--- title: "3 Human existence Quotes By Herbert Marcuse" description: "3 Human existence quotes by Herbert Marcuse. Plus more from Herbert Marcuse and more Human existence sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/015/herbert-marcuse-3589_death_under-conditions-of-a-truly-human-existe_1310686.jpg" --- > [“Under conditions of a truly human existence, the difference between succumbing to disease at the age of ten, thirty, fifty, or seventy,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/under-conditions-of-a-truly-human-existence-the-difference-between/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/015/herbert-marcuse-3589_death_under-conditions-of-a-truly-human-existe_1310686.jpg) > [Those who devote their lives to earning a living are incapable of living a human existence.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/those-who-devote-their-lives-to-earning-a-living-are-incapable-of/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/6d8/herbert-marcuse-3589_earning_those-who-devote-their-lives-to-earning_2676488.jpg) > [One can delineate the domain of philosophy however one likes, but in its search for truth, philosophy is always concerned with human…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/one-can-delineate-the-domain-of-philosophy-however-one-likes-but-in/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/780/herbert-marcuse-3589_care_one-can-delineate-the-domain-of-philosop_3027600.jpg) ## Other authors on Human existence - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b009/author-erich-fromm-33632.jpg) Erich Fromm 10 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/human-existence/erich-fromm/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b024/author-viktor-e-frankl-93688.jpg) Viktor E. Frankl 9 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/human-existence/viktor-e-frankl/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b018/author-milan-kundera-68231.jpg) Milan Kundera 9 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/human-existence/milan-kundera/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b011/author-hannah-arendt-40230.jpg) Hannah Arendt 9 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/human-existence/hannah-arendt/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b006/author-carl-jung-20958.jpg) Carl Jung 5 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/human-existence/carl-jung/) ## More by Herbert Marcuse > [The strains and stresses suffered by the individual in society are grounded in the normal functioning of that society (and of the individual!) rather…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/the-strains-and-stresses-suffered-by-the-individual-in-society-are/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [ \[Art\] can speak its own language only as long as the images are alive which refuse and refute the established order. ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/art-can-speak-its-own-language-only-as-long-as-the-images-are-alive/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [If man has learned to see and know what really is, he will act in accordance with truth, Epistemology is in itself ethics, and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/if-man-has-learned-to-see-and-know-what-really-is-he-will-act-in/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [Hypostatized into a ritual pattern, Marxian theory becomes ideology. But its content and function distinguish it from classical forms of ideology; it is not…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/hypostatized-into-a-ritual-pattern-marxian-theory-becomes-ideology/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [Art cannot change the world, but it can contribute to changing the consciousness and drives of the men and women who could change the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/art-cannot-change-the-world-but-it-can-contribute-to-changing-the/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [That which is cannot be true.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/that-which-is-cannot-be-true/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [The closed language does not demonstrate and explain it communicates decision, dictum, command. Where it defines, the definition becomes "separation of good from evil;"…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/the-closed-language-does-not-demonstrate-and-explain-it-communicates/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [The apparatus defeats its own purpose if its purpose is to create a humane existence on the basis of a humanized nature.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/the-apparatus-defeats-its-own-purpose-if-its-purpose-is-to-create-a/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [“As Hegel defines it: "Thinking is, indeed, essentially the negation of that which is before us." ... Reason is the negation of the negative.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/as-hegel-defines-it-thinking-is-indeed-essentially-the-negation-of/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [The precarious ontological link between Logos and Eros is broken, and scientific rationality emerges as essentially neutral.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/the-precarious-ontological-link-between-logos-and-eros-is-broken-and/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [If mass communications blend together harmoniously, and often unnoticeably, art, politics, religion, and philosophy with commercials, they bring these realms of culture to their…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/if-mass-communications-blend-together-harmoniously-and-often/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [This society turns everything it touches into a potential source of progress and exploitation, of drudgery and satisfaction, of freedom and of oppression.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/this-society-turns-everything-it-touches-into-a-potential-source-of/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [Dialectical thought understands the critical tension between "is" and "ought" first as an ontological condition, pertaining to the structure of Being itself. However, the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/dialectical-thought-understands-the-critical-tension-between-is-and/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [Obscenity is a moral concept in the verbal arsenal of the establishment, which abuses the term by applying it, not to expressions of its…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/obscenity-is-a-moral-concept-in-the-verbal-arsenal-of-the/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) > [“For "totalitarian" is not only a terroristic political coordination of society, but also a non-terroristic economic-technical coordination which operates through the manipulation of needs…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/herbert-marcuse/for-totalitarian-is-not-only-a-terroristic-political-coordination-of/) [Herbert Marcuse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/herbert-marcuse/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/human-existence/herbert-marcuse/#itemlist", "name": "3 Human existence Quotes By Herbert Marcuse", "numberOfItems": 3, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Under conditions of a truly human existence, the difference between succumbing to disease at the age of ten, thirty, fifty, or seventy, and dying a \"natural\" death after a fulfilled life, may well be a difference worth fighting for with all instinctual energy. Not those who die, but those who die before they must and want to die, those who die in agony and pain, are the great indictment against civilization. They also testify to the unredeemable guilt of mankind. Their death arouses the painful awareness that it was unnecessary, that it could be otherwise. It takes all the institutions and values of a repressive order to pacify the bad conscience of this guilt. Once again, the deep connection between the death instinct and the sense of guilt becomes apparent. The silent \"professional agreement\" with the fact of death and disease is perhaps one of the most widespread expressions of the death instinct -- or, rather, of its social usefulness. In a repressive civilization, death itself becomes an instrument of repression. Whether death is feared as constant threat, or glorified as supreme sacrifice, or accepted as fate, the education for consent to death introduces an element of surrender into life from the beginning -- surrender and submission. It stifles \"utopian\" efforts. The powers that be have a deep affinity to death; death is a token of unfreedom, of defeat. 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