James Sinks

“Taken as a whole, the history of the Middle Ages after the ruin in the West of the ancient civilization is one of progress, progress in society, government, order and organization, laws, the development of
human faculties, of rational thought, of knowledge and experience, of art and culture. Men throughout had been restlessly creative and aspiring. But that progress to a better life had been perpetually thwarted and delayed, not merely by external disasters but by the passions and wilful ambitions of men themselves. They generated countless ills. Rough and ready, even skilful and inspired remedies brought with their benefits fresh misfortunes on mankind. Innate barbarism broken from its fetters time and time again. Potent delusions summoned their appropriate nemesis. In our distant retrospect we can perceive how crooked and perilous was the upward road.”
― C.W. Previté-Orton, Cambridge Medieval History, Shorter: Volume 2, The Twelfth Century to the Renaissance

“I tell you, the sperm whale will stand no nonsense.”
― Herman Melville

“We are aliens in this visible world.”
― Erasmus

“The paradox of anthropology: to see something, you had to be outside of it, but when you were outside of it, you couldn't see it for what it was.”
― Paul La Farge, The Night Ocean