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The nation seems to slouch onward into its uncertain future like some huge inarticulate beast, too much attainted by wounds and ailments to be robust, but too strong and resourceful to succumb.

Richard Hofstadter

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Richard Hofstadter
Age: 54 †
Born: 1916
Born: August 6
Died: 1970
Died: October 24
Historian
University Teacher
Buffalo
New York
Future
Onward
Strong
Robust
Uncertain
Seems
Beast
Slouch
Much
Wounds
Succumb
Like
Nation
Ailments
Huge
Inarticulate
Nations
Resourceful

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The role of third parties is to sting like a bee, then die.
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To the zealot overcome by his piety and to the journeyman of ideas concerned only with his marketable mental skills, the beginning and end of ideas lies in their efficacy with respect to some goal external to intellectual processes.
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Intellectualism, though by no means confined to doubters, is often the sole piety of the skeptic.
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In using the terms play and playfulness, I do not intend to suggest any lack of seriousness quite the contrary. Anyone who has watched children, or adults, at play will recognize that there is no contradiction between play and seriousness, and that some forms of play induce a measure of grave concentration not so readily called forth by work.
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As with the pursuit of happiness, the pursuit of truth is itself gratifying whereas the consummation often turns out to be elusive.
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