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Full Idea
It is a sad evidence of the weariness mankind has suffered from excessive toil that his heavens have usually been places where nothing ever happened or changed.
Gist of Idea
That our heaven is a dull place reflects the misery of excessive work in life
Source
Bertrand Russell (Political Ideals [1917], 1)
Book Ref
Russell,Bertrand: 'Political Ideals' [Spokesman 2007], p.19
A Reaction
Has any religion got an idea of heaven as a place full of lively activity and creative problem-solving? That is what suits us best.
| 13 | Is the supreme reward for virtue to be drunk for eternity? [Plato] |
| 7908 | At the end of a saint, he is not located in space, but just ceases to be disturbed [Ashvaghosha] |
| 6820 | The righteous shall dwell on couches in gardens, wedded to dark-eyed houris [Mohammed] |
| 6812 | Heaven will be reclining on couches, eating fruit, attended by virgins [Mohammed] |
| 4412 | Those in bliss have their happiness increased by seeing the damned punished [Aquinas] |
| 7203 | In heaven all the interesting men are missing [Nietzsche] |
| 18318 | People who disparage actual life avenge themselves by imagining a better one [Nietzsche] |
| 18288 | Heaven was invented by the sick and the dying [Nietzsche] |
| 18306 | We don't want heaven; now that we are men, we want the kingdom of earth [Nietzsche] |
| 21520 | That our heaven is a dull place reflects the misery of excessive work in life [Russell] |
| 23063 | The first man obviously found paradise unendurable [Cioran] |
| 20699 | Paradise would not contain some virtues, such as courage [Davies,B] |
| 7356 | Pious Jews saw heaven as a vast library [Johnson,P] |