Raymond Aron Quotes & Sayings

Political thought in France is either nostalgic or Utopian. — Raymond Aron

Peace imposible,war improbable. — Raymond Aron

In writing if it takes over 30 minutes to write the first two paragraphs select another subject. — Raymond Aron

In a way, all sociologists are akin to Marxists because of their inclination to settle everyone's accounts but their own. — Raymond Aron

The intellectual who no longer feels attached to anything is not satisfied with opinion merely; he wants certainty, he wants a system. The revolution provides him with his opium. — Raymond Aron

Skepticism cannot be revolutionary, even though it speaks the language of revolution. — Raymond Aron

Foreknowledge of the future makes it possible to manipulate both enemies and supporters. — Raymond Aron

Europeans would like to escape from their history, a "great" history written in letters of blood. But others, by the hundreds of millions, are taking it up for the first time, or coming back to it. — Raymond Aron

What passes for optimism is most often the effect of an intellectual error. — Raymond Aron

Peace is impossible, war is improbable. — Raymond Aron

Racism is the snobbery of the poor. — Raymond Aron

The intellectual ... must try never to forget the arguments of the adversary, or the uncertainty of the future, or the faults of one's own side, or the underlying fraternity of ordinary men everywhere. — Raymond Aron

The man who no longer expects miraculous changes either from a revolution or from an economic plan is not obliged to resign himself to the unjustifiable. It is because he likes individual human beings, participates in communities, and respects the truth, that he refuses to surrender his soul to an abstract ideal of humanity, a tyrannical party, and an absurd scholasticism. . . . If tolerance is born of doubt, let us teach everyone to doubt all the models and utopias, to challenge all the prophets of redemption and the heralds of catastrophe.

If they can abolish fanaticism, let us pray for the advent of the sceptics. — Raymond Aron

Despotism has so often been established in the name of liberty that experience should warn us to judge parties by their practices rather than their preachings. — Raymond Aron

Freedom flourishes in temperate zones; it does not survive the burning faith of prophets and crowds. — Raymond Aron

Intellectuals cannot tolerate the chance event, the unintelligible: they have a nostalgia for the absolute, for a universally comprehensive scheme. — Raymond Aron