If Thought is capable of being classed with Electricity, or Will with chemical affinity, as a mode of motion, it seems necessary to fall at once under the second law of thermodynamics as one of the energies which most easily degrades itself, and, if not carefully guarded, returns bodily to the cheaper form called Heat. Of all possible theories, this is likely to prove the most fatal to Professors of History.
Henry AdamsA society in stable equilibrium is-by definition-one that has no history and wants no historians.
Henry AdamsA congressman is a pig. The only way to get his snout from the trough is to rap it sharply with a stick.
Henry AdamsThe photograph is a coarse fraud, and seems to delight only in taking the whole beauty out of the picture.
Henry AdamsSince [Rousseau's] time, and largely thanks to him, the Ego has steadily tended to efface itself, and, for purposes of model, to become a manikin on which the toilet of education is to be draped in order to show the fit or misfit of the clothes. The object of study is the garment, not the figure.
Henry Adams