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6a2b7e3 Only God may be adored, because only God is unlimited goodness, truth, and beauty, and thus only God deserves unlimited love. christianity goodness beauty spirituality god love philosophy truth inspirational unlimited-beauty unlimited-goodness unlimited-love unlimited-truth jesus-shock catholicism theology Peter Kreeft
96496e0 Contentment is a state of mind and body when the two work in harmony, and there is no friction. The mind is at peace, and the body also. The two are sufficient to themselves. Happiness is elusive -- coming perhaps once in a life-time -- and approaching ectasy. philosophy Daphne du Maurier
7540218 It is closer to the truth to say that God is crazy than that God is reasonable. I suspect God merely smiles when someone calls him crazy, but shakes His head and frowns when someone calls Him reasonable. christianity spirituality god philosophy reasonable jesus-shock theology crazy Peter Kreeft
80e14b1 Our lives are like these things I make. Turn 'em, build 'em, bake 'em in fire. That's what you've been, son. Baked and fired. But a pot don't have the right to choose whether he be for water, wine, or just left empty. You have, son. You have. life philosophy wisdom Joanne Harris
380950f The hardest bones, containing the richest marrow, can be conquered only by a united crushing of all the teeth of all dogs. That of course is only a figure of speech and exaggerated; if all teeth were but ready they would not need even to bite, the bones would crack themselves and the marrow would be freely accessible to the feeblest of dogs. If I remain faithful to this metaphor, then the goal of my aims, my questions, my inquiries, appears monstrous, it is true. For I want to compel all dogs thus to assemble together, I want the bones to crack open under the pressure of their collective preparedness, and then I want to dismiss them to the ordinary life they love, while all by myself, quite alone, I lap up the marrow. That sounds monstrous, almost as if I wanted to feed on the marrow, not merely of bone, but of the whole canine race itself. But it is only a metaphor. The marrow that I am discussing here is no food; on the contrary, it is a poison. philosophy Franz Kafka
bb80126 ws`dthm lm tkn `l~ lrGm mn lHzn bl bfDlh. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
8c6723b A million zeros joined together do not, unfortunately, add up to one. Ultimately everything depends on the quality of the individual, but our fatally shortsighted age thinks only in terms of large numbers and mass organizations, though one would think that the world had seen more than enough of what a well-disciplined mob can do in the hands of a single madman. Unfortunately, this realization does not seem to have penetrated very far - and our blindness is extremely dangerous. philosophy collective-consciousness mob-mentality establishment subconscious individualism government democracy state psychology C.G. Jung
f99e7d7 I can always choose, but I ought to know that if I do not choose, I am still choosing. philosophy sartre Jean-Paul Sartre
dd21462 Nor let us be resentful when others differ from us. For all men have hearts, and each heart has its own leanings. Their right is our wrong, and our right is their wrong. life philosophy judgement Amartya Sen
3728dff This law ... defines the limits of competition in the community of life. You may compete to the full extent of your capabilities, but you may not hunt down your competitors or destroy their food or deny them access to food. In other words, you may compete but you may not wage war. philosophy ecology exploitation Daniel Quinn
160c564 Giving importance to what we think because we thought it, taking our own selves not only (to quote the Greek philosopher) as the measure of all things but as their norm or standard, we create in ourselves, if not an interpretation, at least a criticism of the universe, which we don't even know and therefore cannot criticize. The giddiest, most weak-minded of us then promote that criticism to an interpretation that's superimposed, like a hallucination; induced rather than deduced. It's a hallucination in the strict sense, being an illusion based on something only dimly seen. criticism philosophy opinions thought Fernando Pessoa
c822b66 A few dud universes can really clutter up your basement. philosophy Neal Stephenson
cc04dfd Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. What then kills love? Only this: Neglect. philosophy Jeanette Winterson
380f181 All depression has its roots in self-pity, and all self-pity is rooted in people taking themselves too seriously. irony humor philosophy self-pity pity psychology sarcasm Tom Robbins
29ccb0f "This is considered almost holy work by farmers and ranchers. Kill off everything you can't eat. Kill off anything that eats what you eat. Kill off anything that doesn't feed what you eat." "It IS holy work, in Taker culture. The more competitors you destroy, the more humans you can bring into the world, and that makes it just about the holiest work there is. Once you exempt yourself from the law of limited competition, everything in the world except your food and the food of your food becomes an enemy to be exterminated." philosophy ecology exploitation Daniel Quinn
