158 Quotes by John Ralston Saul

In all earlier civilizations, it should be remembered, commerce was treated as a narrow activity and by no means the senior sector in society.

People cannot do what they cannot think, and they cannot think what they cannot say.

Love: A term which has no meaning if defined.

Myrmecophaga jubata: The anteater. The existence of this predator demonstrates that thinking 71 percent of the time, as ants do, won't prevent you from being eaten. Thinking less than that, as humans do, will almost guarantee it.

Panic: A highly underrated capacity thanks to which individuals are able to indicate clearly that something is wrong.... Given their head, most humans panic with great dignity and imagination. This can be called democratic expression or practical common sense.

It is the considered opinion of most members of our rational élites that, in any given difference of opinion with reality, reality is wrong.

McDonald's is the ultimate symbol of passive conformity.

The undoubted sign of a society well under control or in decline is that language has ceased to be a means of communication and has become instead a shield for those who master it.

[C]ontent [is] an obstacle to the exercise of power.