Semblance

Famous quotes containing the word semblance:

    Civilisation is hooped together, brought
    Under a rule, under the semblance of peace
    By manifold illusion....
    William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)

    The nearer people approach old age the closer they return to a semblance of childhood, until the time comes for them to depart this life, again like children, neither tired of living nor aware of death.
    Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536)

    How false is the conception, how frantic the pursuit, of that treacherous phantom which men call Liberty: most treacherous, indeed, of all phantoms; for the feeblest ray of reason might surely show us, that not only its attainment, but its being, was impossible. There is no such thing in the universe. There can never be. The stars have it not; the earth has it not; the sea has it not; and we men have the mockery and semblance of it only for our heaviest punishment.
    John Ruskin (1819–1900)