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chanakya
chanakya
1 month 3 weeks ago
Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth, comes...

Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth, comes of Her own accord where fools are not respected, grain is well stored up, and the husband and wife do not quarrel.

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Philosophical Maxims
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius
2 weeks ago
Disturbance comes only from within-from our...

Disturbance comes only from within-from our own perceptions.

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(Hays translation) IV, 4
Philosophical Maxims
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill
4 months 2 weeks ago
He blamed as severely what he...

He blamed as severely what he thought a bad action, when the motive was a feeling of duty, as if the agents had been consciously evil doers. He would not have accepted as a plea in mitigation for inquisitors, that they sincerely believed burning heretics to be an obligation of conscience. But though he did not allow honesty of purpose to soften his disapprobation of actions, it had its full effect on his estimation of characters. No one prized conscientiousness and rectitude of intention more highly, or was more incapable of valuing any person in whom he did not feel assurance of it.

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(pp. 49-50)
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
3 months 1 week ago
Only what we have not accomplished...

Only what we have not accomplished and what we could not accomplish matters to us, so that what remains of a whole life is only what it will not have been.

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Philosophical Maxims
Hilary Putnam
Hilary Putnam
2 months 3 weeks ago
Truth and falsity are the most...

Truth and falsity are the most fundamental terms of rational criticism, and any adequate philosophy must give some account of these, or failing that, show that they can be dispensed with.

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"Introduction: Philosophy of language and the rest of philosophy"
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
3 months 3 weeks ago
Not only does democracy make every...

Not only does democracy make every man forget his ancestors, but also clouds their view of their descendants and isolates them from their contemporaries. Each man is for ever thrown back on himself alone, and there is danger that he may be shut up in the solitude of his own heart.

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Book Two, Chapter II.
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce
3 months 1 week ago
If we endeavor to form our...

If we endeavor to form our conceptions upon history and life, we remark three classes of men. The first consists of those for whom the chief thing is the qualities of feelings. These men create art. The second consists of the practical men, who carry on the business of the world. They respect nothing but power, and respect power only so far as it [is] exercized. The third class consists of men to whom nothing seems great but reason. If force interests them, it is not in its exertion, but in that it has a reason and a law. For men of the first class, nature is a picture; for men of the second class, it is an opportunity; for men of the third class, it is a cosmos, so admirable, that to penetrate to its ways seems to them the only thing that makes life worth living.

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Vol. I, par. 43
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce
3 months 1 week ago
Were the ends of a person...

Were the ends of a person already explicit, there would be no room for development, for growth, for life; and consequently there would be no personality. The mere carrying out of predetermined purposes is mechanical. This remark has an application to the philosophy of religion. It is that genuine evolutionary philosophy, that is, one that makes the principle of growth a primordial element of the universe, is so far from being antagonistic to the idea of a personal creator, that it is really inseparable from that idea; while a necessitarian religion is in an altogether false position and is destined to become disintegrated. But a pseudo-evolutionism which enthrones mechanical law above the principle of growth is at once scientifically unsatisfactory, as giving no possible hint of how the universe has come about, and hostile to all hopes of personal relations to God.

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Philosophical Maxims
Max Horkheimer
Max Horkheimer
3 months 1 week ago
The idea that an aim can...

The idea that an aim can be reasonable for its own sake-on the basis of virtues that insight reveals it to have in itself-without reference to some kind of subjective gain or advantage, is utterly alien to subjective reason, even where it rises above the consideration of immediate utilitarian values and devotes itself to reflection about the social order as a whole.

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p. 4.
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
1 month 2 days ago
You need a change of soul...

You need a change of soul rather than a change of climate.

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Philosophical Maxims
Roger Scruton
Roger Scruton
2 months 1 week ago
Hayek's theory of evolutionary rationality shows...

Hayek's theory of evolutionary rationality shows how traditions and customs (those surrounding sexual relations, for example) might be reasonable solutions to complex social problems, even when, and especially when, no clear rational grounds can be provided to the individual for obeying them. These customs have been selected by the ''invisible hand'' of social reproduction, and societies that reject them will soon enter the condition of ''maladaptation,'' which is the normal prelude to extinction.