38ad1ef My stupidity gave its blessing to succouring nature, on her knees before God. What I am (my drunken laughter and happiness) is nonetheless at stake, handed over to chance, thrown out into the night, chased away like a dog. The wind of truth responded like a slap to piety's extended cheek. The heart is human to the extent that it rebels (this means: to be a man is 'not to bow down before the law'). A poet doesn't justify -- he doesn't accept -- nature completely. True poetry is outside laws. But poetry ultimately accepts poetry. When to accept poetry changes it into its opposite (it becomes the mediator of an acceptance!) I hold back the leap in which I would exceed the universe, I justify the given world, I content myself with it poetry philosophy Georges Bataille
97298dc s'lh mdh bmknh 'n yqdm lh: khmr? l, l, lm tkn rGb@ fy lkhmr. dh kn hnk shy trGb fy shrbh, fsykwn lqhw@. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
f4f01c8 lHnyn l~ ljn@ dhan hw rGb@ lnsn fy 'lan ykwn nsnan. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
6167e05 Music shouldn't be just a tune, it should be a touch. story writing music song motivational philosophy wisdom inspirational advertisement album alliterations amit-kalantri amit-kalantri-quotes amit-kalantri-writer background-music background-score band catch-lines catchphrases concert drums michael-jackson movie-dialogue music-director music-industry music-quotes musicians playing pop script-writing scriptwriting speechwriting tag-lines vocal singer book-writing essay script instruments sound proverbs rock creative-writing rhetoric guitar singing novel-writing movie public-speaking quotes tune movies melody characters knowledge speech artist soul touch Amit Kalantri
43e34d9 fy sfr ltkwyn, `hd llh l~ lnsn blsyd@ `l~ lHywnt. wbmknn 'n nfsr dhlk qy'lyn n llh qd '`r hdhh lslT@ lh. lnsn lys mlk lkwkb bl wkylh w`lyh dht ywm 'n yqdm kshfan lHsbh. dykrt dhhb 'b`d mn dhlk fy hdh lmnH~: j`l lnsn <>. whw mnTqy jdan blt'kyd fym yt`lq bnfyh lwjwd lrwH `nd lHywnt. fHsb m yqwl dykrt, lnsn hw lmlk wlsyd fym lHywn lys l msyWran wal@ Hy@, 'w m ymsyh bl <>. `ndm yy'n lHywn fl'mr l yt`lq bshkw~ bl bSryr tTlqh al@ tsyr bshkl syy'. fHyn ty'z `jl@ `rb@ fhdh l y`ny 'n l`rb@ tt'lm bl l'nh tHtj l~ tshHym. wblTryq@ dhth yjb 'n yufsWr nHyb lHywn. wyjb 'l nshfq `l~ klb yushraWH whw HyW fy mkhtbr. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
58830c5 Saint Thomas Aquinas says, wisely, that the only way to drive out a bad passion is by a stronger good passion. The same is true of thoughts as of passions. When your mind wanders, like a child, your will must bring it back, like a mother. [. . .] The will-parent must discipline the mind-child, avoiding both the opposite extremes commonly made in disciplining either children or thoughts: tyranny or permissiveness. thoughts prayer philosophy Peter Kreeft
5ac7e00 It is culture that is the bully. philosophy sociology Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
7e4a297 If I want to understand an individual human being, I must lay aside all scientific knowledge of the average man and discard all theories in order to adopt a completely new and unprejudiced attitude. I can only approach the task of understanding with a free and open mind, whereas knowledge of man, or insight into human character, presupposes all sorts of knowledge about mankind in general. humanity philosophy non-duality individualism society statistics knowledge wholeness psychology C.G. Jung
4d59571 Do you know the only value life has is what life puts upon itself? And it is of course over-estimated since it is of necessity prejudiced in its own favour. Take that man I had aloft. He held on as if he were a precious thing, a treasure beyond diamonds or rubies. To you? No. To me? Not at all. To himself? Yes. But I do not accept his estimate. He sadly overrates himself. There is plenty more life demanding to be born. Had he fallen and dripped his brains upon the deck like honey from the comb, there would have been no loss to the world. He was worth nothing to the world. The supply is too large. To himself only was he of value, and to show how fictitious even this value was, being dead he is unconscious that he has lost himself. He alone rated himself beyond diamonds and rubies. Diamonds and rubies are gone, spread out on the deck to be washed away by a bucket of sea- water, and he does not even know that the diamonds and rubies are gone. He does not lose anything, for with the loss of himself he loses the knowledge of loss. Don't you see? And what have you to say? religion philosophy Jack London
086cecb Across the board... Not junkies or freaks, but people who were just as comfortable with drugs like weed, booze, or coke as we are - and we're not weird, are we? Hell no, we're just overworked professionals who need to relax now and then, have a bit of the whoop and the giggle, right? morality past philosophy Hunter S. Thompson
8e2b746 He [Wordsworth] invited his readers to abandon their usual perspective and to consider for a time how the world might look through other eyes, to shuttle between the human and the natural perspective. Why might this be interesting, or even inspiring? Perhaps because unhappiness can stem from only having one perspective to play with. writing philosophy perspective Alain de Botton
