“ The pursuit of knowledge can never be anything but a leap in the dark, and a leap in the dark is a very uncomfortable thing. ”
Samuel Butler, The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912). copy citation
| Author | Samuel Butler |
|---|---|
| Source | The Note-Books of Samuel Butler |
| Topic | self-knowledge |
| Date | 1912 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | |
| Weblink | http://www.gutenberg.org/files/6173/6173-h/6173-h.htm |
Context
“How, I wonder, will it be if in our pursuit of knowledge we stumble upon some awkward fact as disturbing for the human race as an enquiry into the state of his own finances may sometimes prove to the individual? The pursuit of knowledge can never be anything but a leap in the dark, and a leap in the dark is a very uncomfortable thing. I have sometimes thought that if the human race ever loses its ascendancy it will not be through plague, famine or cataclysm, but by getting to know some little microbe, as it were, of knowledge which shall get into its system and breed there till it makes an end of us.”
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