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Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
1 month 1 week ago
Every candid eye, I think, will...

Every candid eye, I think, will read the Koran far otherwise than so. It is the confused ferment of a great rude human soul; rude, untutored, that cannot even read; but fervent, earnest, struggling vehemently to utter itself in words. With a kind of breathless intensity he strives to utter himself; the thoughts crowd on him pell-mell: for very multitude of things to say, he can get nothing said. The meaning that is in him shapes itself into no form of composition, is stated in no sequence, method, or coherence;-they are not shaped at all, these thoughts of his; flung out unshaped, as they struggle and tumble there, in their chaotic inarticulate state.

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Philosophical Maxims
Nikos Kazantzakis
Nikos Kazantzakis
2 weeks 6 days ago
Every village has its simpleton, and...

Every village has its simpleton, and if one does not exist they invent one to pass the time.

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Ch. 8
Philosophical Maxims
Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman
3 months 2 days ago
The child shows its individual tendencies...

The child shows its individual tendencies in its plays, in its questions, in its association with people and things. But it has to struggle with everlasting external interference in its world of thought and emotion. It must not express itself in harmony with its nature, with its growing personality. It must become a thing, an object. Its questions are met with narrow, conventional, ridiculous replies, mostly based on falsehoods; and, when, with large, wondering, innocent eyes, it wishes to behold the wonders of the world, those about it quickly lock the windows and doors, and keep the delicate human plant in a hothouse atmosphere, where it can neither breathe nor grow freely.

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Philosophical Maxims
Miguel de Unamuno
Miguel de Unamuno
3 months 6 days ago
And thus the soul pities God...

And thus the soul pities God and feels itself pitied by him; loves Him and feels loved by Him, sheltering its misery in the bosom of the eternal and infinite misery, which, in eternalizing itself and infinitizing itself, is the supreme happiness itself.

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Philosophical Maxims
René Descartes
René Descartes
4 months 3 weeks ago
I suppose the body to be...

I suppose the body to be nothing but a statue or machine made of earth, which God forms with the explicit intention of making it as much as possible like us.

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Descartes, René (1662). Le Homme (The Treatise on Man), XI:119, CSM I:99 in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "Descartes and the Pineal Gland - 2.1 "The Treatise of Man".
Philosophical Maxims
Walter Kaufmann
Walter Kaufmann
1 month 2 weeks ago
Heresy is a set of opinions...

Heresy is a set of opinions "at variance with established or generally received principles." In this sense, heresy is the price of all originality and innovation.

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Philosophical Maxims
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
2 months 2 days ago
I have learned by some experience,...

I have learned by some experience, by many examples, and by the writings of countless others before me, also occupied in the search, that certain environments, certain modes of life, certain rules of conduct are more conducive to inner and outer harmony than others. There are, in fact, certain roads that one may follow. Simplification of life is one of them.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
4 months 2 weeks ago
I have seen manners that make...

I have seen manners that make a similar impression with personal beauty, that give the like exhilaration and refine us like that; and in memorable experiences they are suddenly better than beauty, and make that superfluous and ugly. But they must be marked by fine perception, the acquaintance with real beauty. They must always show control; you shall not be facile, apologetic, or leaky, but king over your word; and every gesture and action shall indicate power at rest. They must be inspired by the good heart. There is no beautifier of complexion, or form, or behavior, like the wish to scatter joy, and not pain, around us.

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p. 167
Philosophical Maxims
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley
4 months 2 weeks ago
In regard to man's final end,...

In regard to man's final end, all the higher religions are in complete agreement. The purpose of human life is the discovery of Truth, the unitive knowledge of the Godhead. The degree to which this unitive knowledge is achieved here on earth determines the degree to which it will be enjoyed in the posthumous state. Contemplation of truth is the end, action the means.

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Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
4 months 3 weeks ago
Physicians have this advantage: the sun...

Physicians have this advantage: the sun lights their success and the earth covers their failures.

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Ch. 37
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
1 month 4 days ago
Our feeling about…

Our feeling about every obligation depends in each case upon the spirit in which the benefit is conferred; we weigh not the bulk of the gift, but the quality of the good-will which prompted it.

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Line 6
Philosophical Maxims
John Rawls
John Rawls
4 months 2 weeks ago
I have tried to set forth...

I have tried to set forth a theory that enables us to understand and to assess these feelings about the primacy of justice. Justice as fairness is the outcome: it articulates these opinions and supports their general tendency.

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Chapter IX, Section 87, p. 586
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
4 months 2 weeks ago
Leave this hypocritical prating about the...

Leave this hypocritical prating about the masses. Masses are rude, lame, unmade, pernicious in their demands and influence, and need not to be flattered, but to be schooled. I wish not to concede anything to them, but to tame, drill, divide, and break them up, and draw individuals out of them.

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Considerations by the Way
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
3 months 1 week ago
Did ye never read in the...

Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes? Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.

