Skip to main content

Main navigation

☰ ˟
  • Home
  • Articulation
  • Contact
  • Shop
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley
2 months 2 weeks ago
Children are nowhere taught, in any...

Children are nowhere taught, in any systematic way, to distinguish true from false, or meaningful from meaningless, statements. Why is this so? Because their elders, even in the democratic countries, do not want them to be given this kind of education.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Chapter 11 (p. 106)
Philosophical Maxims
Roger Scruton
Roger Scruton
1 week 1 day ago
To teach virtue we must educate...

To teach virtue we must educate the emotions, and this means learning "what to feel" in the various circumstances that prompt them.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
"Knowledge and Feeling" (p. 37)
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
4 weeks 1 day ago
Epochs do not rise from the...

Epochs do not rise from the dead.... [W]hereas you can make a replica of an ancient statue, there is no possible replica of an ancient state of mind. There can be no nearer approximation than that which a masquerade bears to real life. There may be understanding of the past, but there is a difference between the modern and the ancient reactions to the same stimuli.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Ch. 9: "Science and Philosophy", p. 194
Philosophical Maxims
Iris Murdoch
Iris Murdoch
1 month 6 days ago
Only lies and evil come from...

Only lies and evil come from letting people off.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
A Severed Head (1961); 1976, p. 61.
Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
3 months 1 week ago
An observer studying the Solar system...

An observer studying the Solar system dispassionately, and finding himself capable of bringing the four giant planets to his notice, could reasonably say that the Solar system consisted of one star, four planets, and some traces of debris.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt
2 months 2 weeks ago
Real power begins where secrecy begins....

Real power begins where secrecy begins.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Part 3, Ch. 12, § 1
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
2 months 2 weeks ago
The Tories in England long imagined...

The Tories in England long imagined that they were enthusiastic about monarchy, the church, and the beauties of the old English Constitution, until the day of danger wrung from them the confession that they are enthusiastic only about ground rent.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
1 month 3 weeks ago
It is not proper either to...

It is not proper either to have a blunt sword or to use freedom of speech ineffectually. Neither is the sun to be taken from the world, nor freedom of speech from erudition.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
As quoted in the translation of Thomas Taylor
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
2 months 2 weeks ago
Consider what you have in the...

Consider what you have in the smallest chosen library. A company of the wisest and wittiest men that could be picked out of all civil countries, in a thousand years, have set in best order the results of their learning and wisdom. The men themselves were hid and inaccessible, solitary, impatient of interruption, fenced by etiquette; but the thought which they did not uncover to their bosom friend is here written out in transparent words to us, the strangers of another age.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
2 months 2 weeks ago
The finest workers in stone are...

The finest workers in stone are not copper or steel tools, but the gentle touches of air and water working at their leisure with a liberal allowance of time.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
2 months 3 weeks ago
Justice is a temporary thing that...

Justice is a temporary thing that must at last come to an end; but the conscience is eternal and will never die.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
On Marriage
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
1 month 1 week ago
Jesus said to His disciples, "Compare...

Jesus said to His disciples, "Compare me to someone and tell Me whom I am like." Simon Peter said to Him, "You are like a righteous angel." Matthew said to Him, "You are like a wise philosopher." Thomas said to Him, "Master, my mouth is wholly incapable of saying whom You are like." Jesus said, "I am not your master. Because you have drunk, you have become intoxicated by the bubbling spring which I have measured out." And He took him and withdrew and told him three things. When Thomas returned to his companions, they asked him, "What did Jesus say to you?" Thomas said to them, "If I tell you one of the things which he told me, you will pick up stones and throw them at me; a fire will come out of the stones and burn you up."

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
1 month 3 weeks ago
Educate the children and it won't...

Educate the children and it won't be necessary to punish the men.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
As quoted in Geary's Guide to the World's Great Aphorists‎ (2007) by James Geary
Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
1 month 2 weeks ago
On condition that you protect my...

On condition that you protect my rights, I will protect your rights. How, then, does some party obtain the right to claim the protection of the other? Evidently, by actually protecting the rights of the other. But if this is so, no party will ever obtain a strictly legal claim to the protection of the other.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
P. 220
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
1 month 1 week ago
We are all secularised anarchists today.

We are all secularised anarchists today.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
1 month 2 weeks ago
Of all our infirmities...
0
⚖0
Main Content / General
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
2 weeks ago
The civilized pagan recognizes life not...

The civilized pagan recognizes life not in himself alone, but in societies of men-in the tribe, the clan, the family, the kingdom -and sacrifices his personal good for these societies. The motive power of his life is glory. His religion consists in the exaltation of the glory of those who are allied to him-the founders of his family, his ancestors, his rulers-and in worshiping gods who are exclusively protectors of his clan, his family, his nation, his government.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Chapter IV, Christianity Misunderstood by Men of Science
Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
2 months 3 weeks ago
It's a thorny undertaking...

