The Greeks possessed a knowledge of human nature we seem hardly able to attain to without passing through the strengthening hibernation of a new barbarism.
Georg C. LichtenbergRead
There are very many people who read simply to prevent themselves from thinking.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that some people read to distract themselves from their own thoughts rather than to gain knowledge.
Georg C. Lichtenberg's quote reflects on the tendency of some individuals to engage in reading as a means of escapism, using it to avoid confronting their own thoughts and feelings. Instead of seeking intellectual growth or understanding, they may use reading as a way to fill their minds with external information, which prevents deeper self-reflection and contemplation about their own lives and experiences.
Themes
ReadingThinkingEscapismKnowledgeReflection
In practice
Example use cases
Using this quote in a book club to discuss the motivations behind reading.
More from Georg C. Lichtenberg
All quotes βMany things about our bodies would not seem to us so filthy and obscene if we did not have the idea of nobility in our heads.
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Astronomy is perhaps the science whose discoveries owe least to chance, in which human understanding appears in its whole magnitude, and through which man can best learn how small he is.
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The thoughts written on the walls of madhouses by their inmates might be worth publicizing.
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The noble simplicity in the works of nature only too often originates in the noble shortsightedness of him who observes it.
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Food probably has a very great influence on the condition of men. Wine exercises a more visible influence, food does it more slowly but perhaps just as surely. Who knows if a well-prepared soup was not responsible for the pneumatic pump or a poor one for a war?
Georg C. LichtenbergRead
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