My dear Adson, I am afraid, however, the truth is never what it appears to be in a particular point in time
Umberto Eco
Categoria: quotes
Labyrinth — Dedalo
Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Faust von Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Of joyous days ye bring the blissful vision;
The dear, familiar phantoms rise again,
And, like an old and half-extinct tradition,
First Love returns, with Friendship in his train.
Renewed is Pain: with mournful repetition
Life tracks his devious, labyrinthine chain,
And names the Good, whose cheating fortune tore them
From happy hours, and left me to deplore them.
Ihr bringt mit euch die Bilder froher Tage,
Und manche liebe Schatten steigen auf;
Gleich einer alten, halbverklungnen Sage
Kommt erste Lieb und Freundschaft mit herauf;
Der Schmerz wird neu, es wiederholt die Klage
Des Lebens labyrinthisch irren Lauf,
Und nennt die Guten, die, um schöne Stunden
Vom Glück getäuscht, vor mir hinweggeschwunden.
Voi recate le immagini di giorni spensierati,
ed affiorano ombre che mi furono care;
simili ad un’antica, quasi svanita saga
ritornano con voi gli amici e i primi amori;
si rinnova il dolore, il pianto ripercorre
il corso labirintico di una vita errabonda,
e nomina i magnanimi prima di me scomparsi,
frodati dalla sorte di belle ore felici.
displacements
Nemo Propheta acceptus in patria sua
No prophet is accepted in his own land
Moving
And facing the people again, he raised his voice and said:
People of Orphalese, the wind bids me leave you.
Less hasty am I than the wind, yet I must go.
We wanderers, ever seeking the lonelier way, begin no day where we have ended another day; and no sunrise finds us where sunset left us.
Even while the earth sleeps we travel.
We are the seeds of the tenacious plant, and it is in our ripeness and our fullness of heart that we are given to the wind and are scattered.
(Kahlil Gibran: The Prophet, 1923)
Creation
Creation begins with chaos and ends in perfection
Sarah Emily Miano
Migration – They do it their way
From an article on telesur, published August 20th
The U.K. is also adopting laws to make it less attractive for migrants to come and work in the country. New immigration policies will allow the government to seize wages and deport illegal immigrants without appeal.“Border Force officers, operating on the ground, provide migrants with a more dissuasive and realistic sense of life for illegal migrants in the United Kingdom. That reflects the United Kingdom government’s work to render the UK a less attractive place for illegal migrants, including through limiting access to housing and health services in the U.K., and through targeting disreputable employers who seek to employ illegal migrants,” the accord states.As part of the recently signed agreement, the U.K. government will provide US$11.1 million over two years, which will be allocated towards enhancing security measures around the perimeter of the Eurotunnel railhead.
Reading this after having talked a short time ago with a friend in Greece about the hospitality migrants experience in many cases especially by people on the street … – I guess no further comment is needed.
Intelligence intellectuals and other people
I was rather interested in my fellow-prisoners, who seemed to me in no way morally inferior to the rest of the population, though they were on the whole slightly below the usual level of intelligence , as was shown by the their having been caught.
(Russels: Autobiography: 256)
I had supposed that intellectuals frequently loved truth, but I found here again that not ten per cent of them prefer truth to popularity
(Russels: Autobiography: 240)
Of course, after having read today an article in the German Die Zeit, I am wondering if only the latter is true, and the first should read today: Intellectuals and the rest of the population tend increasingly to lock themselves up in virtual worlds of numeric and algorithmic truth:
Nun, die leise peinliche Antwort lautet, dass ein System scheinbar raffinierter Anreize die Gefühlswelt der Wissenschaften neu codiert hat. An die Stelle des Zorns über die Verhältnisse in der Welt und an die Stelle des interpretativen Abenteuers mit offenem Ausgang ist die Sorge getreten, ob man genug Drittmittel eingeworben und ausreichend Aufsätze in internationalen Zeitschriften publiziert hat. Die Höhe der eigenen Drittmittel und für eine breitere Öffentlichkeit zumeist nahezu unzugängliche Fachaufsätze gelten im Wettlauf um Evaluationspokale inzwischen als der zentrale Ausweis von Kompetenz.
Indeed, as I read recently:
Un mondo dove non serve farsi domande, cercare risposte, pensare, provare a fare bene e costruire.
Thus, they are easily losing increasingly the ground under their feet
History and Rights, and Justice
The nature of injustice is that we might not always see it in our own times,” Kennedy wrote in Friday’s opinion. “The generations that wrote and ratified the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment did not presume to know the extent of freedom in all of its dimensions, and so they entrusted to future generations a charter protecting the right of all persons to enjoy liberty as we learn its meaning.
A conservative judge made on the occasion of the judgment on gay marriage in the US.
Education
Sure, it is a topic, popping up again and again — and we are facing with variations only. Some more here:
******
The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.
Isaac Asimov
******As a matter of fact student riots of one sort or another, protests against the order that is, kicks against college and university management indicate a healthy growth and a normal functioning of the academic mind.
Youth should be radical. Youth should demand change in the world. Youth should not accept the old order if the world is to move on. But the old orders should not be moved easily—certainly not at the mere whim or behest of youth. There must be clash and if youth hasn’t enough force or fervor to produce the clash the world grows stale and stagnant and sour in decay. If our colleges and universities do not breed men who riot, who rebel, who attack life with all their youthful vim and vigor, then there is something wrong with our colleges. The more riots that come on college campuses, the better world for tomorrow.
******
The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.
Albert Einstein
Il mondo – Passacaglia
Vorrei tornare indietro
per rivedere il passato
per comprendere meglio
quello che abbiamo perduto.
Viviamo in un mondo orribile…
siamo in cerca
di un’ esistenza….
La gente è crudelee spesso infedele,
nessun si vergogna
di dire menzogne
i giovani, i putti
gli uomini tutti
non vale fuggire
si plachi l’ardire.
Vorrei tornare indietroper rivedere gli errori,
per accelerare
il mio processo interiore,
ero in quinta elementare
entrai
per caso
nella mia esistenza
fatta di giorni allegri,
e di continue esplorazioni
e trasformazioni dell’Io…
Franco Battiato
COMMEDIA DELLA VITA OR PÁNTA RÊI'S FIRM GROUND 