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Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
6 months 1 week ago
It is not enough to prove...
It is not enough to prove something, one has also to seduce or elevate people to it. That is why the man of knowledge should learn how to speak his wisdom: and often in such a way that it sounds like folly!
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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
5 months 1 week ago
I went to Salt Lake City...

I went to Salt Lake City and the Mormons tried to convert me, but when I found they forbade tea and tobacco I thought it was no religion for me.

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Letter to C. P. Sanger, 23 December, 1929
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
3 months 3 weeks ago
No reason can be given for...

No reason can be given for the nature of God, because that nature is the ground of all rationality.

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Ch. 11: "God", p. 250
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
4 weeks ago
If A is success in...

If A is success in life, then A = x + y + z. Work is x, play is y and z is keeping your mouth shut.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
4 months 1 week ago
Not to be content with Life...

Not to be content with Life is the unsatisfactory state of those which destroy themselves; who being afraid to live, run blindly upon their own Death, which no Man fears by Experience.

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Philosophical Maxims
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft
4 months 5 days ago
It appears to me impossible that...

It appears to me impossible that I should cease to exist, or that this active, restless spirit, equally alive to joy and sorrow, should only be organised dust - ready to fly abroad the moment the spring snaps, or the spark goes out which kept it together. Surely something resides in this heart that is not perishable, and life is more than a dream.

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Philosophical Maxims
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius
1 month 5 days ago
Remember that what pulls the strings...

Remember that what pulls the strings is the force hidden within; there lies the power to persuade, there the life,-there, if one must speak out, the real man.

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X, 38
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
5 months 1 week ago
For the moment, the jazz is...

For the moment, the jazz is playing; there is no melody, just notes, a myriad of tiny tremors. The notes know no rest, an inflexible order gives birth to them then destroys them, without ever leaving them the chance to recuperate and exist for themselves.... I would like to hold them back, but I know that, if I succeeded in stopping one, there would only remain in my hand a corrupt and languishing sound. I must accept their death; I must even want that death: I know of few more bitter or intense impressions.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Nagel
Thomas Nagel
4 months 4 weeks ago
I do not believe that the...

I do not believe that the source of value is unitary - displaying apparent multiplicity only in its application to the world. I believe that value has fundamentally different kinds of sources, and that they are reflected in the classification of values into types. Not all values represent the pursuit of some single good in a variety of settings.

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"The Fragmentation of Value" (1977), pp. 131-132.
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Spencer
Herbert Spencer
4 months 1 week ago
Those who cavalierly reject the Theory...

Those who cavalierly reject the Theory of Evolution, as not adequately supported by facts, seem quite to forget that their own theory is supported by no facts at all. Like the majority of men who are born to a given belief, they demand the most rigorous proof of any adverse belief, but assume that their own needs none.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
1 month 1 week ago
I had rather be shut up...

I had rather be shut up in a very modest cottage with my books, my family and a few old friends, dining on simple bacon, and letting the world roll on as it liked, than to occupy the most splendid post, which any human power can give.

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Letter to Alexander Donald
Philosophical Maxims
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
5 months 2 weeks ago
He that defers his charity 'till...

He that defers his charity 'till he is dead, is (if a man weighs it rightly) rather liberal of another man's, than of his own.

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Ornamenta Rationalia, [§55]
Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
4 months 1 week ago
What terrible tragedies realism inflicts on...

What terrible tragedies realism inflicts on people.'

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Philosophical Maxims
Gaston Bachelard
Gaston Bachelard
4 months ago
Even a minor event in the...

Even a minor event in the life of a child is an event of that child's world and thus a world event.

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The Phoenix, a Linguistic Phenomenon, ch. 1
Philosophical Maxims
David Hume
David Hume
5 months 1 week ago
We speak not strictly and philosophically...

We speak not strictly and philosophically when we talk of the combat of passion and of reason. Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.

