On "elitist"

As an easy epithet, "elitist" is as mindlessly abused by middlebrows as "Liberal" is by lowbrows.

Only a brain which played with ideas (Cabell)

Why, it seemed to me I had lost the most of myself; and there was left only a brain which played with ideas, and a body that went delicately down pleasant ways. And I could not believe as my fellows believed, nor could I love them, nor could I detect anything in aught they said or did save their exceeding folly: for I had lost their cordial common faith in the importance of what use they made of half-hours and months and years; and because a jill-flirt had opened my eyes so that they saw too much, I had lost faith in the importance of my own actions, too. There was a little time of which the passing might be made endurable; beyond gaped unpredictable darkness: and that was all there was of certainty anywhere.

James Branch Cabell, Jurgen

If you tell a lie big enough... (Goebbels)

It is the absolute right of the State to supervise the formation of public opinion. If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.

Joseph Goebbels, German Minister of Propaganda, 1933-1945

On Speaking

People say (and assume) that the function of speech is to communicate. And yet it is very common that people will talk to animals, which are incapable of understanding or response, and aloud to themselves, which is redundant (though undeniably satisfying). Listening to conversations, one notes this same intent-to-speak-without-caring-to-actually-convey-information. How often do people speak without expecting, wanting, or waiting for a response? These very words, addressed to no one, why do I say them?