God how I hate new countries: They are older than the old, more sophisticated, much more conceited, only young in a certain puerile vanity more like senility than anything.
D. H. LawrenceRead
The more I see of democracy the more I dislike it. It just brings everything down to the mere vulgar level of wages and prices, electric light and water closets, and nothing else.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The speaker expresses a growing discontent with democracy, feeling it reduces complex human issues to mundane concerns.
In this quote, D. H. Lawrence critiques democracy, suggesting that it tends to trivialize significant societal matters by focusing excessively on basic economic concerns like wages and prices. He implies that democracy can lead to a degradation of cultural and intellectual values, as it often prioritizes the average citizen's commonplace needs over more profound discussions or ideals.
Themes
DemocracyCritiqueSocietyValuesEconomics
In practice
Example use cases
During a political debate, one might reference this quote to highlight concerns about how democracy may oversimplify important issues.
More from D. H. Lawrence
All quotes βA young man is afraid of his demon and puts his hand over the demon's mouth sometimes and speaks for him. And the things the young man says are very rarely poetry.
D. H. LawrenceRead
And besides, look at elder flowers and bluebells-they are a sign that pure creation takes place - even the butterfly. But humanity never gets beyond the caterpillar stage -it rots in the chrysalis, it never will have wings.It is anti-creation, like monkeys and baboons.
D. H. LawrenceRead
The Christian fear of the pagan outlook has damaged the whole consciousness of man.
D. H. LawrenceRead
The cosmos is a vast living body, of which we are still parts. The sun is a great heart whose tremors run through our smallest veins. The moon is a great nerve center from which we quiver forever. Who knows the power that Saturn has over us, or Venus? But it is a vital power, rippling exquisitely through us all the time.
D. H. LawrenceRead
... he preferred his own madness, to the regular sanity. He rejoiced in his own madness, he was free. He did not want that old sanity of the world, which was become so repulsive. He rejoiced in the new-found world of his madness. It was so fresh and delicate and so satisfying.
D. H. LawrenceRead
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