cfe1e0a Cheats prosper until there are enough who bear grudges against them to make sure they do not prosper. evolution philosophy ethics Peter Singer
8c218bd Most theists are deists most of the time, in practice if not in theory. They practice the absence of God instead of the presence of God. christianity god philosophy deist presence-of-god jesus-shock theist deism catholicism theology theism Peter Kreeft
1a83e76 "Epicurus founded a school of philosophy which placed great emphasis on the importance of pleasure. "Pleasure is the beginning and the goal of a happy life," he asserted, confirming what many had long thought, but philosophers had rarely accepted. Vulgar opinion at once imagined that the pleasure Epicurus had in mind involved a lot of money, sex, drink and debauchery (associations that survive in our use of the word 'Epicurean'). But true Epicureanism was more subtle. Epicurus led a very simple life, because after rational analysis, he had come to some striking conclusions about what actually made life pleasurable - and fortunately for those lacking a large income, it seemed that the essential ingredients of pleasure, however elusive, were not very expensive. The first ingredient was friendship. 'Of all the things that wisdom provides to help one live one's entire life in happiness, the greatest by far is the possession of friendship,' he wrote. So he bought a house near Athens where he lived in the company of congenial souls. The desire for riches should perhaps not always be understood as a simple hunger for a luxurious life, a more important motive might be the wish to be appreciated and treated nicely. We may seek a fortune for no greater reason than to secure the respect and attention of people who would otherwise look straight through us. Epicurus, discerning our underlying need, recognised that a handful of true friends could deliver the love and respect that even a fortune may not. philosophy inspirational Alain de Botton
d4d3165 So when people say that poetry is a luxury, or an option, or for the educated middle classes, or that it shouldn't be read in school because it is irrelevant, or any of the strange and stupid things that are said about poetry and its place in our lives, I suspect that the people doing the saying have had things pretty easy. A tough life needs a tough language - and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers - a language powerful enough to to say how it is. It isn't a hiding place. It is a finding place. literature reading poetry inspiration philosophy finding-meaning tough-life solace healing Jeanette Winterson
1d40cbe Everything he admired or loved had been the product of intense individualism. ...when had mass philosophies ever brought benefit or wisdom? philosophy wisdom John le Carré
b03bcbd The only debatable issue, it seems to me, is whether it is more ridiculous to turn to experts in social theory for general well-confirmed propositions, or to the specialists in the great religions and philosophical systems for insights into fundamental human values. religion philosophy social-sciences Noam Chomsky
b43d19b "Personally, I prefer Stevie Wonder," confessed the Chink, "but what the hell. Those cowgirls are always bitching because the only radio station in the area plays nothing but polkas, but I say you can dance to if you really feel like dancing." To prove it, he got up and danced to the news." passion philosophy Tom Robbins
70ef7f1 Bigger questions, questions with more than one answer, questions without an answer are the hardest to cope with in silence. Once asked they do not evaporate and leave the mind to its serener musings. Once asked they gain dimension and texture, trip you on the stairs, wake you at night-time. A black hole sucks up its surroundings and even light never escapes. Better then to ask no questions? Better then to be a contented pig than an unhappy Socrates? Since factory farming is tougher on pigs than it is on philosophers I'll take a chance. philosophy questions Jeanette Winterson
191c3bc Human thought, flying on the trapezes of the star-filled universe, with mathematics stretched beneath, was like an acrobat working with a net but suddenly noticing that in reality there is no net. philosophy thought Vladimir Nabokov
6f3b435 The application of this knife, the division of the world into parts and the building of this structure, is something everybody does. All the time we are aware of millions of things around us - these changing shapes, these burning hills, the sound of the engine, the feel of the throttle, each rock and weed and fence post and piece of debris beside the road - aware of these things but not really conscious of them unless there is something unusual or unless they reflect something we are predisposed to see. We could not possibly be conscious of these things and remember all of them because our mind would be so full of useless details we would be unable to think. From all this awareness we must select, and what we select and calls consciousness is never the same as the awareness because the process of selection mutates it. We take a handful of sand from the endless landscape of awareness around us and call that handful of sand the world. philosophy buddhism psychology Pirsig Robert M.
