quotations about society
Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure -- but the state ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico or tobacco, or some other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on with other reverence; because it is not a partnership in things subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable nature. It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are to be born.
EDMUND BURKE
Reflections on the Revolution in France
How to gain the advantages of society, without at the same time losing ourselves, is a question of no slight difficulty. The wise man often follows the crowd at a little distance, in order that he may not come suddenly upon it, nor become entangled with it, and that he may with some means of amusement maintain a clear and quiet pathway.
ARTHUR HELPS
Thoughts in the Cloister and the Crowd
The truth is that a vast restructuring of our society is needed if remedies are to become available to the average person. Without that restructuring the good will that holds society together will be slowly dissipated. It is that sense of futility which permeates the present series of protests and dissents. Where there is a persistent sense of futility, there is violence; and that is where we are today.
WILLIAM O. DOUGLAS
Points of Rebellion
Society is a more level surface than we imagine. Wise men or absolute fools are hard to be met with, as there are few giants or dwarfs.
WILLIAM HAZLITT
Characteristics
And therefore God created only one single man, not, certainly, that he might be a solitary bereft of all society, but that by this means the unity of society and the bond of concord might be more effectually commended to him, men being bound together not only by similarity of nature, but by family affection. And indeed He did not even create the woman that was to be given him as his wife, as he created the man, but created her out of the man, that the whole human race might derive from one man.
ST. AUGUSTINE
The City of God
Society is divided into two classes--the shearers and the shorn; we should always be with the former against the latter.
NAPOLEON
attributed, Day's Collacon
There is a society in the deepest solitude.
ISAAC D'ISRAELI
Literary Character of Men of Genius
Parts of a machine
Modern day slavery
Dehumanizing control
Wasted lives fading
Sick Society System
Sick Society System
System of survival
CRIMINAL
"S.S.S."
It may be that our society is only passing through a period of ugly transition, but the present evil has its root deep down in the social organization, and springs from a diseased public opinion.
CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
"A Chapter of Erie", North American Review, July 1869
We are all civilized people, which means that we are all savages at heart but observing a few amenities of civilized behavior.
TENNESSEE WILLIAMS
foreword, Sweet Bird of Youth
Show me a man or a woman alone and I'll show you a saint. Give me two and they'll fall in love. Give me three and they'll invent the charming thing we call 'society'. Give me four and they'll build a pyramid. Give me five and they'll make one an outcast. Give me six and they'll reinvent prejudice. Give me seven and in seven years they'll reinvent warfare. Man may have been made in the image of God, but human society was made in the image of His opposite number, and is always trying to get back home.
STEPHEN KING
The Stand
No one has yet been found resolute enough in dogmatizing to deny that Nature made man equal; that society has destroyed this equality is a truth not more incontrovertible.
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY
letter to Elizabeth Hitchener, July 25, 1811
Society makes. Then society rewards and punishes her handiwork.
JOHN DANIEL BARRY
"Prisoners of Prejudice", Reactions and Other Essays
Every society has the criminals it deserves.
EMMA GOLDMAN
Red Emma Speaks
The man who lives alone is apt to forget the individuality of others; the man who lives in society is apt to forget his own.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
Society would be a charming affair if we were only interested in one another.
CHAMFORT
The Cynic's Breviary
Society is like air; very high up, it is sublimated--too low down, a perfect chock-damp.
THOMAS PRUEN
attributed, Day's Collacon
Society cares about the individual only in so far as he is profitable. The young know this. Their anxiety as they enter in upon social life matches the anguish of the old as they are excluded from it.
SIMONE DE BEAUVOIR
The Coming of Age
We are rated by normality
One shall never stand out
Personalities are deflated
During the first days in school
Belong to society by following the rules
Belong, with no way to choose
ROTTEN SOUND
"Follow"
I may travel, perhaps. So you have got to like society, and would enjoy it, you think? For me, I always hated it--have put up with it these six or seven years past, lest by foregoing it I should let some unknown good escape me, in the true time of it, and only discover my fault when too late; and now that I have done most of what is to be done, any lodge in a garden of cucumbers for me!
ROBERT BROWNING
letter to Elizabeth Barrett, March 12, 1845