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Ibn Khaldun ابن خلدون

1377 · Tunis · Cairo

The conquered are always in love with imitating the conqueror, in his emblems, his dress, his beliefs and all his ways and customs.

المغلوب مولع أبدا بالاقتداء بالغالب في شعاره وزيه ونحلته وسائر أحواله وعوائده

The Muqaddimah, the title of a chapter

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Akutagawa Ryunosuke 芥川龍之介

1923 · Taisho Japan

Public opinion is always a lynching, and a lynching is always an entertainment. Even when newspaper articles are used in place of pistols.

輿論は常に私刑であり、私刑は又常に娯楽である。たといピストルを用うる代りに新聞の記事を用いたとしても。

Words of a Dwarf (Shuju no kotoba), "Public Opinion"

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Bai Juyi 白居易

c. 829 · Tang China

What is there to fight over on the horn of a snail? We lodge this body in the flash of a flint spark. Rich or poor, take it as it comes and be merry: the one who does not open his mouth and laugh is the fool.

蝸牛角上爭何事,石火光中寄此身。 隨富隨貧且歡樂,不開口笑是癡人。

"Facing the Wine," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Confucius 孔子

5th century BC · Lu, Spring and Autumn China

"The gentleman is in harmony with others without becoming the same as them; the small man becomes the same and is not in harmony."

子曰:「君子和而不同,小人同而不和。」

Analects, book 13 (Zilu)

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1 in 100 Billion · The social network of those who came before us