophy, Hands, Civilization

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• ...while science gives us implements to use, science alone does not determine for what ends they will be employed. Radio is an amazing invention. Yet now that it is here, one suspects that Hitler never could have consolidated his totalitarian control over Germany without its use. One never can tell what hands will reach out to lay hold on scientific gifts, or to what employment they will be put. Ever the old barbarian emerges, destructively using the new civilization.

  Harry Emerson Fosdick

  Science, Hands, Civilization

  Harry Emerson Fosdick (1941). “Living under tension: sermons on Christianity today”

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• How dangerous it is rashly to adopt the Mosaical institutions [Old Testament teachings of eye for an eye]. Laws might have been proper for a tribe of ardent barbarians wandering through the sands of Arabia which are wholly unfit for an enlightened people of civilized and gentle manners.

  Gerald Heaney

  Teaching, Eye, Law

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• You can have the most advanced and efflorescent of cultures. Get your politics wrong, however, and everything stands to be swept away. This is not ancient history. This is Germany 1933... Politics is the moat, the walls, beyond which lie the barbarians. Fail to keep them at bay, and everything burns.

  Charles Krauthammer

  Wall, Lying, Germany

  "Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions, Pastimes and Politics". Book by Charles Krauthammer, 2013).

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• It's a curious thing, this thing we call civilization...we think it is an affair of epochs, and nations. It's really an affair of individuals. One brother will be civilized and the other a barbarian...All civilization comes through literature now, especially in our country. A Greek got his civilization by talking and looking, and in some measure a Parisian may still do it. But we, who live remote from history and monuments, we must read or we must barbarise.

  William Dean Howells

  Country, Brother, Thinking

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• We're living in a Dark Age of macroeconomics. Remember, what defined the Dark Ages wasn’t the fact that they were primitive — the Bronze Age was primitive, too. What made the Dark Ages dark was the fact that so much knowledge had been lost, that so much known to the Greeks and Romans had been forgotten by the barbarian kingdoms that followed.

  Paul Krugman

  Dark, Greek, Age

  "A Dark Age of macroeconomics (wonkish)" by Paul Krugman, krugman.blogs.nytimes.com. January 27, 2009.

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• It is also in theory, conceivable that some universal empire some day might cover the whole globe, leaving no external "barbarians" to serve as invaders.

  Carroll Quigley

  Leaving, Might, Empires

  Carroll Quigley (1979). “The evolution of civilizations: an introduction to historical analysis”, Liberty Fund Inc.

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• Among the conservative Greek opinion there would be no regrets that Alexander the Greek leader was invading the barbarians.

  Robin Lane Fox

  Regret, Leader, Greek

  Robin Lane Fox (2004). “Alexander The Great”, Penguin Group USA

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• Turn the anger of the Almighty against the godless Turks and Barbarians who despise Christ the Lord.....In the royal city of the east, they have slain the successor of Constantine and his people, desecrated the temples of the Lord, defiled the noble church of Justinian with their Mohometan abominations. Each success, will only be a stepping stone until he has mastered all the Western Monarchs, overthrow the Christian Faith, and imposed the law of his false prophet on the whole world

  Pope Pius II

  Christian, Law, Cities

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• I’ve been a barbarian my whole life. I’m just a smarter barbarian now. Evolution, you know?

  Brock Lesnar

  Evolution, Whole Life, Knows

  "Ex-UFC champion Brock Lesnar finally rules out return to MMA". Interview with Greg Beacham, apnews.com. March 25, 2015.

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• War,--the trade of barbarians!

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  War, Trade

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• In its permission to man to render subject to him all other living creatures of the earth, it continued the cruelty of the barbarian and the pagan, and endowed these with what appeared a divine authority.

  Ouida

  Men, Religion, Earth

  Ouida (1896). “Views and Opinions”

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• God has chosen little nations as the vessels by which He carries His choicest wines to the lips of humanity to rejoice their hearts, to exalt their vision, to strengthen their faith, and if we had stood by when two little nations [Belgium and Serbia] were being crushed and broken by the brutal hands of barbarians, our shame would have rung down the everlasting ages.

  David Lloyd George

  War, Heart, Wine

  "The Great War". David Lloyd George's Speech delivered at the Queen's Hall, London, September 19, 1914.

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• I have often come across convinced adepts of Greek mythology who mock our faith under the pretext that we do not say anything else to those whom we instruct in divine things, but merely command them to believe.
  They accuse the apostles of ignorance, labelling them barbarians, because they do not have the subtlety of eloquence; and they say that the cult of martyrs is ridiculous, considering it completely absurd for the living to seek assistance from the dead.

  Theodoret

  Believe, Ignorance, Greek

  "Theodoret of Cyrus" (The Early Church Fathers) by Istvan Pasztori Kupan, Routledge, (p. 86), 2006.

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• We are the new "barbarians", forged in iron hardness in the fires of their hate and persecution. All over the world, we wait to pounce.

  George Lincoln Rockwell

  Hate, Fire, Iron

  George Lincoln Rockwell (1993). “This Time the World”, p.70, Lulu.com

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• The most successful hyperpowers are the ones where there was actual intermixing. Tang dynasty China was Chinas golden age, and contrary to what I was told when I was growing up, Tang China was founded by a man who by todays standards was no more than half Chinese. It was a mixed-blood dynasty that pulled in "barbarians" from the steppe.

  Amy Chua

  Growing Up, Successful, Men

  "The accidental hyperpower: an interview with Amy Chua". Interview with Fritz Lanham, www.chron.com. December 2, 2007.

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• They knew no better, but I do not propose to follow the example of a barbarian because he was honestly a barbarian.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Atheism, Example, Honestly

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1907). “The works of Robert G. Ingersoll”, p.2212, Library of Alexandria

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• It's daunting trying to do any service as an American to such a beautiful, fluid speech pattern that you [British] all have. We are just barbarians in comparison.

  Jake Gyllenhaal

  Beautiful, Trying, Speech

  "Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time - Jake Gyllenhaal interview". Interview with Rob Carnevale, www.indielondon.co.uk.

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