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Publilius Syrus
Publilius Syrus
2 months 3 weeks ago
Many receive advice, few profit by...

Many receive advice, few profit by it.

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Maxim 149
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
3 months 3 weeks ago
Life is not, and death is...

Life is not, and death is a dream. Suffering has invented them both as self-justification. Man alone is torn between an unreality and an illusion.

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Philosophical Maxims
Henry George
Henry George
3 weeks 2 days ago
It is as to whether its...

It is as to whether its services or uses are to be exchanged or not which makes a tool an article of capital or merely an article of wealth. Thus, the lathe of a manufacturer used in making things which are to be exchanged is capital, while the lathe kept by a gentleman for his own amusement is not.

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Book I, Ch. 3
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
2 weeks 1 day ago
How can this cosmic religious...

How can this cosmic religious experience be communicated from man to man, if it cannot lead to a definite conception of God or to a theology? It seems to me that the most important function of art and of science is to arouse and keep alive this feeling in those who are receptive.

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Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
2 months 3 weeks ago
In fact, contempt...
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Voltaire
Voltaire
4 months 3 weeks ago
Nothing is so common…

Nothing is so common as to imitate one's enemies, and to use their weapons.

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"Oracles", 1770
Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
5 months 2 weeks ago
The Yin based its propriety...

The Yin based its propriety on that of the Xia, and what it added and subtracted is knowable. The Zhou has based its propriety on that of the Shang and what it added and subtracted is knowable. In this way, what continues from the Chou, even if 100 generations hence, is knowable.

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
4 months 3 weeks ago
I dislike Communism because it is...

I dislike Communism because it is undemocratic, and capitalism because it favors exploitation.

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Unarmed Victory (1963), p. 14
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
4 months 3 weeks ago
Three o'clock is always too late...

Three o'clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do.

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Philosophical Maxims
David Hume
David Hume
4 months 4 weeks ago
But though all the general rules...

But though all the general rules of art are founded only on experience and on the observation of the common sentiments of human nature, we must not imagine, that, on every occasion, the feelings of men will be conformable to these rules.

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Philosophical Maxims
Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò Machiavelli
5 months 2 days ago
It is truly a marvelous thing...

It is truly a marvelous thing to consider to what greatness Athens arrived in the space of one hundred years after she freed herself from the tyranny of Pisistratus; but, above all, it is even more marvelous to consider the greatness Rome reached when she freed herself from her kings. The reason is easy to understand, for it is the common good and not private gain that makes cities great. Yet, without a doubt, this common good is observed only in republics, for in them everything that promotes it is practised, and however much damage it does to this or that private individual, those who benefit from the said common good are so numerous that they are able to advance in spite of the inclination of the few citizens who are oppressed by it.

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Book 2, Chapter 2
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Buber
Martin Buber
3 months 2 weeks ago
Before his death, Rabbi Zusya said,...

Before his death, Rabbi Zusya said, "In the coming world, they will not ask me: 'Why were you not Moses?' They will ask me: 'Why were you not Zusya?'"

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Tales of the Hasidim (1947), 1991 Ebook edition, p.251, as quoted in Jewish Currents.
Philosophical Maxims
Byung-Chul Han
Byung-Chul Han
3 months 1 week ago
What is obscene about pornography is...

What is obscene about pornography is not an excess of sex, but the fact that it contains no sex at all.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
3 weeks 4 days ago
The basis of our government being...

The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.

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Letter to Colonel Edward Carrington (16 January 1787) Lipscomb & Bergh ed. 6:57 Compare letter to John Norvell (11 June 1807), below.
Philosophical Maxims
William James
William James
4 months 3 weeks ago
We inherit the warlike type; and...

We inherit the warlike type; and for most of the capacities of heroism that the human race is full of we have to thank this cruel history. Dead men tell no tales, and if there were any tribes of other type than this they have left no survivors. Our ancestors have bred pugnacity into our bone and marrow, and thousands of years of peace won't breed it out of us. The popular imagination fairly fattens on the thought of wars. Let public opinion once reach a certain fighting pitch, and no ruler can withstand it. In the Boer war both governments began with bluff, but they couldn't stay there; the military tension was too much for them.

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Philosophical Maxims
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
2 weeks 1 day ago
Our time is Gothic in...