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Part 3, Section 3
Philosophical Maxims
Avicenna
Avicenna
5 months 3 weeks ago
The world is divided into men...

The world is divided into men who have wit and no religion and men who have religion and no wit.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
1 month 1 week ago
Of all the systems of morality,...

Of all the systems of morality, ancient or modern, which have come under my observation, none appear to me so pure as that of Jesus. He who follows this steadily need not, I think, be uneasy, although he cannot comprehend the subtleties and mysteries erected on his doctrines by those who, calling themselves his special followers and favorites, would make him come into the world to lay snares for all understandings but theirs. These metaphysical heads, usurping the judgment seat of God, denounce as his enemies all who cannot perceive the Geometrical logic of Euclid in the demonstrations of St. Athanasius, that three are one, and one is three; and yet that the one is not three nor the three one.

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Letter to William Canby
Philosophical Maxims
Adam Smith
Adam Smith
5 months 1 week ago
By the removal of the unnecessary...

By the removal of the unnecessary mouths, and by extracting from the farmer the full value of the farm, a greater surplus, or what is the same thing, the price of a greater surplus, was obtained for the proprietor...

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Chapter IV, p. 450 (On Highland Clearances).
Philosophical Maxims
Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal
5 months 2 weeks ago
It is necessary to have regard...

It is necessary to have regard to the person whom we wish to persuade, of whom we must know the mind and the heart, what principles he acknowledges, what things he loves; and then observe in the thing in question what affinity it has with the acknowledged principles, or with the objects so delightful by the pleasure which they give him.

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Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
4 months 1 week ago
To the Deity must be left...

To the Deity must be left the task of infinite perfection, while to us poor, weak, incapable mortals, there was no rule of conduct so safe as experience.

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Speech in the House of Commons (6 May 1791), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England, From the Earliest Period to the Year 1803, Vol. XXIX (1817), column 388
Philosophical Maxims
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida
5 months 2 days ago
Whatever the poverty of our knowledge...

Whatever the poverty of our knowledge in this respect, it is certain that the question of the sign is itself more or less, or in any event something other, than a sign of the times. To dream of reducing it to a sign of the times is to dream of violence.

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Force and Signification
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
5 months 1 week ago
The stars awaken a certain reverence,...

The stars awaken a certain reverence, because though always present, they are inaccessible; but all natural objects make a kindred impression, when the mind is open to their influence. Nature never wears a mean appearance. Neither does the wisest man extort her secret, and lose his curiosity by finding out all her perfection. Nature never became a toy to a wise spirit. The flowers, the animals, the mountains, reflected the wisdom of his best hour, as much as they had delighted the simplicity of his childhood.

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Nature
Philosophical Maxims
Alan Watts
Alan Watts
1 month 2 weeks ago
It is especially important for Westerners...

It is especially important for Westerners to understand that high lamas, Zen masters, and Hindu gurus in the discipline of yoga are human beings, not supermen. We must not put them, as we have put Jesus Christ, on pedestals of reverence so high that we automatically exclude ourselves from their states of consciousness.

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Foreward to The Secret Oral Teachings in the Tibetan Buddhist Sects (1964)], by Alexandra David Neel
Philosophical Maxims
Cornel West
Cornel West
5 months 2 days ago
The most taboo issue on U.S....

The most taboo issue on U.S. campuses these days, in many instances, has to do with the vicious Israeli occupation of precious Palestinians. It's very difficult to have a respectful, robust conversation about that. And I am unequivocal in my solidarity with Palestinian brothers and sisters... I'm not in any way going to stop talking about the Palestinian plight and predicament.

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Speaking in Too Radical for Harvard? Cornel West on Failed Fight for Tenure, Biden's First 50 Days & More, Democracy Now!
Philosophical Maxims
Wendell Berry
Wendell Berry
1 month 1 week ago
Violence breeds violence. Acts of violence...

Violence breeds violence. Acts of violence committed in "justice" or in affirmation of "rights" or in defense of "peace" do not end violence. They prepare and justify its continuation.

