"Universal brotherhood is not even a beautiful dream. Antagonism is essential to man's greatest efforts."
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Quote collection
Theodor Herzl quotes (page 2 of 3)
43 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"I prefer being penetrated by iron to seeing Palestine is loose."
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"When I remember thee in days to come, O Jerusalem, it will not be with pleasure. The musty deposits of 2,000 years of inhumanity, intolerance, and uncleanliness lie in the foul-smelling alleys... The amiable dreamer of Nazareth has only contributed to increasing the hatred... What superstition and fanaticism on every side!"
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"Realists are, as a rule, only men in the rut of routine who are incapable of transcending a narrow circle of antiquated notions."
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"If anyone thinks that Jews can steal into the land of their fathers, he is deceiving either himself or others. Nowhere is the coming of Jews so promptly noted as in the historic home of the Jews, for the very reason that it is the historic home."
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"The body is a marvelous machine...a chemical laboratory, a power-house. Every movement, voluntary or involuntary, full of secrets and marvels"
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"The Jews had, as a matter of fact, long been all along the most ingenious entrepreneurs. It was only our own future that we had never built upon a business basis."
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"Dreams and actions are not so different as usually thought, as all actions of men are founded upon dreams, and their end - is a dream too."
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"Philanthropic colonization is a failure. National colonization will succeed."
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"The spirit in which the offer was made must of necessity contribute to improving and alleviating the situation of the Jewish people without our renouncing one iota of the great principles upon which our movement is based."
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"What We want is to make it possible for our unfortunate people to live a life of industry for it is by steady work alone that we hope for our physical and moral rehabilitation. For this reason above all we have undertaken to rally our people around our ideal."
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"Economic distress, political pressure, and social obloquy already drive us from our homes and from our graves. The Jews are already constantly shifting from place to place."
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"I incline to an aristocratic republic. This would satisfy the ambitious spirit among our people. We shall learn from the historic mistakes of others in the same way as we learn from our own; for we are a modern nation and wish to be the most modern in the world."
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"Let sovereignty be granted us over a portion of the earth's surface large enough to satisfy our rightful requirements as a nation. The rest we shall manage for ourselves."
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"When we sink, we become a revolutionary proletariat, the subordinate officers of all revolutionary parties; at the same time, when we rise, there rises also our terrible power of the purse."
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"The land which the Society of Jews will have secured by international law must naturally be privately owned."
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"But I am convinced that those Jews who stand aside today with a malicious smile and with their hands in their trousers' pockets will also want to dwell in our beautiful home."
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"Do you know out of what the German Empire arose? Out of dreams, songs, fantasies and black-red-gold ribbons? Bismarck merely shook the tree that fantasies had planted."
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"We are organizing Jewry for its coming destiny."
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"The character of a people may be ruined by charity."
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