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If a man is fortunate he will, before he dies, gather up as much as he can of his civilized heritage and transmit it to his children.

Will Durant

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Will Durant
Age: 96 †
Born: 1885
Born: November 5
Died: 1981
Died: November 7
Historian
Philosopher
Writer
North Adams
Massachusetts
William James Will Durant
William James Durant
Men
Transmit
Gather
Heritage
Civilized
Fortunate
Dies
Children
Much

More quotes by Will Durant

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[H]istory assures us that civilizations decay quite leisurely.
Will Durant
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When liberty exceeds intelligence, it begets chaos, which begets dictatorship.
Will Durant
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The past is not dead. Indeed, it is often not even past.
Will Durant
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There is no significant example in history, before our time, of a society successfully maintaining moral life without the aid of religion.
Will Durant
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In the last analysis civilization is based upon the food supply.
Will Durant
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The ego is willing but the machine cannot go on. It's the last thing a man will admit, that his mind ages.
Will Durant
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Love one another. My final lesson of history is the same as that of Jesus. You may think that's a lot of lollipop but just try it. Love is the most practical thing in the world. If you take an attitude of love toward everybody you meet, you'll eventually get along.
Will Durant
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To speak ill of others is a dishonest way of praising ourselves let us be above such transparent egotism. If you can't say good and encouraging things, say nothing. Nothing is often a good thing to do, and always a clever thing to say.
Will Durant
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Inquiry is fatal to certainty.
Will Durant
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If man asks for many laws it is only because he is sure that his neighbor needs them privately he is an unphilosophical anarchist, and thinks laws in his own case superfluous.
Will Durant
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Peace is an unstable equilibrium, which can be preserved only by acknowledged supremacy or equal power.
Will Durant
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Truth always originates in a minority of one, and every custom begins as a broken precedent.
Will Durant
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If we have never been amazed by the very fact that we exist, we are squandering the greatest fact of all.
Will Durant
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History offers some consolation by reminding us that sin has flourished in every age.
Will Durant
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Moral codes adjust themselves to environmental conditions.
Will Durant
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Our knowledge is a receding mirage in an expanding desert of ignorance.
Will Durant
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Knowledge is the eye of desire and can become the pilot of the soul.
Will Durant
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When liberty becomes license, dictatorship is near.
Will Durant
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I feel for all faiths the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the trust in reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments of darkness groping for the sun. I know no more about the ultimates than the simplest urchin in the streets.
Will Durant
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Underneath all civilization, ancient or modern, moved and still moves a sea of magic, superstition, and sorcery. Perhaps they will remain when the works of our reason have passed away.
Will Durant