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Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
2 months 1 day ago
Men and boys are learning all...

Men and boys are learning all kinds of trades but how to make men of themselves. They learn to make houses; but they are not so well housed, they are not so contented in their houses, as the woodchucks in their holes. What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on? - If you cannot tolerate the planet that it is on? Grade the ground first. If a man believes and expects great things of himself, it makes no odds where you put him, or what you show him ... he will be surrounded by grandeur. He is in the condition of a healthy and hungry man, who says to himself, - How sweet this crust is!

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Letter to Harrison Blake (20 May 1860); published in Familiar Letters, 1865
Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
2 months 1 week ago
Let no man..

Let no man be ashamed to speak what he is not ashamed to think.

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Book III, Ch. 4
Philosophical Maxims
Plato
Plato
2 months 4 weeks ago
If the one is not,...

Parmenides: If the one is not, nothing is. Then, and we may add, whether the one is or is not, the one and the others in relation to themselves and to each other all in every way are and are not and appear and do not appear.

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Philosophical Maxims
Martin Buber
Martin Buber
3 weeks ago
As the oil is in the...

As the oil is in the olive, so is the teshuvah, repentance, hidden within sin.

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p. 44
Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
2 months 1 week ago
He who fears he shall suffer,...

He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears.

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Book III, Ch. 13
Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
1 month ago
The administrators of the executive power...

The administrators of the executive power may be either elective or not; and in the former case all or only some of them may be elective. They are elective in a proper democracy, that is to say, in a democracy which recognizes representation. If all the public officials are directly elected by the whole people, the democracy is a pure democracy; if only some, it is a mixed democracy. The public officials may also fill vacancies themselves; this is the case in a pure aristocracy. But if only some of the magistrates are thus replaced by the public officers, and if the others are again directly elected by the people, then the form of government is that of a democratic aristocracy. A permanent president (monarch) may also be elected to exercise the executive power during his lifetime. In all these cases, either all citizens of the commonwealth, or only some of them, are eligible to office. Eligibility may, therefore, be limited or unlimited.

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Philosophical Maxims
Aristotle
Aristotle
3 months 1 day ago
The single harmony produced by all...

The single harmony produced by all the heavenly bodies singing and dancing together springs from one source and ends by achieving one purpose, and has rightly bestowed the name not of "disordered" but of "ordered universe" upon the whole.

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Philosophical Maxims
Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean Jacques Rousseau
2 months 3 days ago
Oh providence! Oh nature! Treasure of...

Oh providence! Oh nature! Treasure of the poor, resource of the unfortunate. The person who feels, knows your holy laws and trusts them, the person whose heart is at peace and whose body does not suffer, thanks to you is not entirely prey to adversity.

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Second Dialogue; translated by Judith R. Bush, Christopher Kelly, Roger D. Masters
Philosophical Maxims
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
1 month 3 weeks ago
Absurdity destroys the and of the...

Absurdity destroys the and of the enumeration by making impossible the in where the things enumerated would be divided up.

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Preface
Philosophical Maxims
Adam Smith
Adam Smith
2 months 4 days ago
Consumption is the sole end and...

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer.

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Chapter VIII, p. 719.
Philosophical Maxims
Lucretius
Lucretius
2 months 2 weeks ago
Therefore death is nothing…

Therefore death is nothing to us, it matters not one jot, since the nature of the mind is understood to be mortal.

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Book III, lines 830-831 (tr. Rouse)
Philosophical Maxims
Colin Wilson
Colin Wilson
1 week 6 days ago
Once we can see how this...

Once we can see how this question of freedom of the will has been vitiated by post-romantic philosophy, with its inbuilt tendency to laziness and boredom, we can also see how it came about that existentialism found itself in a hole of its own digging, and how the philosophical developments since then have amounted to walking in circles round that hole.

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p. 214
Philosophical Maxims
Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
3 weeks 6 days ago
Endless brooding over a question undermines...

Endless brooding over a question undermines you as much as a dull pain.

