Annie Besant Quotes

America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between.

He who would dare to undertake to establish a nation would have to feel himself capable of altering, so to speak, human nature, to transform each individual, who by his very nature is a unique and perfect whole, into a mere part of a greater whole, from which this individual would in a sense receive his life and his being.

Each nation grows after its own genius, and has a civilization of its own.

The general idea of history seems to be that it is the biography of a society…. History is to the common life of many what biography is to an individual.

Peoplehood tends to develop into nationhood if the people achieves a certain maturity. This is analogous to an individual person who becomes acquainted with herself only in the course of her life, without being able to say that she possessed no personal uniqueness at all before that 'self-recognition.'

For history is to the nation as memory is to the individual.

Cultures grow on the vine of tradition.

There have been two lines of progress in this world-political and religious. In the former the Greeks are everything, the modern political institutions being only the development of the Grecian; in the latter the Hindus are everything.

Culture is a slingshot moved by the force of its past

My vision is to elevate the consciousness of humanity one mind, one heart, one life, one spirit at a time. They are married.

You see, gentlemen, they have something to die for. They've discovered they're a people. They're awakening.

In order for a man to really understand himself he must be part of a nation; he must have some land of his own, a God of his own, a language of his own. Most of all he must have love and devotion for his own kind.

The German mind, may it live! Almost invisible as a mind, it finally manifests itself assertively as a conviction.

America has never forgotten - and never will forget - the nobler things that brought her into being and that light her path - the path that was entered upon only one hundred and fifty years ago ... How young she is! It will be centuries before she will adopt that maturity of custom - the clothing of the grave - that some people believe she is already fitted for.

I believe deeply that we must find, all of us together, a new spirituality.

I feel a whole country growing inside me, thousands of years, millions of people, stupid, crazy, shrewd people, and all of them me. I never felt like that before, I never felt that there was anything inside me, even myself.

Storytelling awakens us to that which is real. Honest. . . . it transcends the individual. . . . Those things that are most personal are most general, and are, in turn, most trusted. Stories bind. . . . They are basic to who we are. A story composite personality which grows out of its community. It maintains a stability within that community, providing common knowledge as to how things are, how things should be -- knowledge based on experience. These stories become the conscience of the group. They belong to everyone.

It has been our fate as a nation not to have ideologies but to be one.

The problems facing humanity today are spiritual problems, and they can only be solved by taking a long, hard look at what it is we all believe.

A national spirit is necessary for national existence. A flag is a material aid to the development of such a spirit.

We can find common qualities and common values that have made Britain the country it is. Our belief in tolerance and liberty which shines through British history. Our commitment to fairness, fair play and civic duty.

If individuals start to walk on the path of spirit and feel a sense of the sacred connectedness, then social, economic and political problems will also begin to get resolved.

The history of the race is but that of the individual "writ large".

What passes for identity in America is a series of myths about one's heroic ancestors.

Without raising human consciousness, whatever we do in the world will only lead to more and more suffering.