A Quote by Johann Kaspar Lavater
He whom common, gross, or stale objects allure, and when obtained, content, is a vulgar being, incapable of greatness in thought or action.
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One would think that a system loaded with such gross and vulgar absurdities as Scripture religion is could never have obtained credit; yet we have seen what priestcraft and fanaticism can do, and credulity believe.
Mir Bahadur Ali is, as we have seen, incapable of evading the most vulgar of art's temptations: that of being a genius.
Among the innumerable mortifications which waylay human arrogance on every side may well be reckoned our ignorance of the most common objects and effects, a defect of which we become more sensible by every attempt to supply it. Vulgar and inactive minds confound familiarity with knowledge and conceive themselves informed of the whole nature of things when they are shown their form or told their use; but the speculatist, who is not content with superficial views, harasses himself with fruitless curiosity, and still, as he inquires more, perceives only that he knows less.
Woe to the man who is always busy - hurried in a turmoil of engagements, from occupation to occupation, and with no seasons interposed of recollection, contemplation and repose! Such a man must inevitably be gross and vulgar, and hard and indelicate - the sort of man with whom no generous spirit would desire to hold intercourse.
There is a greatness in being generous, and there is only simple justice in satisfying creditors. Generosity is the part of the soul raised above the vulgar.
For the truth is that men do not desire to be the Common Man any more than they are the Common Man. They need greatness in others and the occasion to discover the greatness in themselves.
The fundamental flaw of vulgar thought lies in the fact that it wishes to content itself with motionless imprints of a reality which consists of eternal motion.
Mathematicians do not deal in objects, but in relations between objects; thus, they are free to replace some objects by others so long as the relations remain unchanged. Content to them is irrelevant: they are interested in form only.
Sociology should... be thought of as a science of action-of the ultimate common value element in its relations to the other elements of action.
My pictures are devoid of objects; like objects, they are themselves objects. This means that they are devoid of content, significance or meaning, like objects or trees, animals, people or days, all of which are there without a reason, without a function and without a purpose. This is the quality that counts. Even so, there are good and bad pictures.
Courage, so far as it is a sign of race, is peculiarly the mark of a gentleman or a lady; but it becomes vulgar if rude or insensitive, while timidity is not vulgar, if it be a characteristic of race or fineness of make. A fawn is not vulgar in being timid, nor a crocodile "gentle" because courageous.
A thought has no size in the physical sense but is vast as compared to the physical acts and objects into which it is later precipitated. The power of a thought is enormous and superior to all the successive physical acts, objects, and events that body forth its energy. A thought often endures for a time much greater than the whole life of the man who thought it.
I've always thought the best relationships are those that are as happy and content in silence as they are in action [...]
The vulgar herd catches at the gross apparent fact, but the man of insight knows what lies on the surfaces does lie.
In effective, sustained citizen action, people learn the skills of public life with which to act effectively. "Commons," or the common wealth-the public goods that are objects of sustainable public action-become not only occasions for collaboration by invaluable sources of citizen education in their own right because they are the occasions for learning such skills.
The allure becomes, "Can I make these rooms bigger?" Can I fill these 1,500-seat rooms? Then the allure is, how much, if we're being honest, how much can I squeeze out of it financially?
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