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Hayek and conservatism, in Edward Feser (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Hayek
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
3 months 2 weeks ago
France wanted to make proselytes to...

France wanted to make proselytes to her opinions, and turn every government in the world into a republic. If every government was against her, it was because she had declared herself hostile to every government. He knew of nothing to which this strange republic could be compared, but to the system of Mahomet, who with the koran in one hand, and a sword in the other, held out the former to the acceptance of mankind, and with the latter compelled them to adopt it as their creed. The koran which France held out, was the declaration of the rights of man and universal fraternity; and with the sword she was determined to propagate her doctrines, and conquer those whom she could not convince.

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Speech in the House of Commons (14 December 1792), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England, From the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXX (1817), column 72
Philosophical Maxims
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt
4 months 2 weeks ago
Thinking withdraws radically and for its...

Thinking withdraws radically and for its own sake from this world and its evidential nature, whereas science profits from a possible withdrawal for the sake of specific results.

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p. 56
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
1 month 2 days ago
The archer must…

The archer must know what he is seeking to hit; then he must aim and control the weapon by his skill. Our plans miscarry because they have no aim. When a man does not know what harbour he is making for, no wind is the right wind. Chance must necessarily have great influence over our lives, because we live by chance. It is the case with certain men, however, that they do not know that they know certain things. Just as we often go searching for those who stand beside us, so we are apt to forget that the goal of the Supreme Good lies near us.

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Line 3
Philosophical Maxims
Arnold J. Toynbee
Arnold J. Toynbee
2 months ago
Every oasis is an island that...

Every oasis is an island that has water inside it but not round it.

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Between Niger and Nile (London: Oxford UP, 1965) 20. Cyrenaïca's Green Mountain
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
5 months 2 weeks ago
If the only significant history of...

If the only significant history of human thought were to be written, it would have to be the history of its successive regrets and its impotences.

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Philosophical Maxims
Max Horkheimer
Max Horkheimer
3 months 1 week ago
Logical empiricism holds the view, notwithstanding...

Logical empiricism holds the view, notwithstanding some its assertions, that the forms of knowledge and consequently the relations of man to nature and to other men never change. According to rationalism, too, all subjective and objective potentialities are rooted in insights which the individual already possesses, but rationality uses existing objects as well as the active inner striving and ideas of man to construct standards for the future. In this regard, it is not so closely associated with the present order as is empiricism.

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p. 148.
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
2 months 3 weeks ago
It is almost impossible to bear...

It is almost impossible to bear the torch of truth through a crowd without singeing somebody's beard. G 4 Variant translations: It is almost impossible to carry the torch of wisdom through a crowd without singeing someone's beard. It is virtually impossible to carry the torch of truth through a crowd, without singeing someone's beard

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Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
4 months 2 weeks ago
Let us not underrate the value...

Let us not underrate the value of a fact; it will one day flower in a truth.

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"Natural History of Massachusetts". The Dial (July 1842) p. 39
Philosophical Maxims
William Whewell
William Whewell
2 weeks 3 days ago
We cannot observe external things without...

We cannot observe external things without some degree of Thought; nor can we reflect upon our Thoughts, without being influenced in the course of our reflection by the Things which we have observed.

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The Elements of Morality, Book 1, ch. 1., 1845
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
4 months 3 weeks ago
By God's grace, I know Satan...

By God's grace, I know Satan very well. If Satan can turn God's Word upside down and pervert the Scriptures, what will he do with my words -- or the words of others?

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Confession Concerning Christ's Supper, Part 3. Robert E. Smith, tr. Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtsusgabe. (Weimar: Herman Boehlaus Nachfolger, 1909), pp. 499-500.
Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
4 months 2 weeks ago
The means employed by Nature to...

The means employed by Nature to bring about the development of all the capacities of men is their antagonism in society, so far as this is, in the end, the cause of a lawful order among men.

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Fourth Thesis
Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
2 months 2 weeks ago
Omnipresence has become an ordinary human...

Omnipresence has become an ordinary human dimension.

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Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
4 months 3 weeks ago
If you are a preacher of...

