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Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
4 months 3 weeks ago
Half our days we pass in...

Half our days we pass in the shadow of the earth; and the brother of death exacteth a third part of our lives.

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Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
5 months 3 weeks ago
Every man bears...

Every man bears the whole stamp of the human condition.

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Ch. 2
Philosophical Maxims
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley
5 months 2 weeks ago
The poet is, etymologically, the maker....

The poet is, etymologically, the maker. Like all makers, he requires a stock of raw materials - in his case, experience. Now experience is not a matter of having actually swum the Hellespont, or danced with the dervishes, or slept in a doss-house. It is a matter of sensibility and intuition, of seeing and hearing the significant things, of paying attention at the right moments, of understanding and co-ordinating. Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him. It is a gift for dealing with the accidents of existence, not the accidents themselves. By a happy dispensation of nature, the poet generally possesses the gift of experience in conjunction with that of expression. What he says so well is therefore intrinsically of value.

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p. 5
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
4 months 2 weeks ago
Men without their choice derive benefits...

Men without their choice derive benefits from that association; without their choice they are subjected to duties in consequence of these benefits; and without their choice they enter into a virtual obligation as binding as any that is actual. Look through the whole of life and the whole system of duties. Much the strongest moral obligations are such as were never the results of our option. I allow, that if no supreme ruler exists, wise to form, and potent to enforce, the moral law, there is no sanction to any contract, virtual or even actual, against the will of prevalent power. On that hypothesis, let any set of men be strong enough to set their duties at defiance, and they cease to be duties any longer.

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p. 442
Philosophical Maxims
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft
4 months 2 weeks ago
It is impossible for any man,...

It is impossible for any man, when the most favourable circumstances concur, to acquire sufficient knowledge and strength of mind to discharge the duties of a king, entrusted with uncontrolled power; how then must they be violated when his very elevation is an insuperable bar to the attainment of either wisdom or virtue; when all the feelings of a man are stifled by flattery, and reflection shut out by pleasure! Surely it is madness to make the fate of thousands depend on the caprice of a weak fellow creature, whose very station sinks him NECESSARILY below the meanest of his subjects! But one power should not be thrown down to exalt another--for all power intoxicates weak man; and its abuse proves, that the more equality there is established among men, the more virtue and happiness will reign in society.

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Ch. 1
Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
5 months 2 weeks ago
I came into this world, not...

I came into this world, not chiefly to make this a good place to live in, but to live in it, be it good or bad.

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Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
2 months 1 day ago
A trifling debt…

A trifling debt makes a man your debtor; a large one makes him an enemy.

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Line 11.
Philosophical Maxims
Allan Bloom
Allan Bloom
1 month 3 weeks ago
The distinction between the world of...

The distinction between the world of commerce and that of "culture" quickly became the distinction between infrastructure and superstructure, with the former clearly determining the latter.

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Commerce and Culture, p. 281.
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
5 months 2 weeks ago
We are told that Christ was...

We are told that Christ was killed for us, that His death has washed out our sins, and that by dying He has disabled death itself. That is the formula. That is Christianity. That is what has to be believed. Any theories we build up as to how Christ's death did all this are, in my view, quite secondary: mere plans or diagrams to be left alone if they do not help us, and, if they do help us, not to be confused with the thing itself.

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Book II, Chapter 4, "The Perfect Penitent"
Philosophical Maxims
Michel de Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne
5 months 3 weeks ago
To call out for the hand...

To call out for the hand of the enemy is a rather extreme measure, yet a better one, I think, than to remain in continual fever over an accident that has no remedy. But since all the precautions that a man can take are full of uneasiness and uncertainty, it is better to prepare with fine assurance for the worst that can happen, and derive some consolation from the fact that we are not sure that it will happen.

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Ch. 25
Philosophical Maxims
Rosa Luxemburg
Rosa Luxemburg
1 month 1 week ago
The working class will acquire the...

The working class will acquire the sense of the new discipline, the freely assumed self-discipline of the Social Democracy, not as a result of the discipline imposed on it by the capitalist state, but by extirpating, to the last root, its old habits of obedience and servility.

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Philosophical Maxims
John Searle
John Searle
3 months 2 weeks ago
Whatever is referred to must exist....

Whatever is referred to must exist. Let us call this the axiom of existence.