Our time is Gothic in its spirit. Unlike the Renaissance, it is not dominated by a few outstanding personalities. The twentieth century has established the democracy of the intellect. In the republic of art and science, there are many men who take an equally important part in the intellectual movements of our age. It is the epoch rather than the individual that is important. There is no one dominant personality like Galileo or Newton. Even in the nineteenth century, there were still a few giants who outtopped all others. Today the general level is much higher than ever before in the history of the world, but there are few men whose stature immediately sets them apart from all others.

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Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
3 months 3 weeks ago
The supervision of the state extends...

The supervision of the state extends to the lock upon the door, and there begins mine own. The lock is the boundary line between the power of the government and my own private power. It is the intention of locks to make possible self-protection. In my own house my person is sacred and inviolable even to the government. In civil cases government has no right to attack me in my house, but must wait till I am upon public ground.

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P. 324
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
1 month 2 weeks ago
The habits of study acquired at...

The habits of study acquired at Universities are of the highest importance in after-life. At the season when you are in young years the whole mind is, as it were, fluid, and is capable of forming itself into any shape that the owner of the mind pleases to order it to form itself into. The mind is in a fluid state, but it hardens up gradually to the consistency of rock or iron, and you cannot alter the habits of an old man, but as he has begun he will proceed and go on to the last.

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Philosophical Maxims
Marshall McLuhan
Marshall McLuhan
2 months 3 weeks ago
The role of the artist is...

The role of the artist is to create an Anti-environment as a means of perception and adjustment.

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(p. 31)
Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
3 months 3 weeks ago
I go to spread the tidings,...

I go to spread the tidings, I want to spread the tidings - of what? Of the truth, for I have seen it, have seen it with my own eyes, have seen it in all its glory.

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Philosophical Maxims
Nikos Kazantzakis
Nikos Kazantzakis
3 weeks 4 days ago
This ultimate stage of our spiritual...

This ultimate stage of our spiritual exercise is called Silence. Not because its contents are the ultimate inexpressible despair or the ultimate inexpressible joy and hope. Nor because it is the ultimate knowledge which does not condescend to speak, or the ultimate ignorance which cannot. Silence means: Every person, after completing his service in all labors, reaches finally the highest summit of endeavor, beyond every labor, where he no longer struggles or shouts, where he ripens fully in silence, indestructibly, eternally, with the entire Universe.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
3 weeks 4 days ago
The State legislatures should be immediately...

The State legislatures should be immediately urged to relinquish the right of establishing banks of discount. Most of them will comply, on patriotic principles, under the convictions of the moment; and the non-complying may be crowded into concurrence by legitimate devices.

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Letter to Thomas Cooper, 1814. ME 14:190
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
1 month 2 weeks ago
Our true Deity is Mechanism. It...

Our true Deity is Mechanism. It has subdued external Nature for us, and we think it will do all other things. We are Giants in physical power: in a deeper than metaphorical sense, we are Titans, that strive, by heaping mountain on mountain, to conquer Heaven also.

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Philosophical Maxims
Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal
5 months 1 week ago
What is it, in your opinion,...

What is it, in your opinion, to be a great nobleman? It is to be master of several objects that men covet, and thus to be able to satisfy the wants and the desires of many. It is these wants and these desires that attract them towards you, and that make them submit to you: were it not for these, they would not even look at you; but they hope, by these services... to obtain from you some part of the good which they desire, and of which they see that you have the disposal.

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Philosophical Maxims
Roger Scruton
Roger Scruton
2 months 2 weeks ago
Europe owes its greatness to the...

Europe owes its greatness to the fact that the primary loyalties of the European people have been detached from religion and re-attached to the land. Those who believe that the division of Europe into nations has been the primary cause of European wars should remember the devastating wars of religion that national loyalties finally brought to an end. And they should study our art and literature for its inner meaning. In almost every case, they will discover, it is an art and literature not of war but of peace, an invocation of home and the routines of home, of gentleness, everydayness and enduring settlement.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Babington Macaulay
Thomas Babington Macaulay
2 months 1 week ago
Many evils, no doubt, were produced...

Many evils, no doubt, were produced by the civil war. They were the price of our liberty.

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p. 39
Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
4 months 4 weeks ago
Christianity possesses the great advantage over...

