Human nature presents human minds with a puzzle which they have not yet solved and may never succeed in solving, for all that we can tell. The dichot… - Arnold J. Toynbee

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Human nature presents human minds with a puzzle which they have not yet solved and may never succeed in solving, for all that we can tell. The dichotomy of a human being into 'soul' and 'body' is not a datum of experience. No one has ever been, or ever met, a living human soul without a body... Someone who accepts — as I myself do, taking it on trust — the present-day scientific account of the Universe may find it impossible to believe that a living creature, once dead, can come to life again; but, if he did entertain this belief, he would be thinking more 'scientifically' if he thought in the Christian terms of a psychosomatic resurrection than if he thought in the shamanistic terms of a disembodied spirit.

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About Arnold J. Toynbee

Arnold Joseph Toynbee (April 14, 1889 – October 22, 1975) was a British historian and the nephew of Arnold Toynbee.

Biography information from Wikiquote

Also Known As

Alternative Names: Arnold Joseph Toynbee Toynbee, Arnold Joseph Arnold Toynbee Toynbee
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On the political plane for example, the illusion, projected as 'patriotism', is still 'the last infirmity of noble minds' as well as 'the last refuge of a scoundrel'. In the Western World of our day, almost every Englishman, Frenchman, Czechoslovak, and Lithuanian is influenced in his political feelings, thoughts, and actions, by the irrational assumption that his own national state is a more precious institution than his neighbour's.

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