Adults find pleasure in deceiving a child. They consider it necessary, but they also enjoy it. The children very quickly figure it out and then practice deception themselves.
- Elias Canetti
Practice, Very, Figure, Deceiving
Every decision is liberating, even if it leads to disaster. Otherwise, why do so many people walk upright and with open eyes into their misfortune?
- Elias Canetti
Decision, Why, Otherwise, Liberating
The fear of burglars is not only the fear of being robbed, but also the fear of a sudden and unexpected clutch out of the darkness.
- Elias Canetti
Unexpected, Clutch, Sudden, Robbed
Pessimists are not boring. Pessimists are right. Pessimists are superfluous.
- Elias Canetti
Right, Boring, Pessimists, Superfluous
His head is made of stars, but not yet arranged into constellations.
- Elias Canetti
Head, His, Arranged, Constellations
A 'modern' man has nothing to add to modernism, if only because he has nothing to oppose it with. The well-adapted drop off the dead limb of time like lice.
- Elias Canetti
Drop, Add, Limb, Modernism
The great writers of aphorisms read as if they had all known each other well.
- Elias Canetti
Other, Read, Known, Aphorism
Success is the space one occupies in the newspaper. Success is one day's insolence.
- Elias Canetti
Success, Newspaper, Insolence
The process of writing has something infinite about it. Even though it is interrupted each night, it is one single notation.
- Elias Canetti
Process, Though, Each Night, Interrupted
Success listens only to applause. To all else it is deaf.
- Elias Canetti
Success, Listens, Else, Applause
The planet's survival has become so uncertain that any effort, any thought that presupposes an assured future amounts to a mad gamble.
- Elias Canetti
Thought, Gamble, Planet, Uncertain
The profoundest thoughts of the philosophers have something trickle about them. A lot disappears in order for something to suddenly appear in the palm of the hand.
- Elias Canetti
Thoughts, Palm, About, Philosophers
Whenever you observe an animal closely, you feel as if a human being sitting inside were making fun of you.
- Elias Canetti
Human Being, Making, Closely, Sitting
Rulers who want to unleash war know very well that they must procure or invent a first victim.
- Elias Canetti
Want, Very, Invent, Unleash
The paranoiac is the exact image of the ruler. The only difference is their position in the world. One might even think the paranoiac the more impressive of the two because he is sufficient unto himself and cannot be shaken by failure.
- Elias Canetti
Two, Ruler, Shaken, Exact
People's fates are simplified by their names.
- Elias Canetti
People, Names, Fates, Simplified
There is nothing that man fears more than the touch of the unknown. He wants to see what is reaching towards him, and to be able to recognize or at least classify it. Man always tends to avoid physical contact with anything strange.
- Elias Canetti
More, Always, Classify, Tends
Justice requires that everyone should have enough to eat. But it also requires that everyone should contribute to the production of food.
- Elias Canetti
Everyone, Production, Should, Requires
People love as self-recognition what they hate as an accusation.
- Elias Canetti
Love, Hate, People, Accusation
All the things one has forgotten scream for help in dreams.
- Elias Canetti
Dreams, Help, Things, Forgotten
When you write down your life, every page should contain something no one has ever heard about.
- Elias Canetti
About, Your, Contain, Heard
Most religions do not make men better, only warier.
- Elias Canetti
Men, Better, Most, Religions
One should use praise to recognize what one is not.
- Elias Canetti
Praise, Should, Use, Recognize
One should not confuse the craving for life with endorsement of it.
- Elias Canetti
Craving, Should, Endorsement, Confuse
There is no doubt: the study of man is just beginning, at the same time that his end is in sight.
- Elias Canetti
Study, Same, His, No Doubt
Words are not too old, only people are too old if they use the same words too frequently.
- Elias Canetti
Old, Same, Too, Frequently
Someone who always has to lie discovers that every one of his lies is true.
- Elias Canetti
Someone, Always, His, Discovers
There is no such thing as an ugly language. Today I hear every language as if it were the only one, and when I hear of one that is dying, it overwhelms me as though it were the death of the earth.
- Elias Canetti
Death, Language, Though, Ugly
He who is obsessed by death is made guilty by it.
- Elias Canetti
Death, Guilty, Made, Obsessed
Whether or not God is dead: it is impossible to keep silent about him who was there for so long.
- Elias Canetti
Impossible, Keep, Whether, Silent
As if one could know the good a person is capable of, when one doesn't know the bad he might do.
- Elias Canetti
Bad, Person, Could, Capable
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