Thursday, October 16, 2008

32. The Vigil of a Nation: Lin Yutang

LIN YUTANG The Vigil of A Nation
New York, The John Day Company. (1945). [x], 262pp, map, 8 pages of illustrations from photographs, index. Black cloth silver, spine rubbed both ends, otherwise internally clean. The impressions of an expatriate Chinese scholar returning to his native country in the midst of a bitter war. Lin Yutang (1895-1976) Leipzig, Ph.D. former Dean of Amoy University, came to the US in the late twenties, wrote a number of books, some of which were published by the firm of his close friend Pearl Buck's husband, John Day.

Quote:

"Freedom of the press is more important than the enactment of laws and constitutions. People who do not know how to talk against their government do not deserve a democracy. And the best government in the world , when it os deprived of the goading 'gadflies' soon gets bored with its own virtues and dies of inanity. I sometimes think God himself created Satan because He was so sick of the singing and flattering angels and wanted to save Himself from boredom. If the kingdom of heaven cannot do withoput opposition, how much less can a human secular government?" p213-214


The Vigil of a Nation: Lin Yutang

R 140

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