hard-to-define

Updated: May 29, 2025

Arnold Toynbee concluded from his Study of History that religion has been a prime motive force in the building and preservation of civilizations. Technology has been a motive force of hard-to-define importance in revitalizing, changing, expanding and perpetuating civilizations.

Scott Nearing - Civilization and Beyond: Learning from History

But their statues and their histories and their mosaics and their poems were mere Latin imitations of Greek originals. Without that vague and hard-to-define something which the world calls "personality," there can be no art and the Roman world distrusted that particular sort of personality. The Empire needed efficient soldiers and tradesmen.

Hendrik Willem Van Loon - The Story of Mankind