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Philosophical Maxims
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
5 months 3 days ago
It is said that "being" is...

It is said that "being" is the most universal and the emptiest concept. As such it resists every attempt at definition. Nor does this most universal and thus indefinable concept need any definition. Everybody uses it constantly and also already understands what is meant by it.

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Introduction: The Exposition of the Question of the Meaning of Being (Stambaugh translation)
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
5 months 3 days ago
Those in the crossing must in...

Those in the crossing must in the end know what is mistaken by all urging for intelligibility: that every thinking of being, all philosophy, can never be confirmed by "facts," ie, by beings. Making itself intelligible is suicide for philosophy. Those who idolize "facts" never notice that their idols only shine in a borrowed light. They are also meant not to notice this; for thereupon they would have to be at a loss and therefore useless. But idolizers and idols are used wherever gods are in flight and so announce their nearness.

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Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning) [Beitrage Zur Philosophie (Vom Ereignis)], notes of 1936-1938, as translated by Parvis Emad and Kenneth Maly
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
5 months 2 weeks ago
Faith is born and preserved in...

Faith is born and preserved in us by preaching why Christ came, what he brought and gave to us, and the benefits we obtain when we receive him. This happens when Christian liberty - which he gives to us - is rightly taught and we are told in what way as Christians we are all kings and priests and therefore lords of all.

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p. 70
Philosophical Maxims
Emmanuel Levinas
Emmanuel Levinas
4 months 4 days ago
To be or not to be...

To be or not to be is not the question where transcendence is concerned. The statement of being's other, of the otherwise than being, claims to state a difference over and beyond that which separates being from nothingness - the very difference of the beyond, the difference of transcendence.

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Otherwise than Being, or Beyond Essence (1974) Chapter I, Section 1.
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
5 months 3 days ago
"Fare well!" "A whole world of...

"Fare well!" "A whole world of pain is contained in these words." How can it be contained in them? - It is bound up in them. The words are like an acorn from which an oak tree can grow.

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p. 52e
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Henry Huxley
Thomas Henry Huxley
2 months 3 weeks ago
It cannot be doubted, I think,...

It cannot be doubted, I think, that Mr. Darwin has satisfactorily proved that what he terms selection, or selective modification, must occur, and does occur, in nature; and he has also proved to superfluity that such selection is competent to produce forms as distinct, structurally, as some genera even are. If the animated world presented us with none but structural differences, I should have no hesitation in saying that Mr. Darwin has demonstrated the existence of a true physical cause, amply competent to account for the origin of living species, and of man among the rest.

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Ch.2, p. 126
Philosophical Maxims
Roger Scruton
Roger Scruton
3 months 1 day ago
The future of mankind, for the...

The future of mankind, for the socialist, is simple: pull down the existing order and allow the future to emerge.

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"Eliot and Conservatism" (p. 208)
Philosophical Maxims
Thales of Miletus
Thales of Miletus
4 months 2 weeks ago
Hope is the only good that...

Hope is the only good that is common to all men; those who have nothing else possess hope still.

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A Dictionary of Thoughts (1908) by Tryon Edwards, p. 234
Philosophical Maxims
Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman
3 months 3 weeks ago
It is true that parents today...

It is true that parents today are learning to enhance the physical qualities of their children. But their minds and characters they cannot mould. The antiquated system of education and our perverse social influences unfortunately do that. In view of the numerous misfit and marred children these institutions have created, I am quite content not to have contributed any of my own.

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Philosophical Maxims
Karl Popper
Karl Popper
5 months 1 week ago
You can choose whatever name you...

You can choose whatever name you like for the two types of government. I personally call the type of government which can be removed without violence "democracy", and the other "tyranny".

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As quoted in Freedom: A New Analysis (1954) by Maurice William Cranston, p. 112
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
1 month 1 week ago
But it will be asked, are...

