#peasant

After we passed a few more houses, the street ceased to mantain any pretense of urbanity, like a man returning to his little village who, piece by piece, strips off his Sunday best, slowly changing back into a peasant as he gets closer to his home. ↗

— Bruno Schulz

#pretense #urbanity #change

These romantic visions of the peasantry were constantly undone by contact with reality, often with devastating consequences for their bearers. The populists, who invested much of themselves in their conception of the peasants, suffered the most in this respect, since the disintegration of that conception threatened to undermine not only their radical beliefs but also their own self-identity. ↗

— Orlando Figes

#populists #respect

The 'noble savage' whom the Populists had seen in the simple peasant was, as Gorky now concluded, no more than a romantic illusion. And the more he experienced the everyday life of the peasant, the more he denounced them as savage and barbaric. ↗

— Orlando Figes

#romantic

All men are by nature equal, made all of the same earth by one Workman; and however we deceive ourselves, as dear unto God is the poor peasant as the mighty prince. ↗

— Plato

#deceive #earth #equal #god #however

Give the peasants neither life nor death. ↗

— Ieyasu Tokugawa

#give #life #neither #nor #peasants

And it is practically the same in the case of the four or five million poor peasants in France, and also for Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, and two of the Scandinavian countries. Everywhere small and medium sized industry prevails. ↗

— Herman Gorter

#belgium #case #countries #everywhere #five

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic. ↗

— Woodrow Wilson

#democratic #does #king #kingdom #may

I am a peasant from the Auvergne. I want to keep my farm, and I want to keep France. Nothing else matters now. ↗

— Pierre Laval

#else #farm #france #i #i am

The link between literacy and revolutions is a well-known historical phenomenon. The three great revolutions of modern European history -- the English, the French and the Russian -- all took place in societies where the rate of literacy was approaching 50 per cent. Literacy had a profound effect on the peasant mind and community. It promotes abstract thought and enables the peasant to master new skills and technologies, Which in turn helps him to accept the concept of progress that fuels change in the modern world. ↗

— Orlando Figes

#peasants #revolutionary-wars #change

I prefer the company of peasants because they have not been educated sufficiently to reason incorrectly. ↗

— Michel de Montaigne

#because #been #company #educated #i