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21:27-42 and 44 (KJV)
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
3 months 3 weeks ago
The principle of equality does not...

The principle of equality does not destroy the imagination, but lowers its flight to the level of the earth.

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Book Three, Chapter XI.
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
2 weeks 5 days ago
Never spend your money before you...

Never spend your money before you have it.

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Philosophical Maxims
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
5 months 2 weeks ago
When God chooses to let himself...

When God chooses to let himself be born in lowliness, when he who holds all possibilities in his hand takes upon himself the form of a lowly servant, when he goes about defenseless and lets people do with him what they will, he surely must know well enough what he is doing and why he wills it; but for all that it is he who has people in his power and not they who have power over him-so history ought not play Mr. Malapert by this wanting to make manifest who he was.

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Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
4 months 3 weeks ago
An armed insurrection ... would hinder...

An armed insurrection ... would hinder and bring into disrepute this spiritual insurrection.

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p. 68
Philosophical Maxims
Denis Diderot
Denis Diderot
3 months 3 weeks ago
Go further, and require each of...

Go further, and require each of them to make a contribution: you will see how many things are still missing, and you will be obliged to get the assistance of a large number of men who belong to different classes, priceless men, but to whom the gates of the academies are nonetheless closed because of their social station. All the members of these learned societies are more than is needed for a single object of human science; all the societies together are not sufficient for a science of man in general.

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Article on Encyclopedia
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
2 months 4 weeks ago
To receive applause for works which...

To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfecting of our spirit. It usually means that thereafter we stand still.

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K 42
Philosophical Maxims
Denis Diderot
Denis Diderot
3 months 3 weeks ago
All abstract sciences are nothing but...

All abstract sciences are nothing but the study of relations between signs.

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Dr. Théophile de Bordeu, in "Conversation Between D'Alembert and Diderot"
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
5 months 1 week ago
The superior man accords with the...

The superior man accords with the course of the Mean. Though he may be all unknown, unregarded by the world, he feels no regret. It is only the sage who is able for this.

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Philosophical Maxims
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean Jacques Rousseau
4 months 3 weeks ago
Hatred, as well as love, renders...

Hatred, as well as love, renders its votaries credulous.

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V
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
5 months 1 week ago
The superior man thinks of...

The superior man thinks of virtue; the small man thinks of comfort. The superior man thinks of the sanctions of law; the small man thinks of favors which he may receive.

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Philosophical Maxims
Francis Fukuyama
Francis Fukuyama
1 month 2 weeks ago
The other big issue is an...

The other big issue is an emotional one. We tend to feel the greatest bonds of solidarity with people that are close to us. There are very few true citizens of the world. We're citizens of individual countries and we really feel the closest bonds to people that live within our nation, and therefore... the nation becomes a kind of social glue. But if you're going to make a national identity compatible with liberalism, it has to be the right kind of national identity. It has to be one that is open to all of the citizens that actually live in the territory of the nation. It can't exclude certain groups by race, by ethnicity, by religious belief and the like, and therefore it needs to be an open identity that is based on essentially liberal ideas.

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24:46:00
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
2 months 4 weeks ago
A book is a mirror…

A book is a mirror: if an ape looks into it an apostle is hardly likely to look out. We have no words for speaking of wisdom to the stupid. He who understands the wise is wise already.

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E 49
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
1 month 1 week ago
No sadder proof can be given...

No sadder proof can be given by a man of his own littleness than disbelief in great men.

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Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
2 months 1 week ago
I don't know...
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Main Content / General
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer
4 months 3 weeks ago
Every man takes the limits of...

Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.

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"Psychological Observations"
Philosophical Maxims
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer
4 months 3 weeks ago
Opinion is like a pendulum and...

Opinion is like a pendulum and obeys the same law. If it goes past the centre of gravity on one side, it must go a like distance on the other; and it is only after a certain time that it finds the true point at which it can remain at rest.

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Vol. 2 "Further Psychological Observations" as translated in Essays and Aphorisms (1970), as translated by R. J. Hollingdale
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
4 months 2 weeks ago
"They have an engine called the...

"They have an engine called the Press whereby the people are deceived."

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Ch. 13 : They Have Pulled Down Deep Heaven on Their Heads
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean Jacques Rousseau
4 months 3 weeks ago
He thinks like a philosopher, but...

He thinks like a philosopher, but governs like a king.

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Of Frederick the Great XII
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
3 months 3 weeks ago
The President ... may err ......

The President ... may err ... Congress may decide amiss ... But if the Supreme Court is ever composed of imprudent or bad men, the Union may be plunged into anarchy or civil war.

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Chapter XVIII.
Philosophical Maxims
Horace
Horace
4 months 1 week ago
He wins every hand….

He wins every hand who mingles profit with pleasure, by delighting and instructing the reader at the same time.

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Line 343
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
4 months 2 weeks ago
My argument against God was that...

My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?

