Charles Darwin Quotes

A certain degree of progress from the rudest state in which man is found,—a dweller in caves, or on trees, like an ape, a cannibal, an eater of pounded snails, worms, and offal,—a certain degree of progress from this extreme is called Civilization.

It is inherent in human consciousness to improve. So there is nothing unique about a people searching for and creating ways to make their life better - all civilizations throughout history have done this. What is unique about us in America is the accelerated rate at which we continually search for novelty and progress.

It's too bad our society isn't further along.

A stationary condition of capital and population implies no stationary state of human improvement. There could be as much scope as ever for all kinds of mental culture, and moral and social progress.

Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. Society acquires new arts, and loses old instincts.

I feel I grew up in a different century than I live in. I think most of them are changes for the good.

Since that time up until the present time, there have been progress, and changes all through the time. The changes have not come by themselves; these changes have come from the doings of everyone in the country.

Maybe the preoccupation with technological progress has overshadowed our concern with human progress.

I meant exactly what I said: that we are saddled with a culture that hasn't advanced as far as science.

You have to look at history as an evolution of society.

If we are to have faith that mankind will survive and thrive on the face of the earth, we must believe that each succeeding generation will be wiser than its progenitors.

The history of the world demonstrates that man becomes what we call civilized by increasing his wants.

Life gets boring, someone invents another necessity, and once again we turn the crank on the screwjack of progress hoping that nobody gets screwed.

What keeps the world from reverting to the Neanderthal with each generation is the continuing, ongoing mythos... the huge body of common knowledge that unites our minds as cells are united in the body of man.

Not every advance is progress. Not every new thing is better for us humanly.

We have a very foolish notion in Western countries that progress delivers freedom. But progress doesn't necessarily bring moral virtue.

How great seems human progress when we consider where it began, and how insignificant, when we contemplate the goals for which itstrives.

Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable.

Civilization in certain respects is as inadequate as it was a thousand years ago.

Civilization, like an airplane in flight, survives only as it keeps going forward.

The civilized man is a more experienced and wiser savage.

In the final analysis, the progress of our civilization will be retarded if any large body of citizens falls behind. Without the help of thousands of others, any one of us would die, naked and starved.

The social states of human kinds Are made by multitudes of minds, And after multitudes of years A little human growth appears Worth having, even to the soul Who sees most plain it's not the whole.

Civilization is not a burden. It is an opportunity.

As Americans, preserving the best of our traditions, we have the right- nay the duty-to fight for participation in the forward march of humanity