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Our ignorance allowed us to live, as you are in the mountains, and your rope is frayed and about to break, but you don’t know it and feel safe.

Primo Levi

There are few men who know how to go to their deaths with dignity, and often they are not those whom one would expect.
PRIMO LEVI

Death Dignity Expect Few Know Men Often Whom
What a very few are acquiring in knowledge of the physical world will perhaps cause this period not to be judged as a pure return of barbarism.
PRIMO LEVI

Acquire Barbarism Few Judge Knowledge Perhaps Period Physical Pure Return Very
We are slaves, deprived of every right, exposed to every insult, condemned to certain death, but we still possess one power, and we must defend it with all our strength for it is the last – the power to refuse our consent.
PRIMO LEVI

Certain Condemned Consent Death Deprive Every Expose Insult Last Possess Power Refuse Right Slave Strength
Perhaps one cannot, what is more one must not, understand what happened, because to understand [the Holocaust] is almost to justify.
PRIMO LEVI

Almost Happened Holocaust Justify More Must One Perhaps Understand
My number is 174517; we have been baptized, we will carry the tattoo on our left arm until we die.
PRIMO LEVI

Baptized Carry Left My Number Tattoo Until Die
It is neither easy nor agreeable to dredge this abyss of viciousness, and yet I think it must be done, because what could be perpetrated yesterday could be attempted again tomorrow, could overwhelm us and our children.
PRIMO LEVI

Abyss Again Aggregate Believe Children Done Grudge Must Neither Overwhelm Say Think Tomorrow Viciousness
If you and your child were going to be killed tomorrow, would you not give him to eat today?
PRIMO LEVI

Child Eat Give Going Kill Today Tomorrow
A scientist’s life, the author says, is indeed conflictual, formed by battles, defeats, and victories: but the adversary is always and only the unknown.
PRIMO LEVI

Adversary Always Author Battle Conflictual Efrat Form Indeed Life Only Say Scientist Victory
This cell belongs to a brain, and it is my brain, the brain of me who is writing; and the cell in question, and within it the atom in question, is in charge of my writing, in a gigantic minuscule game which nobody has yet described.
PRIMO LEVI

Atom Belong Brain Cell Described Game Minuscule Nobody Question Writing
To accuse another of having weak kidneys, lungs, or heart, is not a crime; on the contrary, saying he has a weak brain is a crime.
PRIMO LEVI

Accuse Brain Contrary Crime Have Heart Kidney Ling Nothing Says Weak Wek
I am constantly amazed by man’s inhumanity to man.
PRIMO LEVI

Amaze Constantly Inhumanity Man
I am none of these; I’m a normal man with a good memory who fell into a maelstrom and got out of it more by luck than by virtue, and who from that time on has preserved a certain curiosity about maelstroms large and small, metaphorical and actual.
PRIMO LEVI

Actual Good Lucky Maelstorm Man Memory None Normal Preserve Curiosity Virtue
Nothing can be said: nothing sure, nothing probable, nothing honest. Better to err through omission than through commission: better to refrain from steering the fate of others, since it is already so difficult to navigate one’s own.
PRIMO LEVI

Honest Nothing Probably Said Sue
In fact, the existence of the death squads had a meaning, a message: ‘We, the master race, are your destroyers, but you are no better than we are; if we so wish, and we do so wish, we can destroy not only your bodies, but also your souls, just as we have destroyed ours.
PRIMO LEVI

Better Body Death Destroy Existence Fact Master Message Our Soul Squad Wish
I have many times been praised for my lack of animosity towards the Germans. It’s not a philosophical virtue. It’s a habit of having my second reactions before the first.
PRIMO LEVI

Animosity Country Lack Many Praise Time Towards
For he who loses all often easily loses himself.
PRIMO LEVI

Aften Easily Himself Loses

Our ignorance allowed us to live, as you are in the mountains, and your rope is frayed and about to break, but you don’t know it and feel safe.

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Our ignorance allowed us to live, as you are in the mountains, and your rope is frayed and about to break, but you don’t know it and feel safe.

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