#syphilis

Comforts and syphilis are the greatest enemies of mankind. ↗

— Alexis Carrel

#greatest #mankind #syphilis

It is unthinkable for a Frenchman to arrive at middle age without having syphilis and the Cross of the Legion of Honor. ↗

— Andre Gide

#arrive #cross #frenchman #having #honor

Perhaps more than any other disease before or since, syphilis in early modern Europe provoked the kind of widespread moral panic that AIDS revived when it struck America in the 1980s. ↗

— Peter Lewis Allen

#america #any #before #disease #early

Morality is a venereal disease. Its primary stage is called virtue; its secondary stage, boredom; its tertiary stage, syphilis. ↗

— Karl Kraus

#called #disease #morality #primary #secondary

One day in 1948 or 1949, the Brentwood County Mart, a shopping complex in an upscale neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, was the scene of a slight disturbance that carried overtones of the most spectacular upheaval in twientieth-century music. Marta Feuchtwanger, wife of émigré novelist Lion Feuchtwanger, was examining grapefruit in the produce section when she heard a voice shouting German from the far end of the aisle. She looked up to see Arnold Schoenberg, the pioneer of atonal music and the codifier of twelve-tone composition, bearing down on her, with his bald pate and burning eyes. Decades later, in conversation with the writer Lawrence Weschler, Feuchtwanger could recall every detail of the encounter, including the weight of the grapefruit in her hand. “Lies, Frau Marta, lies!” Schoenberg was yelling. “You have to know, I never had syphilis! ↗

— Alex Ross

#syphilis #music

The Philippines is a terrible name, coming from Spain. Phillip II was the father of the inquisition, who I believe died of syphilis. It is my great regret that we didn't change the name of our country. ↗

— Imelda Marcos

#change #coming #country #died #father