A Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Whatever is old corrupts, and the past turns to snakes.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Quote Topics

Corrupts Old Past Snakes Turns Whatever

Quote Author

Ralph Waldo Emerson
American - Philosopher
May 25, 1803 - April 27, 1882

Think about Medusa, with the snakes. If you shoot a movie in Europe, the financiers are three snakes, and they all have opinions. In Hollywood there are, like, 20 snakes.

Daniel Espinosa

Luckily there were no venomous snakes around Hoosick, N.Y., so I amassed quite a collection of milk snakes, garters, ribbons and ring-necked snakes.

Romulus Whitaker

Sam, clinging to Frodo's arm, collapsed on a step in the black darkness. 'Poor old Bill!' he said in a choking voice. 'Poor old Bill! Wolves and snakes! But the snakes were too much for him. I had to choose, Mr. Frodo. I had to come with you.

J. R. R. Tolkien

There are some movies that deserve criticism. They want people to know that it's a great dramatic accomplishment and has some great performances in it. But, c'mon. Yes, you will have some fun if you go see 'Snakes on a Plane.' Snakes are biting people - and they're biting them right on screen. There's nothing to review. It's not 'Snakes on the Waterfront.' You don't have snakes going, 'I coulda been a constrictor.' No. Hell no. It's 'Snakes on a Plane.'

Samuel L. Jackson

I actually like snakes! When I was young, I was a boy scout nature camp counselor, and one of our projects was collecting snakes and creating an environment for them, so I'm quite familiar with snakes and think they're fantastic creatures.

Harrison Ford

It is probably true that business corrupts everything it touches. It corrupts politics, sports, literature, art, labor unions and so on. But business also corrupts and undermines monolithic totalitarianism. Capitalism is at its liberating best in a noncapitalist environment.

Eric Hoffer

It has often been said that power corrupts. But it is perhaps equally important to realize that weakness, too, corrupts. Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many. Hatred, malice, rudeness, intolerance, and suspicion are the faults of weakness. The resentment of the weak does not spring from any injustice done to them but from their sense of inadequacy and impotence. We cannot win the weak by sharing our wealth with them. They feel our generosity as oppression.

Eric Hoffer

Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many.

Eric Hoffer

As rust corrupts iron, so envy corrupts man.

Antisthenes

If power corrupts, the reverse is also true; persecution corrupts the victims though perhaps in subtler and more tragic ways.

Arthur Koestler

Snakes are sometimes perceived as evil, but they are also perceived as medicine. If you look at an ambulance, there's the two snakes on the side of the ambulance. The caduceus, or the staff of Hermes, there's the two snakes going up it, which means that the venom can also be healing.

Nicolas Cage

You know, 'power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely'? It's the same with powerlessness. Absolute powerlessness corrupts absolutely. Einstein said everything had changed since the atom was split, except the way we think. We have to think anew.