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The most striking thing about the rich is the gracious democracy of their manners -- and the crude vulgarity of their way of life.

Edward Abbey

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Edward Abbey
Age: 62 †
Born: 1927
Born: January 29
Died: 1989
Died: March 14
Author
Environmentalist
Essayist
Novelist
Philosopher
Screenwriter
Writer
Edward Paul Abbey
Way
Vulgarity
Life
Striking
Crude
Gracious
Manners
Democracy
Rich
Thing

More quotes by Edward Abbey

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The tank, the B-52, the fighter-bomber, the state-controlled police and military are the weapons of dictatorship. The rifle is the weapon of democracy. Not for nothing was the revolver called an equalizer.
Edward Abbey
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If we had the power of ten Shakespeares or a dozen Mozarts, we could not produce anything half so marvelous as one ordinary human child.
Edward Abbey
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Nature is indifferent to our love, but never unfaithful.
Edward Abbey
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The Proustian aquarium: grotesque and gorgeous fish drifting with languid fins through a subaqueous medium of pale violet polluted ink.
Edward Abbey
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By the age of forty, a man is responsible for his face. And his fate.
Edward Abbey
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A crude meal, no doubt, but the best of all sauces is hunger.
Edward Abbey
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When I hear the word 'culture', I reach for my checkbook.
Edward Abbey
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Why the critics, like a flock of ducks, always move in perfect unison: Their authority with the public depends upon an appearance of unanimous agreement. One dissenting voice would shatter the whole fragile structure.
Edward Abbey
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I have written much about many good places. But the best places of all, I have never mentioned.
Edward Abbey
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Man's deliberate destruction of his own habitat -- planet Earth -- could serve as a mighty theme for a mighty book worthy of a modern Melville or Tolstoy. But our best fictioneers confine themselves to domestic drama -- soap opera with literary trimmings.
Edward Abbey
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Whenever I see a photograph of some sportsman grinning over his kill, I am always impressed by the striking moral and esthetic superiority of the dead animal to the live one.
Edward Abbey
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Where all pretend to be thinking alike, it's likely that no one is thinking at all.
Edward Abbey
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A woman, as much as a man, is responsible by the age of forty for the character of her face. But women, obeying the biological imperative, strive harder to preserve a youthful appearance (the reproductive look) and lose it sooner.
Edward Abbey
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One must be reasonable in one's demands on life. For myself, all that I ask is: (1) accurate information (2) coherent knowledge (3) deep understanding (4) infinite loving wisdom (5) no more kidney stones, please.
Edward Abbey
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The most common form of terrorism in the U.S.A. is that carried on by bulldozers and chainsaws. It is not enough to understand the natural world the point is to defend and preserve it. Sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul.
Edward Abbey
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What draws us into the desert is the search for something intimate in the remote.
Edward Abbey
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Government: If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.
Edward Abbey
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Married couples who quarrel bitterly every day may really need each other as deeply as those who appear to be desperately in love.
Edward Abbey
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Motherhood is an essential, difficult, and full-time job. Women who do not wish to be mothers should not have babies.
Edward Abbey
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Our big social institutions do not reflect human nature they distort it.
Edward Abbey