It is a thorny undertaking, and more so than it seems, to follow a movement so wandering as that of our mind, to penetrate the opaque depths of its innermost folds, to pick out and immobilize the innumerable flutterings that agitate it.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Ch. 6. Of Preparation, tr. E. J. Trechmann, 1927
Philosophical Maxims
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce
1 month 1 week ago
The first character of a general...

The first character of a general idea so resulting is that it is living feeling. A continuum of this feeling, infinitesimal in duration, but still embracing innumerable parts, and also, though infinitesimal, entirely unlimited, is immediately present. And in its absence of boundedness a vague possibility of more than is present is directly felt.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt
2 months 2 weeks ago
In a head-on clash between violence...

In a head-on clash between violence and power, the outcome is hardly in doubt. Nowhere is the self-defeating factor in the victory of violence over power more evident than in the use of terror to maintain domination, about whose weird successes and eventual failures we know perhaps more than any generation before us. Violence can destroy power; it is utterly incapable of creating it.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
On Violence
Philosophical Maxims
Gottfried Leibniz
Gottfried Leibniz
2 months 2 weeks ago
Only geometry can hand us….

Only geometry can hand us the thread [which will lead us through] the labyrinth of the continuum's composition, the maximum and the minimum, the infinitesimal and the infinite; and no one will arrive at a truly solid metaphysic except he who has passed through this [labyrinth].

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Spring 1676
Philosophical Maxims
Porphyry
Porphyry
1 month 4 weeks ago
The Pythagoreans made kindness to beasts...

The Pythagoreans made kindness to beasts a training in humanity and pity.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
3, 20, 7
Philosophical Maxims
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
2 months 3 weeks ago
Some books are to be tasted,...

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Of Studies
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
1 month 2 weeks ago
It is a general popular error...

It is a general popular error to suppose the loudest complainers for the publick to be the most anxious for its welfare.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Observations on a Late Publication on the Present State of the Nation
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
4 weeks 1 day ago
With the sense of sight, the...

With the sense of sight, the idea communicates the emotion, whereas, with sound, the emotion communicates the idea, which is more direct and therefore more powerful.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Ch. 29, June 10, 1943.
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
2 months 2 weeks ago
As a beast of toil an...

As a beast of toil an ox is fixed capital. If he is eaten, he no longer functions as an instrument of labour, nor as fixed capital either.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Vol. II, Ch. VIII, p. 163.
Philosophical Maxims
Saul Bellow
Saul Bellow
1 week 1 day ago
All a writer has to do...

All a writer has to do to get a woman is to say he's a writer. It's an aphrodisiac.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
As quoted in "Dailer's Choice" by Harriet Van Horne, in New York Magazine Vol. 10, No. 13 (28 March 1977), p. 80
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert A. Simon
Herbert A. Simon
3 weeks 2 days ago
Organizations and institutions permit stable expectations...

Organizations and institutions permit stable expectations to be formed by each member of the group as to the behavior of the other members under specified conditions.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
p. 100.
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
1 month 2 weeks ago
Prejudice is of ready application in...

Prejudice is of ready application in the emergency; it previously engages the mind in a steady course of wisdom and virtue and does not leave the man hesitating in the moment of decision sceptical, puzzled, and unresolved. Prejudice renders a man's virtue his habit, and not a series of unconnected acts. Through just prejudice, his duty becomes a part of his nature.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
1 month 2 weeks ago
Granted I am a babbler, a...

Granted I am a babbler, a harmless vexatious babbler, like all of us. But what is to be done if the direct and sole vocation of every intelligent man is babble, that is, the intentional pouring of water through a sieve?

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Part 1, Chapter 5
Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
2 months 2 weeks ago
To be without some of the...

To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Erich Fromm
Erich Fromm
3 weeks 6 days ago
The application of psychoanalysis to sociology...

The application of psychoanalysis to sociology must definitely guard against the mistake of wanting to give psychoanalytic answers where economic, technical, or political facts provide the real and sufficient explanation of sociological questions. On the other hand, the psychoanalyst must emphasize that the subject of sociology, society, in reality consists of individuals, and that it is these human beings, rather than abstract society as such, whose actions, thoughts, and feelings are the object of sociological research.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
"Psychoanalyse und Soziologie" (1929); published as "Psychoanalysis and Sociology" as translated by Mark Ritter, in Critical Theory and Society : A Reader (1989) edited by S. E. Bronner and D. M. Kellner
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
2 months 2 weeks ago
I live in the Managerial Age,...

I live in the Managerial Age, in a world of "Admin." The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voice. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the offices of a thoroughly nasty business concern.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
1961 Preface
Philosophical Maxims
Robert Owen
Robert Owen
1 week 1 day ago
My life was not useless; I...