If you are a preacher of mercy, do not preach an imaginary but the true mercy. If the mercy is true, you must therefore bear the true, not an imaginary sin. God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong (sin boldly), but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world. We will commit sins while we are here, for this life is not a place where justice resides. We, however, says Peter (2. Peter 3:13) are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth where justice will reign.

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Letter 99, Paragraph 13. Erika Bullmann Flores, Tr. from: Dr. Martin Luther's Saemmtliche SchriftenDr. Johann Georg Walch Ed. (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, N.D.), Vol. 15, cols. 2585-2590.
Philosophical Maxims
Vandana Shiva
Vandana Shiva
2 months 1 day ago
Being a planetary citizen does not...

Being a planetary citizen does not need space travel. It means being conscious that we are part of the universe and of the earth. The most fundamental law is to recognise that we share the planet with other beings, and that we have a duty to care for our common home.

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Philosophical Maxims
Karl Popper
Karl Popper
4 months 2 weeks ago
By 'arguing...' I mean... criticizing... inviting......

By 'arguing...' I mean... criticizing... inviting... criticism; and trying to learn from it.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Henry Huxley
Thomas Henry Huxley
2 months 3 days ago
The fact is he made a...

The fact is he made a prodigious blunder in commencing the attack, and now his only chance is to be silent and let people forget the exposure. I do not believe that in the whole history of science there is a case of any man of reputation getting himself into such a contemptible position.

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About Richard Owen's view on human and ape brains, in a letter to J.D. Hooker
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
2 months 3 weeks ago
The fly that doesn't want to...

The fly that doesn't want to be swatted is most secure when it lights on the fly-swatter.

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J 70 Variant translation: The fly that does not want to be swatted is safest if it sits on the fly-swat.
Philosophical Maxims
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill
4 months 2 weeks ago
[E]xperience has taught me that those...

[E]xperience has taught me that those who give their time to the absorbing claims of what is called society, not having leisure to keep up a large acquaintance with the organs of opinion, remain much more ignorant of the general state either of the public mind, or of the active and instructed part of it, than a recluse who reads the newspapers need be.

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(p. 262)
Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
4 months 2 weeks ago
When people begin to philosophize they...

When people begin to philosophize they seem to think it necessary to make themselves artificially stupid.

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Theory of Knowledge, 1913
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
5 months 3 days ago
By faithfulness we are collected and...

By faithfulness we are collected and wound up into unity within ourselves, whereas we had been scattered abroad in multiplicity.

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As quoted in Footprints in Time : Fulfilling God's Destiny for Your Life (2007) by Jeff O'Leary, p. 223
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
3 months 1 week ago
To Live signifies to believe and...

To Live signifies to believe and hope - to lie and to lie to oneself.

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Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
3 months 2 weeks ago
To execute laws is a royal...

To execute laws is a royal office; to execute orders is not to be a king. However, a political executive magistracy, though merely such, is a great trust.

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Volume iii, p. 497
Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
5 months 2 weeks ago
The division between human and robot...

The division between human and robot is perhaps not as significant as that between intelligence and nonintelligence.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
4 months 2 weeks ago
Nor mourn the unalterable Days That...

Nor mourn the unalterable Days That Genius goes and Folly stays.

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In Memoriam E. B. E., st. 9
Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
3 months 2 weeks ago
What man is to be, he...

What man is to be, he must become; and as he is to be a being for himself, must become through himself. Nature completed all her works; only from man did she withdraw her hands, and precisely thereby gave him over to himself. Cultivability, as such, is the character of mankind. The impossibility of subsuming to the human form any other conception than that of his own Ego, is it, which forces every man inwardly to consider every other man as his equal.

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P. 119
Philosophical Maxims
Joseph de Maistre
Joseph de Maistre
2 weeks 1 day ago
What are we, weak and blind...

What are we, weak and blind human beings! And what is that flickering light we call Reason? When we have calculated all the probabilities, questioned history, satisfied every doubt and special interest, we may still embrace only a deceptive shadow rather than the truth. What decree has He pronounced on the king, on his dynasty, on his family, on France, and on Europe? Where and when will the troubles end, and by how many misfortunes must we purchase our tranquillity? Is it to build that He has overthrown, or are our hardships to last forever? Alas! A dark cloud hides the future and no eye can penetrate its shadows.

