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I do not think that any civilization can be called complete until it has progressed from sophistication to unsophistication, and made a conscious return to simplicity of thinking and living.

Lin Yutang

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Lin Yutang
Age: 80 †
Born: 1895
Born: October 10
Died: 1976
Died: March 26
Lexicographer
Linguist
Novelist
Philosopher
Translator
Writer
Conscious
Civilization
Return
Called
Living
Progressed
Made
Sophistication
Think
Simplicity
Thinking
Complete

More quotes by Lin Yutang

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A good traveller is one who does not know where he is going to, and a perfect traveller does not know where he came from.
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Where there are too many policemen, there is no liberty. Where there are too many soldiers, there is no peace. Where there are too many lawyers, there is no justice.
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The greater success a man has made, the more he fears a climb down.
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No man is inherently respectable, but all women are by nature.
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Let us face ourselves bravely as we are. For only a philosophy that recognizes reality can lead us into true happiness, and only that kind of philosophy is sound and healthy.
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Nobody is ever misunderstood at a fireside he may only be disagreed with.
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Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials.
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O wise humanity, terribly wise humanity! How inscrutable is the civilization where men toil and work and worry their hair gray to get a living and forget to play!
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On the whole, the enjoyment of leisure is something which decidedly costs less than the enjoyment of luxury. All it requires is an artistic temperament which is bent on seeking a perfectly useless afternoon spent in a perfectly useless manner.
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Nothing matters to a man who says nothing matters.
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A vague uncritical idealism always lends itself to ridicule and too much of it might be a danger to mankind, leading it round in a futile wild-goose chase for imaginary ideals.
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The purpose of a short story is ... that the reader shall come away with the satisfactory feeling that a particular insight into human character has been gained, or that his (or her) knowledge of life has been deepened, or that pity, love or sympathy for a human being is awakened.
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Few men who have liberated themselves from the fear of God and the fear of death are yet able to liberate themselves from the fear of man.
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It is not so much what you believe in that matters, as the way in which you believe it and proceed to translate that belief into action.
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Now it is characteristic of play that one plays without reason and there must be no reason for it. Play is its own good reason.
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An educated man is one who has the loves and hatreds together.
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As for international understanding, I feel that macaroni has done more for our appreciation of Italy than Mussolini.
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We should not expect people to be good, but should make it impossible for them to be bad.
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There are no books in this world that everybody must read, but only books that a person must read at a certain time in a given place under given circumstances and at a given period of his life.
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Winter in Peking is insurpassable, unless indeed it is surpassed by the other seasons in that blessed city. For Peking is a city clearly marked by the seasons, each perfect in its own way and each different from the others.
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