Superiority Quotes - Page 12

• I think we're insecure about our self-imposed spot at the top of the pyramid of life. New studies are continually undermining our superiority complex and forcing us to reconsider our relationship to animals.

  Jonathan Balcombe

  Insecure, Thinking, Animal

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• Above all, there is no exception to this rule: that the idea of political superiority always resolves itself into the idea of psychological superiority.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Ideas, Political, Politics

  Friedrich Nietzsche “Delphi Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche (Illustrated): Friedrich Nietzsche”, Delphi Classics

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• The human intellect owes its superiority over that of the lower animals in great measure to the stimulus which alcohol has given imagination.

  Samuel Butler

  Beer, Animal, Imagination

  Samuel Butler (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Samuel Butler (Illustrated)”, p.1732, Delphi Classics

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• A solitary laugh is often a laugh of superiority.

  Graham Greene

  Laughing, Solitary

  1982 Monsignor Quixote, pt.1, ch.9.

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• There is no better example of the weakness of our dominant medicine than its clearly ineffective War On Cancer. By the same token, there is no better example of the superiority of complementary, alternative medicine than its management of this dread disease. We are equally concerned about whether mainstream medicine's demand for proof works to maintain it at its current level of ineptitude.

  Robert Atkins

  War, Cancer, Medicine

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• Another powerful principle of our nature, which is the spring of war, is the passion for superiority, for triumph, for power. The human mind is aspiring, impatient of inferiority, and eager for preeminence and control.

  William Ellery Channing

  Powerful, Spring, War

  William Ellery Channing (1835). “The works of Wm. Ellery Channing ...”, p.34

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• There is no such test of a man's superiority of character as in the well-conducting of an unavoidable quarrel.

  Henry Taylor

  Character, Men, Tests

  Sir Henry Taylor (1836). “The Statesman”, p.101

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• Lastly, I would address one general admonition to all: that they consider what are the true ends of knowledge, and that they seek it not either for pleasure of the mind, or for contention, or for superiority to others, or for profit, or fame, or power, or any of these inferior things: but for the benefit and use of life; and that they perfect and govern it in charity.

  Francis Bacon

  Knowledge, Perfect, Mind

  Francis Bacon, Rose-Mary Sargent (1999). “Selected Philosophical Works”, p.75, Hackett Publishing

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• There is no remedy but love for the great superiority of others

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Remedy

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• A dog gladly admits the superiority of his master over himself, accepts his judgment as final, but, contrary to what dog-lovers believe, he does not consider himself as a slave. His submission is voluntary, and he expects his own small rights to be respected.

  Axel Munthe

  Dog, Believe, Rights

  Axel Munthe (1930). “The Story of San Michele”

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• There is a kind of grandeur and respect which the meanest and most insignificant part of mankind endeavor to procure in the little circle of their friends and acquaintance. The poorest mechanic, nay, the man who lives upon common alms, gets him his set of admirers, and delights in that superiority which he enjoys over those who are in some respects beneath him. This ambition, which is natural to the soul of man, might, methinks, receive a very happy turn; and, if it were rightly directed, contribute as much to a person's advantage, as it generally does to his uneasiness and disquiet.

  Joseph Addison

  Ambition, Men, Circles

  Joseph Addison, Sir Richard Steele (1819). “The Spectator”, p.20

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• Whatever a 'superior' group has will be used to justify its superiority, and whatever an 'inferior' group has will be used to justify its plight. Black men were given poorly paid jobs because they were said to be 'stronger' than white men, while all women were relegated to poorly paid jobs because they were said to be 'weaker.

  Gloria Steinem

  Jobs, Men, White Man

  Gloria Steinem (2012). “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions”, p.505, Open Road Media

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• Teachers ... preach "the superiority of the intelligence"; but they preach it because in their opinion it is the intelligence which shows us the actions required for our interests, i.e. from exactly the same passion for the practical.

  Julien Benda

  Teacher, Passion, Action

  Julien Benda (1969). “The Treason of the Intellectuals”

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• All political movements are like this - we are in the right, everyone else is in the wrong. The people on our own side who disagree with us are heretics, and they start becoming enemies. With it comes an absolute conviction of your own moral superiority. There's oversimplification in everything, and a terror of flexibility.

  Doris Lessing

  Party, Reality, People

  "A Notorious Life". Interview with Dwight Garner, www.salon.com. November 11, 1997.

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• Being six feet off the ground does give one a sense of superiority.

  Megan Whalen Turner

  Feet, Giving, Doe

  Megan Whalen Turner (2009). “The Thief”, p.22, Harper Collins

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• People always make the mistake of thinking art is created for them. But really, art is a private language for sophisticates to congratulate themselves on their superiority to the rest of the world. As my artist’s statement explains, my work is utterly incomprehensible and is therefore full of deep significance.

  Bill Watterson

  Art, Mistake, Thinking

  "It's a Magical World". Book by Bill Watterson, October 1996.

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• He was a simple man who had no inferiority complex about his lack of education, and even more amazing no superiority complex because he had succeeded despite that lack.

  Maya Angelou

  Life, Simple, Men

  Maya Angelou (2012). “The Collected Autobiographies of Maya Angelou”, p.169, Modern Library

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• The Negro enslaved by his inferiority, the white man enslaved by his superiority alike behave in accordance with a neurotic orientation.

  Frantz Fanon

  Men, White Man, Inferiority

  Frantz Fanon (1967). “Black Skin, White Masks”, p.60, Pluto Press

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• Every time I asked a question, that magnificent teacher, instead of giving the answer, showed me how to find it. She taught me to organise my thoughts, to do research, to read and listen, to seek alternatives, to resolve old problems with new solutions, to argue logically. Above all, she taught me not to believe anything blindly, to doubt, and to question even what seemed irrefutably true, such as man's superiority over woman, or one race or social class over another.

  Isabel Allende

  Teacher, Believe, Men

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• Cool superiority as a mask for overflowing insecurity.

  Deb Caletti

  Insecurity, Mask

  Deb Caletti (2012). “Stay”, p.67, Simon and Schuster

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• The question of whether one alleges the Superiority or Inferiority of any given race is irrelevant; racism has only one psychological root: the racist's sense of his own Inferiority.

  Ayn Rand

  Race, Roots, Racism

  Ayn Rand (1999). “The Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution”, p.149, Penguin

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• God is the immemorial refuge of the incompetent, the helpless, and the miserable. They find not only sanctuary in his arms, but also a kind of superiority, soothing to their macerated egos; he will set them above their betters.

  H. L. Mencken

  Ego, Sanctuary, Arms

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• Where there are no distinctions there can be no superiority; perfect equality affords no temptation.

  Thomas Paine

  Class, Perfect, Temptation

  Thomas Paine, Bruce Kuklick (2000). “Paine: Political Writings”, p.26, Cambridge University Press

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• The suspicion is in the air nowadays that the superiority of one of our formulas to another may not consist so much in its literal 'objectivity,' as in subjective qualities like its usefulness, its 'elegance,' or its congruity with our residual beliefs

  William James

  Truth, Air, Objectivity

  William James (2000). “Pragmatism and Other Writings”, p.199, Penguin

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• I think that the solution of the question of numerical superiority of Russian conventional forces has to be solved.

  Helmut Schmidt

  Thinking, Force, Conventional

  "War and Peace in the Nuclear Age". "Zero Hour", openvault.wgbh.org. 1987.

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