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![By Stefan Zweig Die Welt von Gestern [Hardcover] by Stefan Zweig](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1697825641l/129355192._SY75_.jpg "By Stefan Zweig Die Welt von Gestern [Hardcover] by Stefan Zweig")
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"Naturally, the imaginative apprehension of meaning cannot promise the certainty of dispassionate, logical investigation; but, nonetheless, the former involves a profound faith without which we definitely cannot live well, and without which we sometimes cannot live at all - a lesson learned by Mill at age twenty." — Jan 26, 2026 05:00AM
"Naturally, the imaginative apprehension of meaning cannot promise the certainty of dispassionate, logical investigation; but, nonetheless, the former involves a profound faith without which we definitely cannot live well, and without which we sometimes cannot live at all - a lesson learned by Mill at age twenty." — Jan 26, 2026 05:00AM
“I short, the government tried to tame people's selfish nature by means of education and ritual, and when that didn't work, it tried harsh punishments to enforce norms that people knew, deep down, had social benefits. Eventually, the punishments closed the gap between the norm and the practice and the government could rely mainly on moral self-regulation instead of harsh punishment, but without completely doing away with laws that served as last-resort checks on selfish and dangerous behavior. More or less as Xunzi would have recommended: Best to rely on informal means of regulation that transform people's selfish tendencies, and if that doesn't work, use the strong arm of the law.”
― The Dean of Shandong: Confessions of a Minor Bureaucrat at a Chinese University
― The Dean of Shandong: Confessions of a Minor Bureaucrat at a Chinese University
“Hesse wrote an essay on what he saw as the world's publishing crisis and the fate of the book. Hesse concluded his talk with these words: 'Only a few sacred books that humankind treasures hold the regenerating power and survive throughout the millennia and the world crises. It is reassuring to see that the situation does not depend on the distribution of these works. It is not necessary for millions, even hundreds of thousands of readers to have appropriated for themselves this or that sacred book. It is enough that a few people should have been touched by them.”
― Maimonides: Faith in Reason
― Maimonides: Faith in Reason
“Life is not a series of gig lamps symmetrically arranged; life is a luminous halo, a semi-transparent envelope surrounding us from the beginning of consciousness to the end.”
― Modern Fiction
― Modern Fiction
“The evolution of technologically advanced Homo sapiens is one of the few truly singular events in the history of life. No species before us wielded anything close to as much power as our species, either individually or collectively, and no singe species has so profoundly altered planet Earth geologically and biologically. We are the first species to create an entire economy, with all of the functions that in the rest of the biosphere would be performed by multiple species. This novel economy, built on top of the remaining biosphere, has in effect become a one-species monopoly, a system with unprecedented power and correspondingly great internal vulnerabilities.”
― The Evolution of Power: A New Understanding of the History of Life
― The Evolution of Power: A New Understanding of the History of Life
“Der Fall Österreichs brachte in meiner privaten Existenz eine Veränderung mit sich, die ich zuerst als eine gänzlich belanglose und bloß formelle ansah; ich verlor damit meinen österreichischen Paß und mußte von den englischen Behörden ein weißes Ersatzpapier, einen Staatenlosenpaß erbitten. Oft hatte ich in meinen kosmopolitischen Träumereien mir heimlich ausgemalt, wie herrlich es sein müsse, wie eigentlich gemäß meinem inneren Empfinden, staatenlos zu sein, keinem Lande verpflichtet und darum allen unterschiedslos zugehörig. Aber wieder einmal mußte ich erkennen, wie unzulänglich unsere irdische Phantasie ist, und daß man gerade die wichtigsten Empfindungen erst versteht, sobald man sie selbst durchlitten hat.”
― Stefan Zweig: Die Welt von gestern: Erinnerungen eines Europäers (Novelaris Klassik)
― Stefan Zweig: Die Welt von gestern: Erinnerungen eines Europäers (Novelaris Klassik)
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