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In too many modern churches there is no emphasis on theology at all. There is a kind of justification by works or by keeping up with modern trends anything that will drag in a few more people.

Robertson Davies

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Robertson Davies
Age: 82 †
Born: 1913
Born: August 28
Died: 1995
Died: December 3
Journalist
Literary Critic
Musicologist
Novelist
Playwright
Professor
Reporter
Writer
William Robertson Davies
Modern
Churches
Church
Justification
Anything
Emphasis
Many
Trends
Kind
Drag
People
Theology
Keeping
Works

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The great book for you is the book that has the most to say to you at the moment when you are reading. I do not mean the book that is most instructive, but the book that feeds your spirit. And that depends on your age, your experience, your psychological and spiritual need.
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The clerisy are those who read for pleasure, but not for idleness who read for pastime but not to kill time who love books, but do not live by books
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After all, we are human beings, and not creatures of infinite possibilities.
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Conversation in its true meaning isn't all wagging the tongue sometimes it is a deeply shared silence.
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Moderation, the Golden Mean, the Aristonmetron, is the secret of wisdom and of happiness. But it does not mean embracing an unadventurous mediocrity rather it is an elaborate balancing act, a feat of intellectual skill demanding constant vigilance. Its aim is a reconciliation of opposites.
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These matters require what I think of as the Shakespearean cast of thought. That is to say, a fine credulity about everything, kept in check by a lively skepticism about everything.... It keeps you constantly alert to every possibility.
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My dear fellow, my whole life is moved by the principle that the one thing which is more important than peace is music. It is because I believe that I am poor.
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We live in a world where bulk is equated with quality.
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It is odd how all men develop the notion, as they grow older, that their mothers were wonderful cooks. I have yet to meet a man who will admit that his mother was a kitchen assassin and nearly poisoned him.
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In my collection, to me at least, the theatre of the past lives again and those long-dead playwrights and actors have in me an enthralled audience of one, and I applaud them across the centuries.
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To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser.
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That's the nub of the thing, you see seriousness of spirit. It doesn't mean heaviness of heart, or a lack of fantasy, but it does mean an awareness of influences that touch our lives, sometimes in ways that seem cruel and unfeeling, and sometimes in ways that open up a glory which can never be forgotten.
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A boy is a man in miniature, and though he may sometimes exhibit notable virtue, as well as characteristics that seem to be charming because they are childlike, he is also a schemer, self-seeker, traitor, Judas, crook, and villain - in short, a man.
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The division between art and deviousness and crime is sometimes as thin as a cigarette paper.
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I think we should see whether we are wise trying to educate everybody to a high standard the way we are trying to do now. There has to be a high level of education so everybody is literate, but whether university education is necessary for everyone is open to question.
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If you don't hurry up and let life know what you want, life will damned soon show you what you'll get.
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It is in this matter that I fall foul of so many American writers on writing they seem to think that writing is a confidence game by means of which the author cajoles a restless, dull-witted, shallow audience into hearing his point of view. Such an attitude is base, and can only beget base prose.
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Boredom and stupidity and patriotism, especially when combined, are three of the greatest evils of the world we live in.
Robertson Davies
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The Alexander Technique keeps the body alive, at ages when many people have resigned themselves to irreversible decline.
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A great many complimentary things have been said about the faculty of memory, and if you look in a good quotation book you will find them neatly arranged.
Robertson Davies