I have got him fast hung up, quoth Didius to himself, upon one of the two horns of my dilemma — let him get off as he can.
--
Book IV (1761-1762), Ch. 26.Laurence Sterne
» Laurence Sterne - all quotes »
I have described the human dilemma as the capacity of man to view himself as object and as subject. My point is that both are necessary — necessary for psychological science, for effective therapy, and for meaningful living. I am also proposing that in the dialectical process between these two poles lies the development, and the deepening and widening, of human consciousness. The error on both sides — for which I have used Skinner and the pre-paradox Rogers as examples — is the assumption that one can avoid the dilemma by taking one of its poles. It is not simply that man must learn to live with the paradox — the human being has always lived in this paradox or dilemma, from the time that he first became aware of the fact that he was the one who would die and coined a word for his own death. Illness, limitations of all sorts, and every aspect of our biological state we have indicated are aspects of the deterministic side of the dilemma — man is like the grass of the field, it withereth. The awareness of this, and the acting on this awareness, is the genius of man the subject. But we must also take the implications of this dilemma into our psychological theory. Between the two horns of this dilemma, man has developed symbols, art, language, and the kind of science which is always expanding in its own presuppositions. The courageous living within this dilemma, I believe, is the source of human creativity.
Rollo May
Marke ye, how she hitteth me on the thombis (quoth hée)
And ye taunt me tyt ouer thumb (quoth shée)
Sens tyt for tat (quoth I) on euen hand is set.John Heywood
True (quoth Ales) thinges doone can not be vndoone,
Be they done in due tyme, to late, or to soone,
But better late than neuer to repent this,
To late (quoth my aunt) this repentance showd is,
Whan the stéede is stolne shut the stable durre.John Heywood
"Well, there was a guy, a blacksmith, in Abbott, and he and my granddad both had blacksmith's jobs. I hung around there a lot. And he had a family band. He just let me play because he knew I wanted to work and needed the work. So, I played a guitar in a big polka band with a lot of horns and everything. So, fortunately, no one ever heard me, because I wasn't that great. But I was nine or 10 years old and making eight to 10 dollars a night. So, it was easier than picking cotton."
Willie Nelson
The "Schedule of Doctrines" of the most liberal Christian Church insists upon human depravity, and the "absolute need of the Holy Spirit's agency in man's regeneration and sanctification."
But what have we here? The "original calamity " was either caused by God or arose without leave of God, in either case degrading God to man. It is the old dilemma whose horns are the irreconcilable attributes of goodness and omniscience in the supposed Creator of sin and suffering. If the one quality be predicable, the other cannot be predicable of the same subject. Far better and wiser is the essayist's poetical explanation now apparently despised because it was the fashionable doctrine of the sage bard's day:—Sir Richard Francis Burton
Sterne, Laurence
Sternhold, Thomas
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z