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P. 77.
Philosophical Maxims
Democritus
Democritus
5 months 6 days ago
For a man petticoat government is...

For a man petticoat government is the limit of insolence.

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Philosophical Maxims
Publilius Syrus
Publilius Syrus
3 months 2 weeks ago
Don't turn back when you are...

Don't turn back when you are just at the goal.

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Maxim 580
Philosophical Maxims
Seneca the Younger
Seneca the Younger
2 months 1 day ago
Then it is that the height...

Then it is that the height of unhappiness is reached, when men are not only attracted, but even pleased, by shameful things, and when there is no longer any room for a cure, now that those things which once were vices have become habits.

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Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
4 months 4 weeks ago
The most momentous thing in human...

The most momentous thing in human life is the art of winning the soul to good or to evil.

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As quoted in Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, as translated by Robert Drew Hicks (1925)
Philosophical Maxims
Gottlob frege
Gottlob frege
4 months 1 week ago
'Facts, facts, facts,' cries the scientist...

Facts, facts, facts,' cries the scientist if he wants to emphasize the necessity of a firm foundation for science. What is a fact? A fact is a thought that is true. But the scientist will surely not recognize something which depends on men's varying states of mind to be the firm foundation of science.

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Gottlob Frege (1956). "The thought: A logical inquiry" in: Peter Ludlow (1997) Readings in the Philosophy of Language. p. 27
Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
5 months 1 week ago
Worte sind Taten. Words are deeds....

Worte sind Taten. Words are deeds.

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p. 50e
Philosophical Maxims
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
1 month 3 weeks ago
Can a man who's warm understand...

Can a man who's warm understand one who's freezing?

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Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
5 months 2 weeks ago
The For-itself, in fact, is nothing...

The For-itself, in fact, is nothing but the pure nihilation of the In-itself; it is like a hole of being at the heart of Being.

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Philosophical Maxims
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
6 months 2 weeks ago
Now any dogma, based primarily on...

Now any dogma, based primarily on faith and emotionalism, is a dangerous weapon to use on others, since it is almost impossible to guarantee that the weapon will never be turned on the user.

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Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
6 months 1 week ago
I do not have much liking...

I do not have much liking for the too famous existential philosophy, and, to tell the truth, I think its conclusions false.

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
5 months 2 weeks ago
I remain convinced that obstinate addiction...

I remain convinced that obstinate addiction to ordinary language in our private thoughts is one of the main obstacles to progress in philosophy.

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Quoted in Library of Living Philosophers: The Philosophy of Bertrand Russell, 1944
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
5 months 2 weeks ago
He who is in love is...

He who is in love is wise and is becoming wiser, sees newly every time he looks at the object beloved, drawing from it with his eyes and his mind those virtues which it possesses.

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The Method of Nature, 1841
Philosophical Maxims
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer
5 months 2 weeks ago
The poet presents the imagination with...

The poet presents the imagination with images from life and human characters and situations, sets them all in motion and leaves it to the beholder to let these images take his thoughts as far as his mental powers will permit. This is why he is able to engage men of the most differing capabilities, indeed fools and sages together. The philosopher, on the other hand, presents not life itself but the finished thoughts which he has abstracted from it and then demands that the reader should think precisely as, and precisely as far as, he himself thinks. That is why his public is so small.

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Vol. 2 "On Philosophy and the Intellect" as translated in Essays and Aphorisms (1970), as translated by R. J. Hollingdale
Philosophical Maxims
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
4 months 2 weeks ago
That chastity of honour which felt...

That chastity of honour which felt a stain like a wound.

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Volume iii, p. 332
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
5 months 2 weeks ago
Consumption is also immediately production, just...

Consumption is also immediately production, just as in nature the consumption of the elements and chemical substances is the production of the plant.

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Introduction, p. 10.
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Buber
Martin Buber
4 months 1 week ago
In the ice of solitude man...

In the ice of solitude man becomes most inexorably a question to himself, and just because the question pitilessly summons and draws into play his most secret life he becomes an experience to himself.

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p. 150
Philosophical Maxims
Antonio Negri
Antonio Negri
2 months 1 week ago
Even when labor is subjugated by...

