Quote

Civilization is a fiction which becomes a fact only as long as everyone can believe in it. It is the cynic, rather than the rebel, who pulls down the whole flimsy structure periodically throughout history.

Helen McCloy

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Helen McCloy
Age: 90 †
Born: 1904
Born: June 6
Died: 1994
Died: December 1
Journalist
Novelist
Writer
New York City
New York
Helen Worrell Clarkson McCloy
Rather
Cynic
Fact
Pulls
Everyone
Rebel
History
Throughout
Facts
Structure
Whole
Civilization
Long
Fiction
Flimsy
Believe
Becomes
Periodically

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the true and the plausible are rarely the same.
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Diamonds are the tears of the poor.
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Everything you do in war is a crime in peace
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the old ploy of the powerful: never refuse when you can confuse. Distraction and delay are always better than obstruction.
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most of our social and educational institutions are designed to weed out or make over people ... until we produce a world where everyone is a smart, quick-witted, aggressive person living on the surface of the mind without ever looking into the depths.
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There's always trouble in the Middle East. I can't recall any time in my life when there hasn't been trouble there.
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That's the worst thing about money - the moment you have some you begin to suspect everyone of trying to take it away from you. And usually they are.
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Every criminal leaves psychic fingerprints. And he can't wear gloves to hide them.
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Nobody believes in ghosts, but everybody is afraid of them.
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Habit is far stronger than the lessons of experience.
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At twenty your choices are almost unlimited. At fifty you're a prisoner of past decisions. At seventy you have no free will left at all.
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... law is a substitute for love.
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Even a small, everyday lie is a clue to the personality and preoccupations of the liar, like a dream or any other confection of the mind, that is half-conscious and half-unconscious, as all creative acts must be.
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Privacy is like sleep - something you don't appreciate until you have to go without it.
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money is an acquired taste that grows as it is fed.
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fiction and lies are both works of creative art, and creation always reveals the creator.
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what you fear, you invite.
Helen McCloy