(cache)George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw
Quotes

26 July 1856, Dublin, Ireland, Died November 1950 (aged 94)

An Unsocial Socialist, by George Bernard Shaw

Man and Superman: A Comedy and a Philosophy, by Bernard Shaw

"Custom will reconcile people to any atrocity." ----George Bernard Shaw [See: Male Circumcision.]

Vaccination, medicine:
"Every doctor will allow a colleague to decimate a whole countryside sooner than violate the bond of professional etiquette by giving him away." --George Bernard Shaw

"We have not lost faith, but we have transferred it from God to the medical profession." (see)

"At present, intelligent people do not have their children vaccinated, nor does the law now compel them to. The result is not, as the Jennerians prophesied, the extermination of the human race by smallpox; on the contrary more people are now killed by vaccination than by smallpox."--George Bernard Shaw (August 9, 1944, the Irish Times )

"As a horrible reversion to the most degraded and abominable forms of tribal ritual, . . . which ought to have been made a criminal offence after the great epidemic of 1871."---George Bernard Shaw (Preface to The Doctor's Dilemma, 1906.)

"For years past the strain of countenancing such a proceeding, so gross, reckless, dirty, and dangerous as vaccination from the calf, has been growing unbearable to bacteriological experts. . . . Nothing but the natural ignorance of the public, countenanced by the inoculated erroneousness of the ordinary general medical practitioners, makes such a barbarism as vaccination possible. . . Recent developments have shown that an inoculation made in the usual general practitioner's light-hearted way, without previous highly skilled examination of the state of the patient's blood, is just as likely to be a simple manslaughter as a cure or preventive. But vaccination is nothing short of attempted murder. A skilled bacteriologist would just as soon think of cutting his child's arm and rubbing the contents of the dustpan into the wound, as vaccinating it in the same."--George Bernard Shaw (Letter to the Secretary of the National Anti-Vaccination League, March, 1906, repeated verbatim in a letter to the Irish Anti-Vaccination League, May, 1911, quoted in the Jennerian No. 29, p. 268. Sourced: Should we be vaccinated ? by Bernhard Stern)

“Vaccination is nothing short of attempted murder.” ~ George Bernard Shaw

"As well consult a butcher on the value of vegetarianism as a doctor on the worth of vaccination." ---George Bernard Shaw

"You let a doctor take a dainty, helpless baby, and put that stuff from a cow, which has been scratched and had dirt rubbed into her wound, into that child. Even, the Jennerians now admit that infant vaccination spreads disease among children. More mites die from vaccination than from the disease they are supposed to be inoculated against."--George Bernard Shaw.(Referee for October 18, 1929)

"A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul. -- George Bernard Shaw (1944)

"All professions are conspiracies against the laity."--George Bernard Shaw.

"During the last considerable epidemic at the turn of the century, I was a member of the Health Committee of London Borough Council, and I learned how the credit of vaccination is kept up statistically by diagnosing all the revaccinated cases (of smallpox) as pustular eczema, varioloid or what not---except smallpox."---George Bernard Shaw

On August 9, 1944, the Irish Times published a letter from Mr. Shaw in which he "added a few words" to a very appreciative account of him that had appeared in that paper. Dealing with some of his alleged eccentricities, Mr. Shaw protested that there is nothing eccentric in his objection to the dangerous and grossly unscientific operation called vaccination. He wrote:

"Within my long lifetime, its ruthless enforcement throughout Europe ended in two of the worst epidemics of smallpox in record, our former more dreaded typhus and cholera epidemics having meanwhile been ended by sanitation. After that failure, the credit of vaccination was saved for a while by the introduction of isolation, which at once produced improved figures. At present, intelligent people do not have their children vaccinated, nor does the law now compel them to. The result is not, as the Jennerians prophesied, the extermination of the human race by smallpox; on the contrary more people are now killed by. vaccination than by smallpox.
Yet the British Government, against the law, has just made vaccination compulsory in the Army by explicitly refusing to discipline an officer who has had an objector forcibly vaccinated; and the House of Commons received the news with cheers. Why does this exploded superstition persist? Simply because our education is not controversial, which means that as it is a hundred years out of date on all open questions, reforms have to come from the uneducated who suffer from the facts and know nothing of the books. .
My own education has been entirely controversial: that is why I know what I am writing about; and appear eccentric to dogmatically educated Old School Ties whose heads are stuffed with obsolete shibboleths."---George Bernard Shaw (August 9, 1944, the Irish Times)

MR. GEO BERNARD SHAW -Further Extracts from His Writings (The Vaccination Inquirer Sept 1952)

When Margaret Viereck interviewed Shaw for the Referee for October 18, 1929, she "could not-resist bringing up the subject of his strong attitude against compulsory vaccination". He blazed: "You let a doctor take a dainty, helpless baby, and put that stuff from a cow, which has been scratched and had dirt rubbed into her wound, into that child. Even, the Jennerians now admit that infant vaccination spreads disease among children. More mites die from vaccination than from the disease they are supposed to be inoculated against."

Non-medical:
“ The Government of your country ! I am the Government of your country, I and Lazarus. Do you suppose that you and half a dozen amateurs like you, sitting in a row in that foolish gabble shop, govern Undershaft and Lazarus ? No, my friend, you will do what pays us. You will make war when it suits us and keep peace when it doesn’t.... When I want anything to keep my dividends up, you will discover that my want is a national need. When other people want something to keep my dividends down, you will call out the police and military. And in return you shall have the support of my newspapers, and the delight of imagining that you are a great statesman.”
—UNDERSHAFT, the armament maker, in Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara.

