Quotes About Conceits

The prose," Robespierre said. "It's so clean, no conceits, no show, no wit. He means every word. Formerly, you see, he meant every other word. That was his style.

Thus when we fondly flatter our desires, Our best conceits do prove the greatest liars.

Every society produces its own cultural conceits, a set of lies and delusions about itself that thrive in the face of all contrary evidence.

History repeats the old conceits, the glib replies, the same defeats.

Hence, the new operating principle was simple: do the opposite of what they (Obama, but the Bush neocons, too) would do. Their behavior, their conceits, their ideas - in some sense even their backgrounds, education and class -- were all suspect. And, what's more, you don't really have to know all that much yourself; you just do it differently than it was done before.