Spencer Heath Archive

Item 782

Verbatim note by Spencer MacCallum from conversation with Heath about Voltaire’s dictum that “Men will not long believe absurdities without practicing violence” (the quote may not be exact).

March 23, 1956

Reason is perhaps the only restraint — because irrationality works both ways, both for benevolence and malevolence.

Benevolence is no less irrational than is malevolence