Civilization Quotes

To be civilized is to be incapable of giving unnecessary offense, it is to have some quality of consideration for all who cross our path.

When man learns to understand and control his own behavior as well as he is learning to understand and control the behavior of crop plants and domestic animals, he may be justified in believing that he has become civilized.

The slum is the measure of civilization.

Civilization has been thrust upon me… and it has not added one whit to my love for truth, honesty, and generosity.

Something ought to be done about these “primitive” people who live in various parts of the world, and don’t know a thing but to live off what nature provides. You would think they would get civilized and learn to live off each other like us civilized folks do.

In his heart, mankind has never been able to evolve past the tribal stage. Civilization does not take the place of tribalism, but if it is well designed, it can control it.

How encouraging it would be to see the germ of civilization, rooted and grounded in hope, thus arise as it were by magic, and raising new feelings in the native mind, to humanize the barren desert. Nor would it at all be over-stepping the bounds of probability to expect, that within the short period of […]

Civilizations fall; cultures are exterminated.

The boons of civilization are so noisily cried up by sentimentalists that we are all apt to overlook its disadvantages. Intrinsically, it is a mere device for regimenting men. Its perfect symbol is the goose-step. The most civilized man is simply that man who has been most successful in caging and harnessing his honest and […]

To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization, and at present very few people have reached this level.