Quote #141

Historical thought was to deliver man from subjection to a divinity; but this liberation demanded of him the most absolute subjection to historical evolution. The man takes refuge in the permanence of the party in the same way that he formerly prostrated himself before the altar. That is why the era which dares to claim that it is the most rebellious that has ever existed only offers a choice of various types of conformity. The real passion of the twentieth century is servitude.

More from Albert Camus

  1. Historical reasoning is not a type of reasoning that, within the framework of its own functions, can pass judgment on the world. While pret…
  2. History without a value to transfigure it, is controlled by the law of expediency.
  3. Heraclitus, the discoverer of the constant change of things, nevertheless set a limit to this perpetual process. This limit was symbolized …
  4. History, undoubtedly, is one of the limits of man's experience; in this sense the revolutionaries are right. But man, by rebelling, imposes…
  5. He who rejects the entire past, without keeping any part of it which could serve to breathe life into the revolution, condemns himself to f…
  6. I do not have much liking for the too famous existential philosophy, and, to tell the truth, I think its conclusions false. But at least it…
  7. He who despairs over an event is a coward, but he who holds hope for the human condition is a fool.
  8. I have seen people behave badly with great morality and I note every day that integrity has no need of rules.

All Albert Camus quotes