American politics is a struggle, not of men but of forces. The men become every year more and more creatures of force, massed about central power houses.
Henry AdamsRead
Church and State, Soul and Body, God and Man, are all one at Mont Saint Michel, and the business of all is to fight, each in his own way, or to stand guard for each other.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests a harmonious relationship between different elements of existence that have their own roles in supporting each other.
Henry Adams emphasizes the interconnectedness of various aspects of life—such as spirituality, governance, and human relationships—using Mont Saint Michel as a metaphorical backdrop. He suggests that while each component may have its own responsibilities and methods of engagement, they collectively contribute to a greater purpose of mutual protection and support.
Themes
InterconnectednessSupportHarmonyBalanceCollaboration
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about civic responsibility, one might say, 'As Henry Adams noted, each of us has a role to play in supporting one another.'
More from Henry Adams
All quotes →Of all studies, the one he would rather have avoided was that of his own mind. He knew no tragedy so heartrending as introspection.
Henry AdamsRead
Simplicity is the most deceitful mistress that ever betrayed man.
Henry AdamsRead
The American President resembles the commander of a ship at sea. He must have a helm to grasp, a course to steer, a port to seek.
Henry AdamsRead
The effect of power and publicity on all men is the aggravation of self, a sort of tumor that ends by killing the victim's sympathies.
Henry AdamsRead
Man is an imperceptible atom always trying to become one with God.
Henry AdamsRead
Similar quotes
The best physician is also a philosopher.
GalenRead
I despair of the Republic! Such dreariness, such whining sallow women, such utter absence of the amenities, such crass food, crass manners, crass landscape!! What a horror it is for a whole nation to be developing without the sense of beauty, and eating bananas for breakfast.
Edith WhartonRead
That a lie which is all a lie may be met and fought with outright, But a lie which is part a truth is a harder matter to fight.
Alfred Lord TennysonRead
I had displeased the jacobins by blaming their aristocratic usurpation of legitimate powers; the priests of all sorts by claiming religious liberty; the anarchists by repressing them; and the conspirators by rejecting their offers.
Marquis De LafayetteRead
History shows that the human mind, fed by constant accessions of knowledge, periodically grows too large for its theoretical coverings, and bursts them asunder to appear in new habiliments, as the feeding and growing grub, at intervals, casts its too narrow skin and assumes another.
Charles DarwinRead
For the whole earth is the tomb of famous men; not only are they commemorated by columns and inscriptions in their own country, but in foreign lands there dwells also an unwritten memorial of them, graven not on stone but in the hearts of men.
PericlesRead