Man and Superman and Three Other Plays (73 page)

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Authors: George Bernard Shaw

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MAXIMS FOR REVOLUTIONISTS (
SELECTED
)
The golden rule is that there are no golden rules.
Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.
He who confuses political liberty with freedom and political equality with similarity has never thought for more than five minutes about either.
Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.
When a man teaches something he does not know to somebody who has no aptitude for it, and gives him a certificate of proficiency, the latter has completed the education of a gentleman.
A fool's brain digests philosophy into folly, science into superstition, and art into pedantry. Hence University education.
The best brought-up children are those who have seen their parents as they are.
Hypocrisy is not the parent's first duty.
The vilest abortionist is he who attempts to mold a child's character.
He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches.
A learned man is an idler who kills time with study. Beware of his false knowledge: it is more dangerous than ignorance.
Activity is the only road to knowledge.
Marriage is popular because it combines the maximum of temptation with the maximum of opportunity.
The essential function of marriage is the continuance of the race, as stated in the Book of Common Prayer.
The accidental function of marriage is the gratification of the amoristic sentiment of mankind.
The artificial sterilization of marriage makes it possible for marriage to fulfill its accidental function whilst neglecting its essential one.
Polygamy, when tried under modern democratic conditions, as by the Mormons, is wrecked by the revolt of the mass of inferior men who are condemned to celebacy by it; for the maternal instinct leads a woman to prefer a tenth share in a first rate man to the exclusive possession of a third rate one. Polyandry has not been tried under these conditions.
It is the deed that teaches, not the name we give it. Murder and capital punishment are not opposites that cancel one another, but similars that breed their kind.
When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when the tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity. The distinction between Crime and Justice is no greater.
Whilst we have prisons it matters little which of us occupy the cells.
Ladies and gentlemen are permitted to have friends in the kennel, but not in the kitchen.

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