John Tegner

“Once, men and women were able to turn themselves into eagles and fly immense distances. They communed with rivers and mountains and received wisdom from them. They felt the turning of the stars inside their own minds. My contemporaries did not understand this. They were all enamoured with the idea of progress and believed that whatever was new must be superior to what was old. As if merit was a function of chronology!”
― Susanna Clarke, Piranesi

“No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof. What everybody echoes or in silence passes by as true to-day may turn out to be falsehood to-morrow, mere smoke of opinion, which some had trusted for a cloud that would sprinkle fertilizing rain on their fields.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden & Civil Disobedience

“It is never too late to give up our prejudices. No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof. What everybody echoes or in silence passes by as true to-day may turn out to be falsehood to-morrow, mere smoke of opinion, which some had trusted for a cloud that would sprinkle fertilizing rain on their fields. What old people say you cannot do, you try and find that you can. Old deeds for old people, and new deeds for new.”
― Henry David Thoreau

“DECIPHERING THE LOGIC OF EXTORTION To recognize the megapolitical implications of the current shift to the Information Age, you have to strip away the cant and focus on the real logic of violence in society. This is like stripping away the layers of an overripe onion. It may bring tears to your eyes, but don’t look away.”
― James Dale Davidson, The Sovereign Individual: Mastering the Transition to the Information Age