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Chapter VIII, p. 76
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
1 month 1 week ago
The young generations of the world,...

The young generations of the world, who had in them the freshness of young children, and yet the depth of earnest men, who did not think that they had finished off all things in Heaven and Earth by merely giving them scientific names, but had to gaze direct at them there, with awe and wonder: they felt better what of divinity is in man and Nature; they, without being mad, could worship Nature, and man more than anything else in Nature.

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Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
4 months 3 weeks ago
Not because Socrates said so,... I...

Not because Socrates said so,... I look upon all men as my compatriots.

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Book III, Ch. 9. Of Vanity
Philosophical Maxims
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
5 months 2 weeks ago
That a woman is presented as...

That a woman is presented as a teacher, as a prototype of piety, cannot amaze anyone who knows that piety or godliness is fundamentally womanliness. ... from a woman you learn concern for the one thing needful, from Mary, sister of Lazarus, who sat silent at Christ's feet with her heart's choice: the one thing needful.

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Philosophical Maxims
Epicurus
Epicurus
5 months 1 week ago
It is impossible for someone to...

It is impossible for someone to dispel his fears about the most important matters if he doesn't know the nature of the universe but still gives some credence to myths. So without the study of nature there is no enjoyment of pure pleasure.

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Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
3 months 1 week ago
The abolition of private property has...

The abolition of private property has become not only possible but absolutely necessary. ... The outcome can only be the victory of the proletariat.

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Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
2 months 1 week ago
Our subjective judgment of what seems...

Our subjective judgment of what seems like a good bet is irrelevant to what is actually a good bet.

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Chapter 6 "Origins and Miracles" (p. 162)
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
5 months 3 days ago
In this one man, the whole...

In this one man, the whole Church has been assumed by the Word.

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p.434
Philosophical Maxims
José Ortega y Gasset
José Ortega y Gasset
3 months 1 week ago
The history of the Roman Empire...

The history of the Roman Empire is also the history of the uprising of the Empire of the Masses, who absorb and annul the directing minorities and put themselves in their place. Then, also, is produced the phenomenon of agglomeration, of "the full." For that reason, as Spengler has very well observed, it was necessary, just as in our day, to construct enormous buildings. The epoch of the masses is the epoch of the colossal.

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Chap.II: The Rise Of The Historic Level
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Spencer
Herbert Spencer
3 months 2 weeks ago
Every man may claim the fullest...

Every man may claim the fullest liberty to exercise his faculties compatible with the possession of like liberties by every other man.

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Pt. II, Ch. 4 : Derivation of a First Principle, § 3
Philosophical Maxims
William Whewell
William Whewell
2 weeks 3 days ago
Secondary Qualities are not 'extended' but...

Secondary Qualities are not 'extended' but 'intensive'; their effects are not augmented by addition of parts, but by increased operation of the medium. Hence they are not measured directly, but by 'scales'; not by 'units', but by 'degrees'.

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Philosophical Maxims
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
4 months 2 weeks ago
The goal to be reached is...

The goal to be reached is the mind's insight into what knowing is. Impatience asks for the impossible, wants to reach the goal without the means of getting there. The length of the journey has to be borne with, for every moment is necessary, ... because by nothing less could that all-pervading mind ever manage to become conscious of what itself is - for that reason, the individual mind, in the nature of the case, cannot expect by less toil to grasp what its own substance contains.

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Preface (J. B. Baillie translation), § 29
Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
4 months 2 weeks ago
Apart from autograph hunters, I get......

Apart from autograph hunters, I get... many letters from Hindus, beseeching me to adopt some form of mysticism, from young Americans, asking me where I think the line should be drawn in petting, and from Poles, urging me to admit that while all other nationalism may be bad that of Poland is wholly noble. I get letters from engineers who cannot understand Einstein, and from parsons who think that I cannot understand Genesis, from husbands whose wives have deserted them - not (they say) that that would matter, but the wives have taken the furniture with them, and what in these circumstances should an enlightened male do? ...I get letters (concerning whose genuineness I am suspicious) trying to get me to advocate abortion, and I get letters from young mothers asking my opinion of bottle-feeding.

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Letter to Mr C. L. Aiken, March 19, 1930
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
3 weeks 4 days ago
Ritual society...
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