"We are more gullible and superstitious today than we were in the Middle Ages, and an example of modern credulity is the widespread belief that the Earth is round. The average man can advance not a single reason for thinking that the Earth is round. He merely swallows this theory because there is something about it that appeals to the twentieth century mentality."----George Bernard Shaw

'Imagine what you desire, Will what you imagine, Create what you Will'.---George Bernard Shaw

"Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it." George Bernard Shaw

You use a glass mirror to see your face; you use works of art to see your soul”

“The secret to success is to offend the greatest number of people”

“The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact than a drunken man is happier than a sober one”

“A gentleman is one who puts more into the world than he takes out.”

“The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react.”

“The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech.”

A fashion is nothing but an induced epidemic.

I can forgive Alfred Nobel for having invented dynamite, but only a fiend in human form could have invented the Nobel Prize.

Gambling promises the poor what property performs for the rich--something for nothing.

Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it.

The liar's punishment is not in the least that he is not believed but that he cannot believe anyone else.

When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth.

We don't bother much about dress and manners in England, because as a nation we don't dress well and we've no manners.

My way of joking is to tell the truth. It is the funniest joke in the world.

“If there was nothing wrong in the world there wouldn't be anything for us to do.”

“If you can't get rid of the skeleton in your closet, you'd best teach it to dance.”

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

“The things most people want to know about are usually none of their business.”

“Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.”

“I would like to take you seriously, but to do so would be an affront to your intelligence.”

“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”

“Two percent of the people think; three percent of the people think they think; and ninety-five percent of the people would rather die than think."

"All great truths begin as blasphemies."--George Bernard Shaw.

"All evolution in thought and conduct must at first appear as heresy and misconduct."--George Bernard Shaw

"The art of government is the organisation of idolatry."--George Bernard Shaw.

"Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power."--George Bernard Shaw.

"The minority is sometimes right; the majority always wrong."----George Bernard Shaw.

"If you injure your neighbour, better not do it by halves."----George Bernard Shaw.

"Home life is no more natural to us than a cage is natural to a cockatoo."--George Bernard Shaw.

"Go anywhere in England where there are natural wholesome, contented and really nice English people; and what do you find? That the stables are the real centre of the household."--George Bernard Shaw.

"He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career."--George Bernard Shaw.

"A little learning is a dangerous thing, but we must take that risk because a little is as much as our biggest heads can hold." -- Bernard Shaw

"My own education has been entirely controversial: that is why I know what I am writing about; and appear eccentric to dogmatically educated Old School Ties whose heads are stuffed with obsolete shibboleths."--George Bernard Shaw

"Vivisection is a social evil because if it advances human knowledge, it does so at the expense of human character."-----George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)

"The power of accurate observation is called cynicism by those who have not got it." - George Bernard Shaw

Few people think more than two or three times a year; I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week.---George Bernard Shaw

Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.--George Bernard Shaw

"People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can't find them, make them."
-- Mrs. Warren's Profession, 1893

"Forget about likes and dislikes. They are of no consequence. Just do what must be done. This may not be happiness, but it is greatness."

"There are two tragedies in life: one is not to get your heart's desire. The other is to get it."

"Manners are more important than laws and upon them, to a great deal, the law depends...."

"England and America are two countries divided by a common language."

"Marriage: When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part."

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place"

"A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing."

"Any man who is not a Communist at the age of twenty is a fool. Any man who is still a communist at the age of thirty is an even bigger fool."

"Assassination is the extreme form of censorship."
-"The Rejected Statement -- Part I," The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet, 1911

"Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few."

"Every person who has mastered a profession is a skeptic concerning it."

"He's a man of great common sense and good taste meaning thereby a man without originality or moral courage."

"He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches. "

"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and besides, the pig likes it."

"I often quote myself. It adds spice to my conversation."

"If all economists were laid end to end, they would not reach a conclusion."

"It is dangerous to be sincere unless you are also stupid."

"It is most unwise for people in love to marry."

"Lack of money is the root of all evil."

"Martyrdom is the only way a person can become famous without ability."

"Men have to do some awfully mean things to keep up their respectability."

"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others because you were born in it."

"Peace is not only better than war, but infinitely more arduous."

"Reading made Don Quixote a gentleman, but believing what he read made him mad."

"She had lost the art of conversation, but not, unfortunately, the power of speech."

"There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it."

"You see things; and you say, "Why?" But I dream things that never were; and I say, "Why not?" "

"Virtue is insufficient temptation."

"We've already established what you are, ma'am. Now we're just haggling over the price."

Quotes re Shaw
Thomas Edward Lawrence (1888-1935) was George Bernard Shaw's illegitimate with one of Renoir's models. Turks interrogated him by sodomy with no new information forthcoming. The Colonel of MI-5 took him to a disused post office, iced him on the large mailing table, jumped on his head till his neck broke, then iced the body beside his motorcycle - officially an accident to this day. Hitler was a British Agent by Greg Hallett

Look alikes Thomas Edward Lawrence

c1886: Portrait of Shaw, probably wearing a stockinette Jaeger suit, looking straight at the camera, possibly taken by Emery Walker

1906