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May 10, 2007

Great Quote on Man

From an article in Encyclopaedia Britannica by Robert Ardrey, quoted in The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs:


"But we were born of risen apes, not fallen angels, and the apes were armed killers besides. And so what shall we wonder at? Our murders and massacres and missiles, and our irreconcilable regiments? Or our treaties whatever they may be worth; our symphonies however seldom they are played; our peaceful acres, however frequently they may be converted into battlefields; our dreams however rarely they may be accomplished. The miracle of man is not how far he has sunk but how magnificently he has risen. We are known among the stars by our poems, not our corpses."

Wow.

Posted by tat at May 10, 2007 09:20 AM
Comments

I don't know whether to be uplifted because of what he says or depressed because hardly anyone else thinks this way.

Posted by: ToddDrevers at May 21, 2007 02:28 PM