Even when labor is subjugated by capital it always necessarily maintains its own autonomy, and this ever more clearly true today with respect to the new immaterial, cooperative and collaborative forms of labor. This relationship is not isolated to the economic terrain but, as we will argue later, spills over into the biopolitical terrain of society as a hole, including military conflicts. In any case, we should recognize here that even in asymmetrical conflicts victory in terms of complete domination is not possible. All that can be achieved is a provisional and limited maintenance of control and order that must constantly be policed and preserved. Counterinsurgency is a full-time job.

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54
Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
4 months 2 days ago
When we are the victims of...

When we are the victims of illusion we do not feel it to be an illusion but a reality. It is the same perhaps with evil. Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil but as a necessity, or even a duty.

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p. 64
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
1 month 6 days ago
Physical concepts are free creations...

Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world. In our endeavor to understand reality we are somewhat like a man trying to understand the mechanism of a closed watch. He sees the face and the moving hands, even hears its ticking, but he has no way of opening the case. If he is ingenious he may form some picture of a mechanism which could be responsible for all the things he observes, but he may never be quite sure his picture is the only one which could explain his observations. He will never be able to compare his picture with the real mechanism and he cannot even imagine the possibility or the meaning of such a comparison. But he certainly believes that, as his knowledge increases, his picture of reality will become simpler and simpler and will explain a wider and wider range of his sensuous impressions. He may also believe in the existence of the ideal limit of knowledge and that it is approached by the human mind. He may call this ideal limit the objective truth.

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Philosophical Maxims
Rosa Luxemburg
Rosa Luxemburg
1 month 1 week ago
Marxism is a revolutionary worldview that...

Marxism is a revolutionary worldview that must always struggle for new revelations. Marxism must abhor nothing so much as the possibility that it becomes congealed in its current form. It is at its best when butting heads in self-criticism, and in historical thunder and lightning, it retains its strength.

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As quoted in Quote Junkie : Political Edition (2008) by Hagopian Institute
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
5 months 2 weeks ago
The law of gravity thus asserts...

The law of gravity thus asserts itself when a house falls about our ears.

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Vol. I, Ch. 1, Section 4, pg. 86.
Philosophical Maxims
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson
3 months 1 week ago
Alas! in the clothes of the...

Alas! in the clothes of the greatest potentate, what is there but a man?

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The Suicide Club, Story of the Young Man with the Cream Tarts.
Philosophical Maxims
Miguel de Unamuno
Miguel de Unamuno
4 months 3 days ago
Our longing to save consciousness, to...

Our longing to save consciousness, to give personal and human finality to the Universe and to existence, is such that even in the midst of a supreme, an agonizing and lacerating sacrifice, we should still hear the voice that assured us that if our consciousness disappears, it is that the infinite and eternal Consciousness may be enriched thereby, that our souls may serve as a nutriment to the Universal soul.

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Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle
2 months 1 week ago
All work is as seed sown;...

All work is as seed sown; it grows and spreads, and sows itself anew.

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Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
2 months 2 weeks ago
Only the skilled....
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Main Content / General
Cornel West
Cornel West
5 months 1 week ago
Analytical philosophy was very interesting. It...

Analytical philosophy was very interesting. It always struck me as being very interesting and full of tremendous intellectual curiosities. It is wonderful to see the mind at work in such an intense manner, but, for me, it was still too far removed from my own issues.

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Interview in African-American Philosophers: 17 Conversations (1998) edited by George Yancy, p. 35
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
5 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.

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On Marriage
Philosophical Maxims
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius
1 month 1 week ago
Let opinion be taken away, and...

Let opinion be taken away, and no man will think himself wronged. If no man shall think himself wronged, then is there no more any such thing as wrong.

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IV. 7, trans. Méric Casaubon
Philosophical Maxims
John Gray
John Gray
2 months 3 weeks ago
The mass political movements of the...

The mass political movements of the 20th century were vehicles for myths inherited from religion, and it is no accident that religion is reviving now that these movements have collapsed.

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Philosophical Maxims
A. J. Ayer
A. J. Ayer
4 months 1 week ago
The principles of logic and mathematics...

The principles of logic and mathematics are true simply because we never allow them to be anything else. And the reason for this is that we cannot abandon them without contradicting ourselves, without sinning against the rules which govern the use of language, and so making our utterances self-stultifying. In other words, the truths of logic and mathematics are analytic propositions or tautologies.

