Henry Steele Commager Professions : Historian Born : October 25, 1902 Died : March 2, 1998 Browse All Authors Top 37 quotes by Henry Steele Commager The English love for privacy is proverbial, and has not been exaggerated. A stranger who strikes up a conversation is looked upon with suspicion - unless he happens to be an American, when his ignorance of good manners is indulged. Henry Steele Commager good-man privacy ignorance Freedom is not a luxury that we can indulge in when at last we have security and prosperity and enlightenment; it is, rather, antecedent to all of these, for without it we can have neither security nor prosperity nor enlightenment. Henry Steele Commager enlightenment luxury indulge-in We should not forget that our tradition is one of protest and revolt, and it is stultifying to celebrate the rebels of the past ... while we silence the rebels of the present. Henry Steele Commager silence war past And we wonder what can be that 'philosophy of education' which believes that young people can be trained to the duties of citizenship by wrapping their minds in cotton wool. Henry Steele Commager philosophy believe people It seems fair to say that while the moral standards of the nineteenth century persisted almost unchanged into the twentieth, moral practices changed sharply, and that though the standards of the nineteenth century persisted the institutions that had sustained them and the sanctions that had enforced them lost influence and authority. Henry Steele Commager moral influence practice Its awfully hard to be the son of a great man and also of a half-crazy woman. Henry Steele Commager crazy men son The greatest danger we face is not any particular kind of thought. The greatest danger we face is absence of thought. Henry Steele Commager kind absence faces Our best people don't go into politics. Henry Steele Commager people It is probably safe to say that over a long period of time, political morality has been as high as business morality. Henry Steele Commager political business long Every effort to confine Americanism to a single pattern, to constrain it to a single formula, is disloyalty to everything that is valid in Americanism. Henry Steele Commager patterns effort government History is a jangle of accidents, blunders, surprises and absurdities, and so is our knowledge of it, but if we are to report it at all we must impose some order upon it. Henry Steele Commager surprise order history The American people...have a stake in non-conformity. For they know that the American genius is non-conformist. Henry Steele Commager conformity genius people What every college must do is hold up before the young the spectacle of greatness. Henry Steele Commager greatness college young Change does not necessarily assure progress, but progress implacably requires change. Education is essential to change, for education creates both new wants and the ability to satisfy them. Henry Steele Commager A free society cherishes nonconformity. It knows from the non-conformist, from the eccentric, have come many of the great ideas. Henry Steele Commager If our democracy is to flourish it must have criticism, if our government is to function it must have dissent. Only totalitarian governments insist upon conformity and they - as we know - do so at their peril. Henry Steele Commager The fact is that censorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion. Henry Steele Commager end society purpose real Similar Authors Abram L. Sachar historian Bryan Ward-Perkins historian Bruce Catton historian Bruce Bartlett historian Brian Crozier historian Allan Nevins historian All Authors