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Philosophical Maxims
Confucius
Confucius
2 months 2 weeks ago
Honesty and trust are promoted, and...

Honesty and trust are promoted, and good neighborliness cultivated.

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Philosophical Maxims
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
Just now
Art is a human activity having...

Art is a human activity having for its purpose the transmission to others of the highest and best feelings to which men have risen.

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Ch. 8
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
2 weeks ago
'Tis a grievous...
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Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
1 month 1 day ago
But what is liberty without wisdom,...

But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint.

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Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
2 weeks 1 day ago
Religion is the vision of something...

Religion is the vision of something which stands beyond, behind and within the passing flux of immediate things; something which is real, and yet waiting to be realized; something which is a remote possibility, and yet the greatest of present facts; something that gives meaning to all that passes, and yet eludes apprehension; something whose possession is the final good, and yet is beyond all reach; something which is the ultimate ideal, and the hopeless quest.

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Ch. 12: "Religion and Science", pp. 267-268
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
2 months 2 weeks ago
Now, justification in this life is...

Now, justification in this life is given to us according to these three things: first by the laver of regeneration by which all sins are forgiven; then, by a struggle with the faults from whose guilt we have been absolved; the third, when our prayer is heard, in which we say: Forgive us our debts, because however bravely we fight against our faults, we are men; but the grace of God so aids as we fight in this corruptible body that there is reason for His hearing us as we ask forgiveness.

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Against Julian, Book II, ch. 8, 22. In The Fathers of the Church, Matthew A. Schumacher, tr., 1957, ISBN 0813214009 ISBN 9780813214009 pp. 83-84.
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
2 weeks 1 day ago
Education is the acquisition of the...

Education is the acquisition of the art of the utilisation of knowledge.

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Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
2 months 1 week ago
Covetousness is both the beginning and...

Covetousness is both the beginning and the end of the devil's alphabet- the first vice in corrupt nature that moves, and the last which dies.

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Philosophical Maxims
Dante Alighieri
Dante Alighieri
2 months 1 week ago
Morality is the beauty…

Morality is the beauty of Philosophy.

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Trattato Terzo, Ch. 15.
Philosophical Maxims
Nikolai Berdyaev
Nikolai Berdyaev
2 weeks 3 days ago
Ethics occupies a central place in...

Ethics occupies a central place in philosophy because it is concerned with sin, with the origin of good and evil and with moral valuations. And since these problems have a universal significance, the sphere of ethics is wider than is generally supposed. It deals with meaning and value and its province is the world in which the distinction between good and evil is drawn, evaluations are made and meaning is sought.

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The Destiny of Man (1931), p. 15
Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
2 months 1 day ago
None can be an impartial or...

None can be an impartial or wise observer of human life but from the vantage ground of what we should call voluntary poverty.

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Philosophical Maxims
Mikhail Bakunin
Mikhail Bakunin
4 weeks ago
The people should never be deceived,...

The people should never be deceived, under any pretext or for any purpose. It would not only be criminal but detrimental to the revolutionary cause, for deception of any kind, by its very nature, is shortsighted, petty, narrow, always sewn with rotten threads, so that it inevitably tears and is exposed.

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"Appendix A"
Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
2 weeks 1 day ago
It is in literature that the...

It is in literature that the concrete outlook of humanity receives its expression.

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Ch. 5: "The Romantic Reaction", p. 106
Philosophical Maxims
Roland Barthes
Roland Barthes
2 weeks 2 days ago
Barthes's discovery and articulation of the...

Barthes's discovery and articulation of the "new" liberatory category of perception and deciphering, semiotic-mythology, belongs to the praxis of his heroic mythologist, alone. This unfortunate theoretical strategy makes the articulation of a coalitional consciousness in social struggle impossible to imagine or enact. ... His terminologies appropriate the technologies of the oppressed for use by academic classes.

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Chela Sandoval, Methodology of the Oppressed, p. 201
Philosophical Maxims
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
Johann Gottlieb Fichte
1 month ago
The correct relationship between the higher...