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p. 77.
Philosophical Maxims
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy
3 months 2 weeks ago
The slaves of our times are...

The slaves of our times are not all those factory and workshop hands only who must sell themselves completely into the power of the factory and foundry-owners in order to exist, but nearly all the agricultural laborers are slaves, working, as they do, unceasingly to grow another's corn on another's field, and gathering it into another's barn; or tilling their own fields only in order to pay to bankers the interest on debts they cannot get rid of. And slaves also are all the innumerable footmen, cooks, porters, housemaids, coachmen, bathmen, waiters, etc., who all their life long perform duties most unnatural to a human being, and which they themselves dislike.

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Chapter 8: Slavery Exists Among Us
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
5 months 3 weeks ago
Let us keep to Christ, and...

Let us keep to Christ, and cling to Him, and hang on Him, so that no power can remove us.

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p. 433
Philosophical Maxims
Lin Yutang
Lin Yutang
1 month 3 weeks ago
A reasonable naturalist then settles down...

A reasonable naturalist then settles down to this life with a sort of animal satisfaction. As Chinese illiterate women put it, "Others gave birth to us and we give birth to others. What else are we to do?".... Life becomes a biological procession and the very question of immortality is sidetracked. For that is the exact feeling of a Chinese grandfather holding his grandchild by the hand and going to the shops to buy some candy, with the thought that in five or ten years he will be returning to his grave or to his ancestors. The best that we can hope for in this life is that we shall not have sons and grandsons of whom we need to be ashamed.

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p. 23
Philosophical Maxims
George Santayana
George Santayana
4 months 1 week ago
Prosperity, both for individuals and for...

Prosperity, both for individuals and for states, means possessions; and possessions mean burdens and harness and slavery; and slavery for the mind, too, because it is not only the rich man's time that is pre-empted, but his affections, his judgement, and the range of his thoughts.

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"The Irony of Liberalism"
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Marcuse
Herbert Marcuse
4 months 1 week ago
The philosopher ... subjects experience to...

The philosopher ... subjects experience to his critical judgment, and this contains a value judgment - namely, that freedom from toil is preferable to toil, and an intelligent life is preferable to a stupid life. It so happened that philosophy was born with these values. Scientific thought had to break this union of value judgment and analysis, for it became increasingly clear that the philosophic values did not guide the organisation of society.

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p. 126
Philosophical Maxims
Iris Murdoch
Iris Murdoch
4 months 1 week ago
Being good is just a matter...

Being good is just a matter of temperament in the end.

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The Nice and the Good (1968), ch. 14, p. 127. Murdoch attributed this opinion to her character Kate Gray. It was not her own.
Philosophical Maxims
Simone Weil
Simone Weil
4 months 2 days ago
It is because of my wretchedness...

It is because of my wretchedness that I am "I." It is on account of the wretchedness of the universe that, in a sense, God is "I" (that is to say a person).

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p. 83
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
1 month 6 days ago
In the temple of science...

In the temple of science are many mansions, and various indeed are they that dwell therein and the motives that have led them thither. Many take to science out of a joyful sense of superior intellectual power; science is their own special sport to which they look for vivid experience and the satisfaction of ambition; many others are to be found in the temple who have offered the products of their brains on this altar for purely utilitarian purposes. Were an angel of the Lord to come and drive all the people belonging to these two categories out of the temple, the assemblage would be seriously depleted, but there would still be some men, of both present and past times, left inside. Our Planck is one of them, and that is why we love him. I am quite aware that we have just now lightheartedly expelled in imagination many excellent men who are largely, perhaps chiefly, responsible for the buildings of the temple of science; and in many cases, our angel would find it a pretty ticklish job to decide. But of one thing I feel sure: if the types we have just expelled were the only types there were, the temple would never have come to be, any more than a forest can grow which consists of nothing but creepers. For these people any sphere of human activity will do if it comes to a point; whether they become engineers, officers, tradesmen, or scientists depends on circumstances.Now let us have another look at those who have found favor with the angel. Most of them are somewhat odd, uncommunicative, solitary fellows, really less like each other, in spite of these common characteristics, than the hosts of the rejected. What has brought them to the temple? That is a difficult question and no single answer will cover it.

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Philosophical Maxims
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