1984 in the mail

an old friend just forwarded this quote from george orwell.

In a way, the world-view of the Party imposed itself most
successfully on people incapable of understanding it. They could be
made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they
never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and
were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was
happening. By lack of understanding they remained sane. They simply
swallowed everything, and what they swallowed did them no harm,
because it left no residue behind, just as a grain of corn will pass
undigested through the body of a bird. From “1984” by George Orwell.

and then this one. i was trying to remember who wrote that apathy was the death of democracy. i’m pretty sure that a greek or a roman senator said it, but this was the quote that popped up in google:

The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.
Robert M. Hutchins