The correct relationship between the higher and lower classes, the appropriate mutual interaction between the two is, as such, the true underlying support on which the improvement of the human species rests. The higher classes constitute the mind of the single large whole of humanity; the lower classes constitute its limbs; the former are the thinking and designing part, the latter the executive part.

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The System of Ethics According to the Principles of the Wissenschaftslehre (1798; Cambridge, 2005), p. 320.
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
3 months 3 days ago
What! the inventors of ancient civilisations,...
What! the inventors of ancient civilisations, the first makers of tools and tape lines, the first builders of vehicles, ships, and houses, the first observers of the laws of the heavens and the multiplication tables is it contended that they were entirely different from the inventors and observers of our own time, and superior to them? And that the first slow steps forward were of a value which has not been equalled by the discoveries we have made with all our travels and circumnavigations of the earth?
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Philosophical Maxims
Thales of Miletus
Thales of Miletus
1 month 1 week ago
Place is the greatest thing….

Place is the greatest thing, as it contains all things.

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As quoted in Diogenes Laërtius, The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, I, 35
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Popper
Karl Popper
1 month 4 weeks ago
Do not allow your dreams of...

Do not allow your dreams of a beautiful world to lure you away from the claims of men who suffer here and now. Our fellow men have a claim to our help; no generation must be sacrificed for the sake of future generations, for the sake of an ideal of happiness that may never be realised.

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Philosophical Maxims
Colin Wilson
Colin Wilson
1 week 6 days ago
The individual begins that long effort...

The individual begins that long effort as an Outsider; he may finish it as a saint.

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Chapter Nine, Breaking the Circuit, final sentence
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
3 weeks 2 days ago
Blessed are the poor in spirit,...

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

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5:1 12 (NIV) Often referred to as "The Beatitudes" this is the start of "The Sermon on the Mount".
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
1 month 6 days ago
Burden not the back of Aries,...

Burden not the back of Aries, Leo, or Taurus, with thy faults, nor make Saturn, Mars, or Venus, guilty of thy Follies.

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Part III, Section VII
Philosophical Maxims
Democritus
Democritus
1 month 2 weeks ago
No one deserves to live who...

No one deserves to live who has not at least one good-man-and-true for a friend.

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Philosophical Maxims
Erich Fromm
Erich Fromm
1 week 5 days ago
Chronic boredom - compensated or uncompensated...

Chronic boredom - compensated or uncompensated - constitutes one of the major psychopathological phenomena in contemporary technotronic society, although it is only recently that it has found some recognition.

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p. 273
Philosophical Maxims
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
3 months 1 day ago
In the New Testament sense, to...

In the New Testament sense, to be a Christian is, in an upward sense, as different from being a man as, in a downward sense, to be a man is different from being a beast. A Christian in the sense of the New Testament, although he stands suffering in the midst of life's reality, has yet become completely a stranger to this life; in the words of the Scripture and also of the Collects (which still are read-O bloody satire!-by the sort of priests we now have, and in the ears of the sort of Christians that now live) he is a stranger and a pilgrim-just think, for example of the late Bishop Mynster intoning, We are strangers and pilgrims in this world! A Christian in the New Testament sense is literally a stranger and a pilgrim, he feels himself a stranger, and everyone involuntarily feels that this man is a stranger to him.

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Philosophical Maxims
Alfred North Whitehead
Alfred North Whitehead
2 weeks 1 day ago
The art of progress is to...

The art of progress is to preserve order amid change, and to preserve change amid order.

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Philosophical Maxims
Baruch Spinoza
Baruch Spinoza
2 months 4 days ago
The perfection of a thing does...

The perfection of a thing does not annul its existence, but, on the contrary, asserts it. Imperfection, on the other hand, does annul it ; therefore we cannot be more certain of the existence of anything, than of the existence of a being absolutely infinite or perfect-that is, of God. For inasmuch as his essence excludes all imperfection, and involves absolute perfection, all cause for doubt concerning his existence is done away, and the utmost certainty on the question is given. This, I think, will be evident to every moderately attentive reader.

