Why can't people live with each other in peace? Why must everything be destroyed? Why must people go hungry while surplus food elsewhere in the world rots away? Oh why must people be so crazy?
Everything that is popular, it has been said, deserves the attention of philosophers: and this is for the obvious reason, that although it may not be of any worth in itself, yet it characterizes the people.
I think that, with age, people come to realize that death is inevitable. And we need to learn to face it with serenity, wisdom and resignation. Death often frees us from a lot of senseless sufferings.
There are certain people in our popular culture that just capture people's imaginations. And in death, they become even larger. Now, I have to admit that it's also fed by a 24/7 media that is insatiable.
I am for the people of the whole nation doing just as they please in all matters which concern the whole nation; for that of each part doing just as they choose in all matters which concern no other part; and for each individual doing just as he chooses in all matters which concern nobody else.
To predict the behavior of ordinary people in advance, you only have to assume that they will always try to escape a disagreeable situation with the smallest possible expenditure of intelligence.
The great majority of people will go on observing forms that cannot be explained; they will keep Christmas Day with Christmas gifts and Christmas benedictions; they will continue to do it; and some day suddenly wake up and discover why.
When people impute special vices to the Christian Church, they seem entirely to forget that the world (which is the only other thing there is) has these vices much more. The Church has been cruel; but the world has been much more cruel. The Church has plotted; but the world has plotted much more. The Church has been superstitious; but it has never been so superstitious as the world is when left to itself.
The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.