But it will be asked, are we to have no banks? Are merchants and others to be deprived of the resource of short accommodations, found so convenient? I answer, let us have banks; but let them be such as are alone to be found in any country on earth, except Great Britain. There is not a bank of discount on the continent of Europe (at least there was not one when I was there) which offers anything but cash in exchange for discounted bills.

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ME 13:277
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
1 month 4 weeks ago
O reader, to what shifts is...

O reader, to what shifts is poor Society reduced, struggling to give still some account of herself, in epochs when Cash Payment has become the sole nexus of man to men!

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Ch. 6, Laissez-Faire.
Philosophical Maxims
Publilius Syrus
Publilius Syrus
3 months 5 days ago
He dies twice who perishes by...

He dies twice who perishes by his own hand.

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Maxim 97
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
4 months 1 week ago
Manners are of more importance than...

Manners are of more importance than laws. The law can touch us here and there, now and then. Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation like that of the air we breathe in.

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No. 1, p. 172 in The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke: A New Edition, v. VIII. London: F. C. and J. Rivington, 1815
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
2 months 3 days ago
And seeing every man is......
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Main Content / General
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
6 months 1 week ago
A Roman emperor sitting at the...

A Roman emperor sitting at the table surrounded by his bodyguard is a magnificent sight, but when the reason is fear, the magnificence pales. So also when the individual does not dare stand taciturnly by his word, does not stand freely and confidently on the pedestal of a conscious act, but is surrounded by a host of deliberations before and after that render him incapable of getting his eye on the action.

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Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
4 months 4 days ago
I believe in the salvation of...

I believe in the salvation of humanity, in the future of cyanide . . .

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Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
6 months 5 days ago
It's funny the respectable names you...

It's funny the respectable names you can give to superstition.

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Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
5 months 1 week ago
I do not, therefore, need any...

I do not, therefore, need any penetrating acuteness to see what I have to do in order that my volition be morally good. Inexperienced in the course of the world, incapable of being prepared for whatever might come to pass in it, I ask myself only: can you also will that your maxim become a universal law?

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Philosophical Maxims
Miguel de Unamuno
Miguel de Unamuno
3 months 3 weeks ago
There are pretenses which are very...

There are pretenses which are very sincere, and marriage is their school.

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Tres novelas ejemplares y un prólogo [Three Exemplary Novels and a Prologue] (1920); Two Mothers
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
5 months 1 week ago
None believeth in the soul of...

None believeth in the soul of man, but only in some man or person old and departed.

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p. 25
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
1 month 1 week ago
Delay is preferable to error. Letter...

Delay is preferable to error.

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Letter to George Washington
Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
4 months 1 week ago
What, then, is the animal? First...

What, then, is the animal? First of all, a system of plant-souls. The unity of those plant-souls, which unity nature itself produces, is the soul of the animal. Its world is therefore partly that of the plants - its nourishment, for instance, it receives partly through synthesis from vegetable, and through analysis from animal nature - and partly that of the animals, whereof we shall speak directly. Each product of nature is an organically in-itself completed totality in space, like the plant. Hence, the unknown x which we are looking for must also be such a whole or totality, and in so far it must also have a principle of organization, a sphere and central point of this organization ; in short, the same which we have called the soul of the plant, which thus remains common to both. ... The animal is a system of plant-souls, and the plant is a separated, isolated part of an animal. Both reciprocally affect each other.

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P. 502, 503, 504
Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
3 months 4 days ago
Atheists have the intellectual courage to...

Atheists have the intellectual courage to accept reality for what it is: wonderfully and shockingly explicable. As an atheist, you have the moral courage to live to the full the only life you're ever going to get: to fully inhabit reality, rejoice in it, and do your best finally to leave it better than you found it.

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The Intellectual and Moral Courage of Atheism
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
1 month 1 week ago
The good old Dominion, the blessed...

The good old Dominion, the blessed mother of us all.

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"Thoughts on Lotteries", 1826
Philosophical Maxims
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