111 Quotes About Civilisation

Look's like we're all suffering from some mental illness. I think it's called 'civilisation'.

At times I feel your voice is reaching me from far away, while I am prisoner of a gaudy and unlivable present, when all forms of human society have reached an extreme of their cycle and there is no imagining what new forms they may assume. And I hear, from your voice, the invisible reasons which make cities live, through which perhaps, once dead, they will come to life again.

J'avais eu peur en effet de mourir dans les geôles colonialistes sans laisser à l'Algérie, à mes frères musulmans, une technique de renaissance, tant je les voyais sacrifier leurs meilleurs moyens et le meilleur de leur temps à des futilités. On verra comment le "patrimoine" algérien m'en récompensera.

Det uhæmmede, det uciviliserede øjeblik af ubesværet nøgenhed forsvinder for øjnene af mig, som de perlende dråber af det azurblå hav forinden havde gjort det på pigernes skuldre. Jeg hvirvler igennem tiden. Jeg, et seksuelt væsen af det enogtyvende århundrede, hvirvles tilbage til mit efterår. Tilbage til min seng.

Civilisation is the art of living in contact with other persons with the minimum of discomfort.

(...) L'histoire de la civilisation peut être entreprise de dedans l'âme humaine, en la considérant comme le reflet de cette âme, l'histoire d'un état d'âme, ou bien de dedans la société comme l'histoire d'un état social.

Doesn’t civilisation mean keeping your temper when there is no reason for restraint?

I am not a simpleton', he said, 'nor am I a childish old man. I dislike childishness and all such rubbish. I feel nothing but impatience with the people who pretend that the world is other than it is. The world, Lady Slane, is pitiably horrible. It is horrible because it is based upon competitive struggle - and really one does not know whether to call the basis of that struggle a convention or a necessity. Is it some extraordinary delusion, or is it a law of life?

As civilisation advances, so does indifference.