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Part I, Prop. XI
Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
1 month 1 day ago
Nothing in the world is harder...

Nothing in the world is harder than speaking the truth and nothing easier than flattery. If there's the hundredth part of a false note in speaking the truth, it leads to a discord, and that leads to trouble. But if all, to the last note, is false in flattery, it is just as agreeable, and is heard not without satisfaction. It may be a coarse satisfaction, but still a satisfaction. And however coarse the flattery, at least half will be sure to seem true. That's so for all stages of development and classes of society.

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Philosophical Maxims
Jean Baudrillard
Jean Baudrillard
3 days ago
Nothing is wholly obvious without becoming...

Nothing is wholly obvious without becoming enigmatic. Reality itself is too obvious to be true.

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Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
2 months 1 day ago
Fire is the most tolerable third...

Fire is the most tolerable third party.

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January 2, 1853
Philosophical Maxims
Desiderius Erasmus
Desiderius Erasmus
2 months 1 week ago
A constant element of enjoyment must...

A constant element of enjoyment must be mingled with our studies, so that we think of learning as a game rather than a form of drudgery, for no activity can be continued for long if it does not to some extent afford pleasure to the participant.

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Letter to Christian Northoff (1497), as translated in Collected Works of Erasmus (1974), p. 114
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
3 weeks 5 days ago
The general co-operation of all members...

The general co-operation of all members of society for the purpose of planned exploitation of the forces of production, the expansion of production to the point where it will satisfy the needs of all, the abolition of a situation in which the needs of some are satisfied at the expense of the needs of others, the complete liquidation of classes and their conflicts, the rounded development of the capacities of all members of society through the elimination of the present division of labor, through industrial education, through engaging in varying activities, through the participation by all in the enjoyments produced by all, through the combination of city and country - these are the main consequences of the abolition of private property.

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Philosophical Maxims
Diogenes of Sinope
Diogenes of Sinope
1 month 2 weeks ago
Being asked where in Greece he...

Being asked where in Greece he saw good men, he replied, "Good men nowhere, but good boys at Sparta."

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Diogenes Laërtius, vi. 27
Philosophical Maxims
St. Augustine of Hippo
St. Augustine of Hippo
2 months 2 weeks ago
Once for all, then, a short...

Once for all, then, a short precept is given thee: Love, and do what thou wilt: whether thou hold thy peace, through love hold thy peace; whether thou cry out, through love cry out; whether thou correct, through love correct; whether thou spare, through love do thou spare: let the root of love be within, of this root can nothing spring but what is good.

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Tractatus VII, 8 Latin: "dilige et quod vis fac."; falsely often: "ama et fac quod vis." Translation by Professor Joseph Fletcher: Love and then what you will, do.
Philosophical Maxims
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
1 month 3 weeks ago
We are aware of all the...

We are aware of all the inconveniences of prison, and that it is dangerous when it is not useless. And yet one cannot 'see' how to replace it. It is the detestable solution, which one seems unable to do without.

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Part Four, Complete and austere institutions
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
1 month 5 days ago
The Indian knew how to live...

The Indian knew how to live without wants, to suffer without complaint, and to die singing.

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Chapter I.
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Buber
Martin Buber
3 weeks ago
God ... demands everything, in order...

God ... demands everything, in order to give everything anew to him who loves Him, after that loving has truly given up all.

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p. 45
Philosophical Maxims
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley
2 months ago
You can do everything with bayonets...

You can do everything with bayonets except sit on them. If you want to preserve your power indefinitely you have to get the consent of the ruled. And this they will do partly by drugs as I foresaw in "Brave new World", and partly by these new techniques of propaganda. They will do it by bypassing the sort of rational side of man and appealing to his subconscious, and his deeper emotions, and his physiology, even, and so making him actually love his slavery. I mean I think this is the danger that actually people may be, in some ways, happy under the new regime. But they will be happy in situations when they oughtn't be happy.

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Philosophical Maxims
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