47 Roger Scruton Quotes for You to Enjoy

Roger Scruton

English Philosopher

Born: Feb 27, 1944

Died: Jan 12, 2020

Conservative Life Own People World You

The conservative is the one who understands his own society from within and loves and defends it. Roger Scruton

Conservative Own Society Defends Within Understands His Loves Who

Conservatives hold on to things not only because they are attached to them, but also because they do not see the sense in radical change, until someone has told them what it will lead to. Roger Scruton

Change Will Sense Radical Conservatives See Someone Only Attached Lead Until Also Because Hold Them Radical Change Things

For Conservatives, all disputes over law, liberty and justice are addressed to a historic and existing community. The root of politics, they believe, is attachment - the motive in human beings that binds them to the place, the customs, the history and the people who are theirs. Roger Scruton

Politics History Justice People Liberty Law Community Believe Conservatives Attachment Over Motive Existing Historic Human Human Beings Place Them Customs Root Who Beings Binds Disputes

My own view is that left-wing positions largely come about from resentment - I agree with Nietzsche about this - a resentment about the surrounding social order. They have privileges, I don't. Or, I have them and I can't live up to them. Roger Scruton

Own Live Positions About My Own Come Up Left-Wing Surrounding Privileges Order Social Them View Social Order Agree Resentment Largely Nietzsche

Certainly the multicultural activists in the Labour party and the universities wanted to destroy the old white Anglo-Saxon education system as they saw it, and produce something completely different - with no conception of what that completely different thing would be, of course. Roger Scruton

Education Old Party White Saw Destroy System Would Would-Be Something Anglo-Saxon Conception Course Labour Labour Party Different Wanted Produce Certainly Multicultural Different Thing Activists Thing Universities

I'm a hate figure for a certain kind of half-educated politically correct person. Roger Scruton

Hate Correct Kind Person Politically Politically Correct Certain Figure

We should make the case for the things we love, even if we think that people will misunderstand them. That is why people defend the U.S. Constitution, even though so few really understand the subtle thinking embodied in that document. Roger Scruton

Love Constitution People Will Few Think Thinking Though Embodied Case U.S. Constitution Document Make Understand Misunderstand Subtle Them Really Should Even Why Things Defend

My main argument is that environmental destruction comes when people externalise their costs and pass them on to future generations. That is obviously something that large enterprises do and they become large by doing it. Roger Scruton

Environmental Future People Destruction Argument Become Enterprises Future Generations Something Costs Main Generations Obviously Pass Doing Them Large

I know ideals aren't realities, but they do influence reality - social, legal, political, cultural. Roger Scruton

Legal Reality Political Ideals Know Cultural Influence Realities Social

A high culture is the self-consciousness of a society. It contains the works of art, literature, scholarship and philosophy that establish a shared frame of reference among educated people. Roger Scruton

Art Culture People Society Frame Philosophy High Scholarship Shared Self-Consciousness Contains Educated Educated People Reference Establish Literature Works Among

Each Chinese person is a kind of replica of the next one and that is a very frightening thing. Roger Scruton

Kind Very Replica Frightening Person Chinese Next Each Thing

I've always taken the view that works of art are not just things that we enjoy. They can convey truths about the world more vividly and to greater effect than ordinary philosophical prose can because they don't just deal in ideas but show the emotional reality of them. Roger Scruton

Art Reality World Enjoy Philosophical Vividly About More Emotional Taken Prose Ideas Greater Because Deal Always Effect Than Truths Just Ordinary Them Convey View Show Works Things

Perhaps the world of art is just one vast pretence, in which we all take part since, after all, there is no real cost to it, except to those like Charles Saatchi, rich enough to splash out on junk? Roger Scruton