Paul

“This, indeed this, is bitterness for my bowels, that I can endure you neither naked nor clothed, you men of today. All that is uncanny in the future and all that has ever made fugitive birds shudder is surely more comfortable and cozy than your “reality.” For thus you speak: “Real are we entirely, and without belief or superstition.” Thus you stick out your chests—but alas, they are hollow!”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

“In this America, too, the Christian teaching that every human soul is unique and precious has been stressed, by the prophets of self-fulfillment and gurus of self-love, at the expense of the equally important teaching that every human soul is fatally corrupted by original sin. Absent the latter emphasis, religion becomes a license for egotism and selfishness, easily employed to justify what used to be considered deadly sins. The result is a society where pride becomes 'healthy self-esteem', vanity becomes 'self-improvement', adultery becomes 'following your heart', greed and gluttony become 'living the American dream'.”
― Ross Douthat, Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics

“Eagles don't flock, you have to find them one at a time.”
― Ross Perot

“This has ever been the fate of energy in security; it takes to art and eroticism, and then come languor and decay.”
― H.G. Wells, The Time Machine