George Santayana Quotes
Skepticism, like chastity, should not be relinquished too readily.
George Santayana, 1863-1952, Philosopher, Quoted in Laurence J. Peter, Quotations for Our Time, 1977
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
This Quatrain amazingly preceded Tennyson’s expression of the same idea by almost 1000 years. See {620306}. At the time this was written Islam was entering the flower of its intellectual height where one could express doubt and be a religious dissident and not be murdered or even censored in many Muslim communities. At that time Islamic science, mathematics, philosophy, and literature was well in advance of Christian Europe. However, a hundred years later, the Islamic world went through a “Closing” where all new ideas became suspect and the religion and culture became stultified and Europe advanced while the Islamic world ceased its creative intellectual development.
Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás, known in English as George Santayana, was a philosopher, essayist, poet, and novelist. Originally from Spain, Santayana was raised and educated in the US from the age of eight and identified himself as an American, although he always retained a valid Spanish passport. At the age of 48, Santayana left his position at Harvard and returned to Europe permanently.
