1940s

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Humour is, in fact, a prelude to faith; and laughter is the beginning of prayer.

Reinhold Niebuhr

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Niebuhr, Reinhold. "Humour and Faith." Discerning the Signs of the Times: Sermons for Today and Tomorrow. Charles Scribner's Sons, 1946.

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If we simply accept and acquiesce in the face of discrimination, we accept the responsibility ourselves and allow those responsible to salve their conscience by believing that they have our acceptance and concurrence. We should, therefore, protest openly everything... That smacks of discrimination or slander.

Mary McLeod Bethune

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Bethune, Mary McLeod. "Certain Unalienable Rights." What the Negro Wants, edited by Rayford Logan. University of North Carolina Press, 1944.

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The last time I saw Paris
Her heart was warm and gay,
I heard the laughter of her heart in ev'ry street cafe.

Oscar Hammerstein II

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The Last Time I Saw Paris

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"The Last Time I Saw Paris." Lady Be Good. Directed by Norman Z. McLeod, performed by Ann Sothern. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1941.

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The only way to be new is constantly to change yourself, and the only way to be original is to increase, enlarge, deepen your own personality.

W. Somerset Maugham

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Maugham, William Somerset. A Writer's Notebook. Greenwood Press, 1970.

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Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

E.B. White

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White, E. B. "The Meaning of Democracy." The New Yorker, 3 July 1943.

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Although we read with our minds, the seat of artistic delight is between the shoulder blades. That little shiver behind is quite certainly the highest form of emotion that humanity has attained when evolving pure art and pure science. Let us worship the spine and its tingle.

Vladimir Nabokov

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Nabokov, Vladimir. Talking about the novel Bleak House. c. 1940, Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA, USA. Lecture.

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Nabokov, Vladimir. "Charles Dickens: Bleak House." Lectures on Literature, edited by Fredson Bowers. Mariner Books, 2002.

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All those who try to go it sole alone,
Too proud to be beholden for relief,
Are absolutely sure to come to grief.

Robert Frost

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Frost, Robert. "Haec Fabula Docet." Atlantic Monthly, Dec. 1946, I. 18.

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Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms-to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.

Viktor Frankl

Man's Search for Meaning

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Frankl, Victor. …trotzdem Ja zum Leben sagen: Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager [Man's Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy]. Verlag für Jugend und Volk, 1946.

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Frankl, Victor. Man's Search for Meaning. Beacon Press, 2006.

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Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life; everyone must carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated, thus, everyone's task is unique as his specific opportunity to implement it.

Viktor Frankl

Man's Search for Meaning

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Frankl, Victor. …trotzdem Ja zum Leben sagen: Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager [Man's Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy]. Verlag für Jugend und Volk, 1946.

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Frankl, Victor. Man's Search for Meaning. Beacon Press, 2006.

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My advice to you is not to inquire into why or whither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it's on your plate-that's my philosophy.

Thornton Wilder

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Wilder, Thornton. The Skin of Our Teeth. 15 Oct. 1942, Shubert Theatre, New Haven, Connecticut, USA, act 1.

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Wilder, Thornton. "The Skin of Our Teeth." Three Plays: Our Town, The Skin of Our Teeth, and The Matchmaker. Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2020, act 1.

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There is no history of mankind, there is only an indefinite number of histories of all kinds of aspects of human life. And one of these is the history of political power. This is elevated into the history of the world.

Karl Popper

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Popper, Karl. The Open Society and Its Enemies. Vol. 2, Routledge, 1995, ch. 25.

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The more people have studied different methods of bringing up children, the more they have come to the conclusion that what good mothers and fathers instinctively feel like doing for their babies is usually best, after all.

Benjamin Spock

The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care

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Spock, Benjamin. The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care. Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1946, ch. 1.

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The crown of life is neither happiness nor annihilation; it is understanding.

Winifred Holtby

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Holtby, Winifred. Quoted in Testament of Friendship: The Story of Winifred Holtby, written by Vera Brittain. Macmillan & Co., 1940.

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Murder's never perfect. Always comes apart sooner or later, and when two people are involved it's usually sooner.

Double Indemnity

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Double Indemnity. Directed by Billy Wilder, Paramount Pictures, 1944.

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Were I to... Take a peasant by the shoulders and whisper to him, "In your lifetime, have you known peace?" wait for his answer, shake his shoulders and transform him into his father, and ask him the same question, and transform him in turn into his father, I would never hear the word "yes" if I carried my questioning of the dead back for a thousand years.

Rebecca West

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West, Rebecca. Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: A Journey Through Yugoslavia. Vol. 1, The Viking Press, 1941.

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Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos. Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist.

George C. Marshall

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Read this speech at oecd.org

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Marshall, George Catlett. Address announcing the Marshall Plan. 5 June 1947, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.

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The first trial in history for crimes against the peace of the world imposes a grave responsibility. The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated.

Robert H. Jackson

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Jackson, Robert H. "Opening Statement before the International Military Tribunal." 21 Nov. 1945, International Military Tribunal, Palace of Justice, Nuremberg, Germany.

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Right conclusions are more likely to be gathered out of a multitude of tongues, than through any kind of authoritative selection. To many this is, and will always be, folly; but we have staked upon it our all.

Learned Hand

United States v. Associated Press

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Hand, Learned. District Court, S. D. New York. United States v. Associated Press. 52 F. Supp. 362 (1943). 6 Oct. 1943, law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/52/362/1755014/.

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The day has clearly gone forever of societies small enough for their members to have personal acquaintance with each another, and to find their station through the appraisal of those who have any first-hand knowledge of them. Publicity is an evil substitute and the art of publicity is a black art; but it has come to stay, every year adds to its potency and to the finality of its judgments. The hand that rules the press, the radio, the screen and the far-spread magazine, rules the country; whether we like it or not, we must learn to accept it.

Learned Hand

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Hand, Learned. "Mr. Justice Brandeis." Memorial Service. 21 Dec. 1942, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, DC, USA.

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Oh, Christmas isn't just a day, it's a frame of mind...and that's what's been changing. That's why I'm glad I'm here, maybe I can do something about it.