Christianity possesses the great advantage over Judaism of being represented as coming from the mouth of the first Teacher not as a statutory but as a moral religion, and as thus entering into the closest relation with reason so that, through reason, it was able of itself, without historical learning, to be spread at all times and among all peoples with the greatest trustworthiness.

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Book IV, Part 1, Section 1, "The Christian religion as a learned religion"
Philosophical Maxims
bell hooks
bell hooks
3 months 1 week ago
The moment we choose to love...

The moment we choose to love we begin to move against domination, against oppression. The moment we choose to love we begin to move towards freedom, to act in ways that liberate ourselves and others.

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Philosophical Maxims
Lin Yutang
Lin Yutang
1 month 3 days ago
It is important that man dreams,...

It is important that man dreams, but it is perhaps equally important that he can laugh at his own dreams.

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Ch. I : The Awakening, pp. 4-5
Philosophical Maxims
Gaston Bachelard
Gaston Bachelard
3 months 2 weeks ago
Man is a creation of desire,...

Man is a creation of desire, not a creation of need.

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The Psychoanalysis of Fire, ch. 2, "Fire and Reverie"
Philosophical Maxims
Cornel West
Cornel West
4 months 2 weeks ago
Without some redistribution of wealth and...

Without some redistribution of wealth and power, downward mobility and debilitating poverty will continue to drive people into desperate channels. And without principled opposition to xenophobias from above and below, these desperate channels will produce a cold-hearted and mean-spirited America no longer worth fighting for or living in.

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(p79)
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
4 months 3 weeks ago
"And yet, it was not, not...

"And yet, it was not, not now, she that really counted. Or if she counted (and, oh, gloriously she did) it was for another's sake. The earth and stars and sun, all that was or will be, existed for his sake. And he was coming. The most dreadful, the most beautiful, the only dread and beauty there is, was coming. The pillars on the far side of the pool flushed with his approach. I cast down my eyes."

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Orual
Philosophical Maxims
Cornel West
Cornel West
4 months 2 weeks ago
Well, as you know, I was...

Well, as you know, I was blessed to do over a hundred events for my dear brother [Bernie Sanders]. And this is the first time I've had a chance to publicly endorse him again, but yes, indeed. I'll be in his corner that we're going to win this time. And it has to do with the Martin Luther King like criteria of assessing a candidate namely the issues of militarism, poverty, materialism, and racism, xenophobia in all of its forms that includes any kind of racism as you know against black people, brown people, yellow people, anybody, Arabs, Muslims, Jews, Palestinians, Kashmirians, Tibetans and so forth. So that there's no doubt that the my dear brother Bernie stands shoulders above any of the other candidates running in the Democratic primary when it comes to that Martin Luther King-like standards or criteria.

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Quoted in: Cornel West on Bernie, Trump, and Racism, The Intercept, Mehdi Hasan,
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach
Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach
3 months 3 weeks ago
...for stones, plants, and animals there...

...for stones, plants, and animals there is no God, but only for man.

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Philosophical Maxims
John Rawls
John Rawls
4 months 3 weeks ago
A scheme is unjust when the...

A scheme is unjust when the higher expectations, one or more of them, are excessive. If these expectations were decreased, the situation of the less favored would be improved.

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Chapter II, Section 13, pg. 79
Philosophical Maxims
Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini
2 months 4 days ago
Cinema is an old whore, like...

Cinema is an old whore, like circus and variety, who knows how to give many kinds of pleasure. Besides, you can't teach old fleas new dogs.

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As quoted in in The Atlantic
Philosophical Maxims
Voltaire
Voltaire
4 months 3 weeks ago
The man, who in a fit….

The man, who in a fit of melancholy, kills himself today, would have wished to live had he waited a week.

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"Cato", 1764
Philosophical Maxims
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson
2 months 2 weeks ago
He and his tyrannicide! I am...

He and his tyrannicide! I am in a mad fury about these explosions. If that is the new world! Damn O'Donovan Rossa; damn him behind and before, above, below, and roundabout; damn, deracinate, and destroy him, root and branch, self and company, world without end. Amen. I write that for sport if you like, but I will pray in earnest, O Lord, if you cannot convert, kindly delete him!

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Letter to Sidney Colvin, 2 August 1881. Quoted in Terrorism and Literature Chapter 12 - "Parliament Is Burning" by Deaglán Ó Donghaile ISBN 9781316987292
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
4 months 3 weeks ago
To be taken without consent from...

