Quotes Library

October 30, 2025

Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds.

Henry Adams (1838–1918), American historian, The Education of Henry Adams (1907), in The Cynic’s Lexicon, Jonathon Green, ed. (London: 1986), p.2

To what systematic hatreds do you subscribe? And to what ends? Can such ends be “flipped”, so that you can instead be part of some faction for good?

The son of a congressman, grandson of one president and great grandson of another, Henry Adams had a ringside seat on things political all his life. His comment should not be dismissed out of hand.


More Quotes

November 26, 2025
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.
February 27, 2025
I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
July 9, 2025
If ever the public was betrayed by its press, it’s ours.
Page 93 of 122