“Whoever debases others is debasing himself.”
“Even speech was for them was a debased form of silence; how much more futile is poetry which is a debased form of speech.”
“Chitchat debases a language.”
“We have made it our overriding ambition to escape work, and as a consequence have debased work until it is only fit to escape from. We have debased the products of work and have been, in turn, debased by them.(pg. 43, "The Unsettling of America")”
“Public life is debased because it's only the nice people who are worried about imposing their views on others.”
“Whatever debases the intelligence degrades the entire human being.”