Quote

We human beings do have some genuine freedom of choice and therefore some effective control over our own destinies. I am not a determinist. But I also believe that the decisive choice is seldom the latest choice in the series. More often than not, it will turn out to be some choice made relatively far back in the past.

Arnold J. Toynbee

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Arnold J. Toynbee
Age: 85 †
Born: 1889
Born: April 14
Died: 1975
Died: January 1
Diplomat
Historian
University Teacher
London
England
Toynbee
Arnold Joseph Toynbee
Arnold Toynbee
Also
Choice
Relatively
Back
Turn
Seldom
Human
Control
Effective
Humans
Choices
Genuine
Made
Turns
Series
Determinist
Believe
Freedom
Destiny
Destinies
Often
Beings
Decisive
Past
Therefore
Latest

More quotes by Arnold J. Toynbee

Image
The human race's prospects of survival were considerably better when we were defenceless against tigers than they are today when we have become defenceless against ourselves.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
The last stage but one of every civilisation, is characterised by the forced political unification of its constituent parts, into a single greater whole.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
The West has never been all of the world that matters. The West has not been the only actor on the stage of modern history even at the peak of the West's power (and this peak has perhaps now already been passed)... It has not been the West that has been hit by the world it has been the world that has been hit - and hit hard - by the West.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
I do not believe that civilizations have to die because civilization is not an organism. It is a product of wills.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
The penalty of affluence is that it cuts one off from the common lot, common experience, and common fellowship. In a sense it outlaws one automatically from one's birthright of membership in the great human family.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Write regularly, day in and day out, at whatever times of day you find that you write best. Don't wait till you feel that you are in the mood. Write, whether you are feeling inclined to write or not.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Sooner or later, man has always had to decide whether he worships his own power or the power of God.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Apathy can be overcome by enthusiasm.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Religion holds the solution to all problems of human relationship, whether they are between parents and children or nation and nation. Sooner or later, man has always had to decide whether he worships his own power or the power of God.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
There is no such thing as gratitude in international politics.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
No being can be what he is unless he is putting his essence into action in his field.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
The immense cities lie basking on the beaches of the continent like whales that have taken to the land.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Civilization is a movement and not a condition, a voyage and not a harbor.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
The twentieth century will be chiefly remembered by future generations not as an era of political conflicts or technical inventions, but as an age in which human society dared to think of the welfare of the whole human race as a practical objective.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Angkor is perhaps the greatest of Man's essays in rectangular architecture that has yet been brought to life.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
I believe that a religious conversion is the only way to stimulate the peoples of the industrialized nations to be willing to make sacrifices for the sake of esho funi (the oneness of self and environment). ... I wish the entire world would accept as an item of religious faith the concept of esho funi and its moral obligations.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Civilizations, I believe, come to birth and proceed to grow by successfully responding to successive challenges. They break down and go to pieces if and when a challenge confronts them that they fail to meet.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
History not used is nothing, for all intellectual life is action, like practical life, and if you don't use the stuff - well, it might as well be dead.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder.
Arnold J. Toynbee
Image
History is a vision of God's creation on the move.
Arnold J. Toynbee