Secrecy involves a tension which, at the moment of revelation, finds its release.

The psychological basis of the metropolitan type of individuality consists in the intensification of nervous stimulation which results from the swift and uninterrupted change of outer and inner stimuli.

The metropolis has always been the seat of the money economy.

In order to accommodate to change and to the contrast of phenomena, the intellect does not require any shocks and inner upheavals; it is only through such upheavals that the more conservative mind could accommodate to the metropolitan rhythm of events.

Thus, the technique of metropolitan life is unimaginable without the most punctual integration of all activities and mutual relations into a stable and impersonal time schedule.

Man's nature, originally good and common to all, should develop unhampered.

The individual has become a mere cog in an enormous organization of things and powers which tear from his hands all progress, spirituality, and value in order to transform them from their subjective form into the form of a purely objective life.

Every relationship between persons causes a picture of each to take form in the mind of the other, and this picture evidently is in reciprocal relationship with that personal relationship.

Secrecy sets barriers between men, but at the same time offers the seductive temptation to break through the barriers by gossip or confession.

For the metropolis presents the peculiar conditions which are revealed to us as the opportunities and the stimuli for the development of both these ways of allocating roles to men.

Secrecy is thus, so to speak, a transition stadium between being and not-being.

Discretion is nothing other than the sense of justice with respect to the sphere of the intimate contents of life.

For the division of labor demands from the individual an ever more one-sided accomplishment, and the greatest advance in a one-sided pursuit only too frequently means dearth to the personality of the individual.

The earliest phase of social formations found in historical as well as in contemporary social structures is this: a relatively small circle firmly closed against neighboring, strange, or in some way antagonistic circles.

The first internal relation that is essential to a secret society is the reciprocal confidence of its members.

Every relationship between two individuals or two groups will be characterized by the ratio of secrecy that is involved in it.

The metropolis reveals itself as one of those great historical formations in which opposing streams which enclose life unfold, as well as join one another with equal right.

For this reason, strangers are not really conceived as individuals, but as strangers of a particular type: the element of distance is no less general in regard to them than the element of nearness.

The intellectually sophisticated person is indifferent to all genuine individuality, because relationships and reactions result from it which cannot be exhausted with logical operations.

Modern culture is constantly growing more objective. Its tissues grow more and more out of impersonal energies, and absorb less and less the subjective entirety of the individual.

For, to be a stranger is naturally a very positive relation; it is a specific form of interaction.

In the latter case life rests upon a thousand presuppositions which the individual can never trace back to their origins, and verify; but which he must accept upon faith and belief.

The deepest problems of modern life derive from the claim of the individual to preserve the autonomy and individuality of his existence in the face of overwhelming social forces, of historical heritage, of external culture, and of the technique of life.

On the one hand, life is made infinitely easy for the personality in that stimulations, interests, uses of time and consciousness are offered to it from all sides. They carry the person as if in a stream, and one needs hardly to swim for oneself.

Every superior personality, and every superior performance, has, for the average of mankind, something mysterious.

Cities are, first of all, seats of the highest economic division of labor.

Secrecy involves a tension which, at the moment of revelation, finds its release.

Gratitude is the moral memory of mankind.

The metropolis reveals itself as one of those great historical formations in which opposing streams which enclose life unfold, as well as join one another with equal fight.

Life within the Kremlin was shrouded in impenetrable secrecy.

But then, so far as I know, I am the only performer who ever pledged his assistants to secrecy, honor and allegiance under a notarial oath.

Children love secret club houses. They love secrecy even when there's no need for secrecy.

The higher the classification of secrecy, the quicker you will report it.

Secrecy is the chastity of friendship.

There is nothing we like to communicate to others as much as the seal of secrecy together with what lies under it.

In all secrets there is a kind of guilt, however beautiful or joyful they may be, or for what good end they may be set to serve. Secrecy means evasion, and evasion means a problem to the moral mind.

Secrecy is the freedom tyrants dream of.

In such a case secrecy must be absolute to be effective, and although mere vague curiosity induced many persons of my intimate acquaintance to ask to be allowed to just go in and have a peep, I never admitted anyone.

Secrecy sets barriers between men, but at the same time offers the seductive temptation to break through the barriers by gossip or confession.

The better the information it has, the better democracy works. Silence and secrecy are never good for it.

Secrecy is thus, so to speak, a transition stadium between being and not-being.

Secrecy is the element of all goodness; even virtue, even beauty is mysterious.

Secrecy, being an instrument of conspiracy, ought never to be the system of a regular government.

Secrecy is the first essential in affairs of state.

I like to write in a shroud of secrecy because I have to keep finding ways to scare myself.

So far as I know, there were no pains taken to preserve secrecy on this subject; that is, I saw no attempt made to keep any of the inmates of the Convent in ignorance of the murder of children.

Every relationship between two individuals or two groups will be characterized by the ratio of secrecy that is involved in it.

There are many hands touching ballots after a voter drops his ballot into the ballot box. There is no guarantee of ballot secrecy for anyone, which makes the whole system vulnerable to intimidation and bribery.

At that time we were very definitely told that under no circumstances should there be any secret chapters or any other secrecy in the life of the Party, but that everything should be done publicly.