My life was not useless; I gave important truths to the world, and it was only for want of understanding that they were disregarded. I have been ahead of my time.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Deathbed statement (November 1858), in response to a church minister who asked if he regretted wasting his life on fruitless projects; as quoted in Harold Hill : A People's History
Philosophical Maxims
Willard van Orman Quine
Willard van Orman Quine
1 month ago
How are we to adjudicate among...

How are we to adjudicate among rival ontologies? Certainly the answer is not provided by the semantical formula "To be is to be the value of a variable"; this formula serves rather, conversely, in testing the conformity of a given remark or doctrine to a prior ontological standard.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
"On What There Is"
Philosophical Maxims
Robert Owen
Robert Owen
1 week 1 day ago
The will of man has no...

The will of man has no power whatever over his opinions; he must, and ever did, and ever will, believe what has been, is, or may be impressed on his mind by his predecessors, and the circumstances which surround him.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
2 months 2 weeks ago
It is our interest and our...

It is our interest and our task to make the revolution permanent until all the more or less propertied classes have been driven from their ruling positions, until the proletariat has conquered state power and until the association of the proletarians has progressed sufficiently far - not only in one country but in all the leading countries of the world - that competition between the proletarians of these countries ceases and at least the decisive forces of production are concentrated in the hands of the workers. Our concern cannot simply be to modify private property, but to abolish it, not to hush up class antagonisms but to abolish classes, not to improve the existing society but to found a new one.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Address of the Central Committee to the Communist League in London, March 1850
Philosophical Maxims
Novalis
Novalis
1 month 1 week ago
Everywhere we seek the Absolute, and...

Everywhere we seek the Absolute, and always we find only things.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Fragment No. 1; Variant: We seek the absolute everywhere and only ever find things.
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
4 weeks 1 day ago
We do not require elaborate training...

We do not require elaborate training merely in order to refrain from embarking upon intricate trains of inference. Such abstinence is only too easy.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Symbolism: Its Meaning and Effect (1927).
Philosophical Maxims
Auguste Comte
Auguste Comte
1 month 2 weeks ago
There are three successive states of...

There are three successive states of morality answering to the three principal stages of human life; the personal, the domestic, and the social stage.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
p. 104
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
1 month 1 week ago
If you have money, don't lend...

If you have money, don't lend it at interest. Rather, give it to someone from whom you won't get it back.

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Ptahhotep
Ptahhotep
2 months 5 days ago
Truth is great and its effectiveness...

Truth is great and its effectiveness endures. 

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Maxim no. 5. Cf. 1 Esdras 4:41
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
2 months 2 weeks ago
The tool, as we have seen,...

The tool, as we have seen, is not exterminated by the machine.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Vol. I, Ch. 15, Section 2, pg. 422.
Philosophical Maxims
George Santayana
George Santayana
1 month 1 week ago
The pint would call the quart...

The pint would call the quart a dualist, if you tried to pour the quart into him.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
p. 60
Philosophical Maxims
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
2 weeks ago
In the spiritual realm nothing is...

In the spiritual realm nothing is indifferent: what is not useful is harmful.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
VII
Philosophical Maxims
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley
2 months 2 weeks ago
All war propaganda consists, in the...

All war propaganda consists, in the last resort, in substituting diabolical abstractions for human beings. Similarly, those who defend war have invented a pleasant sounding vocabulary of abstractions in which to describe the process of mass murder.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
"Pacifism and Philosophy", 1936
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
1 month 2 weeks ago
In doing good, we are generally...

In doing good, we are generally cold, and languid, and sluggish; and of all things afraid of being too much in the right. But the works of malice and injustice are quite in another style. They are finished with a bold, masterly hand; touched as they are with the spirit of those vehement passions that call forth all our energies, whenever we oppress and persecute.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Speech at Bristol Previous to the Election (6 September 1780), quoted in The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II (1855), pp. 158-159
Philosophical Maxims
Publilius Syrus
Publilius Syrus
1 week 5 days ago
He doubly benefits…

He doubly benefits the needy who gives quickly. Maxim 6

0
⚖0
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
1 month 1 week ago
Now I am about to take...

Now I am about to take my last voyage, a great leap in the dark.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Last words
Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
2 months 3 weeks ago
Age imprints more wrinkles in the...

Age imprints more wrinkles in the mind than it does on the face.

0
⚖0
▼ Source
source
Book III, Ch. 2
Philosophical Maxims
  • Load More

User login

  • Create new account
  • Reset your password

Social

☰ ˟
  • Main Feed
  • Philosophical Maxims

Civic

☰ ˟
  • Propositions
  • Issue / Solution

Who's new

  • Søren Kierkegaard
  • Jesus
  • Friedrich Nietzsche
  • VeXed
  • Slavoj Žižek

Who's online

There are currently 0 users online.

CivilSimian.com created by AxiomaticPanic, CivilSimian, Kalokagathia