A Quote by Man Ray

To me, a painter, if not the most useful, is the least harmful member of our society.

Man Ray

Quote Topics

Society Harmful Least Me Member Most Our Our Society Painter Useful

Quote Author

Man Ray
American - Photographer
August 27, 1890 - November 18, 1976

Politics are not a science based on logic; they are the capacity of always choosing at each instant, in constantly changing situations, the least harmful, the most useful.

Otto von Bismarck

We have heard of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. It is said that knowledge is power, and the like. Methinks there is equal need of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful Ignorance, what we will call Beautiful Knowledge, a knowledge useful in a higher sense: for what is most of our boasted so-called knowledge but a conceit that we know something, which robs us of the advantage of our actual ignorance? What we call knowledge is often our positive ignorance; ignorance our negative knowledge.

Henry David Thoreau

...I also know - and this won't alter the course of history or your personal view of me - that you will die with a clenched fist and a tense jaw, the epitome of hatred and struggle, because you are not a symbol (some inanimate example) but a genuine member of the society to be destroyed; the spirit of the beehive speaks through your mouth and motivates your actions. You are as useful as I am, but you are not aware of how useful your contribution is to the society that sacrifices you.

Che Guevara

You can't expect to work for the Daily Mail group and have the rest of society treat with you respect as a useful member of society, because you are not.

Ken Livingstone

Why should the residence of a preacher be untaxed? Useful citizens must pay taxes on their homes. Yet the Preacher - actually and notoriously the least useful member of the community - lives in a tax-free dwelling.

E. Haldeman-Julius

But the most annoying of all public reformers is the personal satirist. Though he may be considered by some few as a useful member of society, yet he is only ranked with the hangman, whom we tolerate because he executes the judgment we abhor to do ourselves, and avoid with a natural detestation of his office. The pen of the one and the cord of the other are inseparable in our minds.

Jane Porter

If you expect to succeed as a writer, rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects. If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway.

Stephen King

Incarceration is as useful for addiction as it is for diabetes - i.e., not useful and potentially harmful, particularly for kids.

Maia Szalavitz

Marijuana is not not harmful, but is the least harmful psychoactive substance that we have, with the possible exception of caffeine.

Maia Szalavitz

In society you will not find health, but in nature. Unless our feet at least stood in the midst of nature, all our faces would bepale and livid. Society is always diseased, and the best is the most so.

Henry David Thoreau

I'm really into architecture, I'm a member of the Brutalist Appreciation Society; I'm a member of the Postmodern Society. I write letters to save buildings.

Roisin Murphy

The most humble research scientist in the Department of Agriculture is at this time contributing more to this country than the most useful member of Congress.

Fiorello H. La Guardia

I like to describe myself as a proudly visible member of the most invisible segments of our society - older women.

Cindy Gallop

Paint records the most delicate gesture and the most tense. It tells whether the painter sat or stood or crouched in front of the canvas. Paint is a cast made of the painter's movements, a portrait of the painter's body and thoughts.

James Elkins

An excessive preponderance of an idealistic mood is harmful to society: it creates daydreaming, political Don Quixotism, hope for heavenly intervention. This is an undeniable truth--but it is also true that every extreme is harmful.