Meandering in the stacks . . .

Today is the birthday of Maxwell "Max" Alan Lerner and Sidney Hook, both born December 20th, 1902.

Maxwell "Max" Alan Lerner (December 20, 1902—June 5, 1992), journalist and educator.

"A world technology means either a world government or world suicide." - Max Lerner

"Either men will learn to live like brothers, or they will die like beasts." - Max Lerner

"Despite the success cult, men are most deeply moved not by the reaching of the goal but by the grandness of the effort involved in getting there - or failing to get there." - Max Lerner

"The crime of book purging is that it involves a rejection of the word. For the word is never absolute truth, but only man's frail and human effort to approach the truth. To reject the word is to reject the human search." - Max Lerner

"In our rich consumers' civilization we spin cocoons around ourselves and get possessed by our possessions." - Max Lerner

"The so-called lessons of history are for the most part the rationalizations of the victors. History is written by the survivors." - Max Lerner

"The turning point in the process of growing up is when you discover the core of strength within you that survives all hurt." - Max Lerner

"When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil." - Max Lerner

Lerner image source (1)

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Sidney Hook (December 20, 1902 – July 12, 1989), philosopher.

"Before impugning an opponent's motives, even when they legitimately may be impugned, answer his arguments." - Sidney Hook

"Idealism, alas, does not protect one from ignorance, dogmatism, and foolishness." - Sidney Hook

"Everyone who remembers his own education remembers teachers, not methods and techniques. The teacher is the heart of the educational system." - Sidney Hook

"Students rarely disappoint teachers who assure them in advance that they are doomed to failure." - Sidney Hook

"Those who say that life is worth living at any cost have already written an epitaph of infamy, for there is no cause and no person that they will not betray to stay alive." - Sidney Hook

"To silence criticism is to silence freedom." - Sidney Hook

Hook image source (1)