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Book II, Chapter 1, "The Rival Conceptions of God"
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
4 months 2 weeks ago
Philosophical problems can be compared to...

Philosophical problems can be compared to locks on safes, which can be opened by dialing a certain word or number, so that no force can open the door until just this word has been hit upon, and once it is hit upon any child can open it.

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Ch. 9 : Philosophy, p. 175
Philosophical Maxims
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
4 months 4 weeks ago
Cosmus, Duke of Florence, was wont...

Cosmus, Duke of Florence, was wont to say of perfidious friends, that "We read that we ought to forgive our enemies; but we do not read that we ought to forgive our friends."

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No. 206
Philosophical Maxims
David Hume
David Hume
4 months 3 weeks ago
As to the Approbation or Esteem...

As to the Approbation or Esteem of those Blockheads who call themselves the Public, & whom a Bookseller, a Lord, a Priest, or a Party can guide, I do most heartily despise it.

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Letter 138, To Gilbert Elliot of Minto; August 9, 1757
Philosophical Maxims
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill
4 months 2 weeks ago
The possession and the exercise of...

The possession and the exercise of political, and among others of electoral, rights, is one of the chief instruments both of moral and of intellectual training for the popular mind; and all governments must be regarded as extremely imperfect, until every one who is required to obey the laws, has a voice, or the prospect of a voice, in their enactment and administration.

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Thoughts on Parliamentary Reform (1859), p. 22
Philosophical Maxims
Epictetus
Epictetus
5 months 4 days ago
Does anyone bathe in a mighty...

Does anyone bathe in a mighty little time? Don't say that he does it ill, but in a mighty little time. Does anyone drink a great quantity of wine? Don't say that he does ill, but that he drinks a great quantity. For, unless you perfectly understand the principle from which anyone acts, how should you know if he acts ill? Thus you will not run the hazard of assenting to any appearances but such as you fully comprehend.

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(45).
Philosophical Maxims
Nikos Kazantzakis
Nikos Kazantzakis
2 weeks 6 days ago
Do you believe in dreams, Uncle...

Do you believe in dreams, Uncle Simeon? I do; I believe in nothing else. One night I dreamed that invisible enemies had me tied to a dead cypress. Long red arrows were sticking into me from my head to my feet, and the blood was flowing. On my head they had placed a crown of thorns, and intertwined with the thorns were fiery letters which said: "Saint Blasphemer." I am Saint Blasphemer, Rabbi Simeon. So you'd better not ask me anything else, or I'll start my blasphemies.

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Ch. 10
Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
2 months 2 weeks ago
When we invent a new technology,...

When we invent a new technology, we become cannibals. We eat ourselves alive since these technologies are merely extensions of ourselves. The new environment shaped by electric technology is a cannibalistic one that eats people. To survive one must study the habits of cannibals.

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(p. 261)
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Nagel
Thomas Nagel
4 months 1 week ago
It is often remarked that nothing...

It is often remarked that nothing we do now will matter in a million years. But if that is true, then by the same token, nothing that will be the case in a million years matters now.

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"The Absurd" (1971), p. 11.
Philosophical Maxims
Mikhail Bakunin
Mikhail Bakunin
3 months 2 weeks ago
Nothing, in fact, is as universal...

Nothing, in fact, is as universal or as ancient as the iniquitous and absurd; truth and justice, on the contrary, are the least universal, the youngest features in the development of human society.

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Philosophical Maxims
John Rawls
John Rawls
4 months 2 weeks ago
The circumstances of justice may be...

The circumstances of justice may be described as the normal conditions under which human cooperation is both possible and necessary.

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Chapter III, Section 22, pg. 126
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
4 months 2 weeks ago
All the great speakers were bad...

All the great speakers were bad speakers at first.

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Power
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
1 week 2 days ago
The only progress I can...

The only progress I can see is progress in the organization. The ordinary human being does not live long enough to draw any substantial benefit from his own experience. And no one, it seems, can benefit by the experiences of others. Being both a father and teacher, I know we can teach our children nothing. We can transmit to them neither our knowledge of life nor of mathematics. Each must learn its lesson anew.

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Philosophical Maxims
Antisthenes
Antisthenes
4 months 1 week ago
The ability to hold….

When he was asked what advantage had accrued to him from philosophy, his answer was, "The ability to hold converse with myself."

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§ 4
Philosophical Maxims
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson
2 months 2 weeks ago
A man, Mr. Scrymgeour, may fall...

A man, Mr. Scrymgeour, may fall into a thousand perplexities, but if his heart be upright and his intelligence unclouded, he will issue from them all without dishonour.

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The Rajah's Diamond, Story of the House with the Green Blinds.
Philosophical Maxims
Paracelsus
Paracelsus
1 month 4 days ago
Consider that we shouldn't call our...

Consider that we shouldn't call our brother a fool, since we don't know ourselves what we are.

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Philosophical Maxims
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