To be taken without consent from my home and friends; to lose my liberty; to undergo all those assaults on my personality which modern psychotherapy knows how to deliver; to be re-made after some pattern of "normality" hatched in a Viennese laboratory to which I never professed allegiance; to know that this process will never end until either my captors have succeeded or I have grown wise enough to cheat them with apparent success-who cares whether this is called Punishment or not? "The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment"

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1949
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Marcuse
Herbert Marcuse
3 months 2 weeks ago
Many, and I think the determining,...

Many, and I think the determining, constitutive facts remain outside the reach of the operational concept. And by virtue of this limitation-this methodological injunction against transitive concepts which might show the facts in their true light and call them by their true name-the descriptive analysis of the facts blocks the apprehension of facts and becomes an element of the ideology that sustains the facts. Proclaiming the existing social reality as its own norm, this sociology fortifies in the individuals the "faithless faith" in the reality whose victims they are.

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p. 119
Philosophical Maxims
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
5 months 3 weeks ago
Every human being is tried this...

Every human being is tried this way in the active service of expectancy. Now comes the fulfillment and relieves him, but soon he is again placed on reconnaissance for expectancy; then he is again relieved, but as long as there is any future for him, he has not yet finished his service. And while human life goes on this way in very diverse expectancy, expecting very different things according to different times and occasions and in different frames of mind, all life is again one nightwatch of expectancy.

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Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
4 months 4 weeks ago
This proof can at most, therefore,...

This proof can at most, therefore, demonstrate the existence of an architect of the world, whose efforts are limited by the capabilities of the material with which he works, but not of a creator of the world, to whom all things are subject.

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A 627, B 655 (Physico-Theological Proof Impossible)
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
3 months 4 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
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer
4 months 3 weeks ago
Life is a task to be...

Life is a task to be done. It is a fine thing to say defunctus est; it means that the man has done his task.

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"On the Sufferings of the World"
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Babington Macaulay
Thomas Babington Macaulay
2 months 1 week ago
We have seen that the true...

We have seen that the true source of the power of demagogues is the obstinacy of rulers and that a liberal Government makes a conservative people. 

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Speech in the House of Commons on the Reform Bill (5 July 1831), quoted in Speeches of the Right Honourable T. B. Macaulay, M.P. (1854), pp. 28-29
Philosophical Maxims
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
2 months 3 weeks ago
Evidence is the only good reason...

Evidence is the only good reason to believe anything.

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Interview shown in AlJazeera ,
Philosophical Maxims
Colin Wilson
Colin Wilson
3 months 1 week ago
I found Randi likable and plausible;...

I found Randi likable and plausible; the only thing that bothered me was the sweeping and intense nature of his skepticism. He was obviously working from the premise that all paranormal phenomena, without exception, are fakes or delusions. He seemed to take to take it for granted that all of us - there were also two women present - shared his opinions, and he made jovial, disparaging remarks about psychics and other such weirdos. I began to get the uncomfortable feeling of a Jew who has accidentally walked into a Nazi meeting, or a Jehovah's Witness at a convention of militant atheists. As a supposedly scientific psychic investigator, Randi struck me as being oddly fixed in his opinions.

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pp. 39-40
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert A. Simon
Herbert A. Simon
3 months 3 days ago
Definition of design = Everyone designs...

Definition of design = Everyone designs who devise courses of action aimed at changing existing situations into preferred ones. The intellectual activity that produces material artifacts is no different fundamentally from the one that prescribes remedies for a sick patient or the one that devises a new sales plan for a company or a social welfare policy for a state.

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p. 130.
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
1 month 1 week ago
... the only contestant who can...

... the only contestant who can confidently enter the lists is the man who has seen his own blood, who has felt his teeth rattle beneath his opponent's fist, who has been tripped and felt the full force of his adversary's charge, who has been downed in body but not in spirit, one who, as often as he falls, rises again with greater defiance than ever.

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
4 months 3 weeks ago
In the past, there was a...

In the past, there was a small leisure class and a larger working class. The leisure class enjoyed advantages for which there was no basis in social justice; this necessarily made it oppressive, limited its sympathies, and caused it to invent theories by which to justify its privileges.

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Ch. 1: In Praise of Idleness, p. 13
Philosophical Maxims
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