Progressive Ideas Quotes

When people speak of ideas that revolutionize society, they do but express the fact that within the old society, the elements of a new one have been created, and that the dissolution of the old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old conditions of existence.

Always, at every period, the few were the banner bearers of a great idea, of liberating effort. Not so the mass, the leaden weight of which does not let it move.

Historically the mainstream media has never been particularly friendly to any socially progressive ideas.

It's quite difficult to get through to the people who are really committed to these anti-progressive beliefs.

The party at its best has always been a modern party.

When we've been bold on the Bank of England, on PFI, on great constitutional change, on the New Deal, we've been most successful. So what we have to continue to try and do is to battle with ideas and find new ways of applying those values as the world changes.

This year's blasphemy is next year's liberating truth.

This old Germany was partly defeated in its conflict with the progressive ideas of socialism, for it had given the people nothing that could serve as a successful alternative to socialism.

I have always been driven to buck the system, to innovate, to take things beyond where they've been.

So many new ideas are at first strange and horrible though ultimately valuable that a very heavy responsibility rests upon those who would prevent their dissemination.

When a new idea assaults the power of established authority, authority always screams out that morality has been affronted. It makes no difference if this idea is that the world is round or that women should vote or that the workers should control industry.

Nothing should be banned. Anything that is progressive and contributes something to society shouldn't come in the way of politics.

The way to promote an idea is to put the word reform at the end of it.

There's never any percentage in being ahead of your time.

It's unusual for elected officials to step outside of the box.

There is a place for visionaries and the avant-garde in this world, but not at 9 o'clock on a network.

It is not enough to criticize society without offering a workable alternative.

Sometimes, you're before your time with ideas, and you have to accept that you can't know.

The most dynamic cities have always been immersed in the critical innovations of their time.

Rational thought will always trump medieval dogma.

People always think that history proceeds in a straight line. It doesn't. Social attitudes don't change in a straight line. There's always a backlash against progressive ideas.

Both the revolutionary and the creative individual are perpetual juveniles. The revolutionary does not grow up because he cannot grow, while the creative individual cannot grow up because he keeps growing.

No great idea in its beginning can ever be within the law. How can it be within the law? The law is stationary. The law is fixed. The law is a chariot wheel which binds us all regardless of conditions or place or time.

Innovation, born from true creativity, depends on movement.