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The history of mankind is a perennial tragedy; for the highest ideals which the individual may project are ideals which he can never realize in social and collective terms.

Reinhold Niebuhr

All this talk about atheistic materialism and God-fearing American I think is beside the point; it’s a rather vapid form of religion.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Materialism Thinking Vapid
To the end of history, social orders will probably destroy themselves in an effort to prove they are indestructible.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Effort Order Social
You can’t say that religion or irreligion will give us a particular answer to the nuclear dilemma.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Answers Giving Nuclear
We have, on the whole, more liberty and less equality than Russia has. Russia has less liberty and more equality. Whether democracy should be defined primarily in terms of liberty or equality is a source of unending debate.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Country Democracy Liberty People
Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in a lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Accomplishment Lifetime Success
Certainly, anybody who says, “in the eyes of God,” is pretentious.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Anybody Eye Pretentious
Goodness, armed with power, is corrupted; and pure love without power is destroyed.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Goodness Love Power
I think I have one answer, that is partly religious and partly secular; and that is to say, we ought to at least recognize that we and the Russians are in a common predicament. That would be religious in the sense, “Judge not lest you be judged.”
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Judging Religious Thinking
Every experience proves that the real problem of our existence lies in the fact that we ought to love one another, but do not.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Brotherhood Lying Real
It is significant that it is as difficult to get charity out of piety as to get reasonableness out of rationalism.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Charity Difficult Significant
Marxism is the modern form of Jewish prophecy.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Form Modern
It is the evil in man that makes democracy necessary, and man’s belief in justice that makes democracy possible.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Evil Justice Men
Nothing worth doing can be accomplished in a single lifetime.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Accomplished Life Lifetime Single
My personal attitude toward atheists is the same attitude that I have toward Christians, and would be governed by a very orthodox text: “By their fruits shall ye know them.”
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Atheist Attitude Christian
The essence of man is his freedom. Sin is committed in that freedom. Sin can therefore not be attributed to a defect in his essence. It can only be understood as a self-contradiction, made possible by the fact of his freedom but not following necessarily from it.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Essence Men Self
Nationalism: One of the effective ways in which the modern man escapes life’s ethical problems.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR

Men Problem Way

The history of mankind is a perennial tragedy; for the highest ideals which the individual may project are ideals which he can never realize in social and collective terms.

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The history of mankind is a perennial tragedy; for the highest ideals which the individual may project are ideals which he can never realize in social and collective terms.

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