e2e1dfc Culture had worked in her own case, but during the last few weeks she had doubted whether it humanized the majority, so wide and so widening is the gulf that stretches between the natural and the philosophic man, so many the good chaps who are wrecked in trying to cross it. philosophy E.M. Forster
8ab4ee4 "Man can be master of nothing while he fears death, but he who does not fear it possesses all. If there were no suffering, man would not know his limitations, would not know himself. The hardest thing is to be able in your soul to unite the meaning of all. To unite all? Pierre asked himself. "No, not to unite. Thoughts cannot be united, but to harness all these thoughts together is what we need! Yes, one must harness them, must harness them!" philosophy inspirational inner-strength Leo Tolstoy
5ffe2f7 [Y]our agricultural revolution is not an event like the Trojan War, isolated in the distant past and without relevance to your lives today. The work begun by those neolithic farmers in the Near East has been carried forward from one generation to the next without a single break, right into the present moment. It's the foundation of your vast civilization today in exactly the same way that it was the foundation of the very first farming village. philosophy civilization Daniel Quinn
d510684 "[Woman] is simply what man decrees; thus she is called "the sex," by which is meant that she appears essentially to the male as a sexual being. For him she is sex -- absolute sex, no less. She is defined and differentiated with reference to man and not he with reference to her; she is incidental, the inessential as opposed to the essential. He is the Subject, he is the Absolute -- she is the Other." philosophy gender Simone de Beauvoir
b79ee3f I want to talk about another kind of high country now in the world of thought, which in some ways, for me at least, seems to parallel or produce feelings similar to this, and call it the high country of the mind. If all of human knowledge, everything that's known, is believed to be an enormous hierarchic structure, then the high country of the mind is found at the uppermost reaches of this structure in the most general, the most abstract considerations of all. Few people travel here. There's no real profit to be made from wandering through it, yet like this high country of the material world all around us, it has its own austere beauty that to some people makes the hardships of traveling through it seem worthwhile. In the high country of the mind one has to become adjusted to the thinner air of uncertainty, and to the enormous magnitude of questions asked, and to the answers proposed to these questions. The sweep goes on and on and on so obviously much further than the mind can grasp one hesitates even to go near for fear of getting lost in them and never finding one's way out. enlightenment philosophy high-country montana mountains wild meditation reflection consciousness awareness thought introspection Robert M. Pirsig
07eb9d9 I'm now asking an idle question of my own: which is better--cheap happiness, or lofty suffering? Well, which is better? philosophy notes-from-the-underground Fyodor Dostoyevsky
9480b18 A true confession: I believe in a soluble fish. fish philosophy Charles Simic
be568ec "So Merlyn sent you to me," said the badger, "to finish your education. Well, I can only teach you two things -- to dig, and love your home. These are the true end of philosophy." philosophy wisdom home T.H. White
e3f6711 The world was floods above and fire below philosophy Gregory Maguire
47157d5 ... science demands a terrible price - that we accept what experiments tell us about the universe, whether we like it or not. science philosophy superstition David Brin
29db738 In the pragmatist, streetwise climate of advanced postmodern capitalism, with its scepticism of big pictures and grand narratives, its hard-nosed disenchantment with the metaphysical, 'life' is one among a whole series of discredited totalities. We are invited to think small rather than big - ironically, at just the point when some of those out to destroy Western civilization are doing exactly the opposite. In the conflict between Western capitalism and radical Islam, a paucity of belief squares up to an excess of it. The West finds itself faced with a full-blooded metaphysical onslaught at just the historical point that it has, so to speak, philosophically disarmed. As far as belief goes, postmodernism prefers to travel light: it has beliefs, to be sure, but it does not have faith. faith religion life philosophy grand-narratives islamic-fundamentalism philosophical-scepticism western-world western-culture metaphysics islamic-terrorism belief capitalism islam islamism pragmatism postmodernism Terry Eagleton
223362e When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all these bets are off: he is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says. He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purpose. philosophy truth liar Harry G. Frankfurt
c4dabc4 My mistake was to confuse a destiny to love with a destiny to love a specific person. It was the error of thinking that Chloe, rather than love, was inevitable. philosophy Alain de Botton
7060cb4 mn lbdyhy 'nh l t`y hdhh lHqyq@, whdh shy mfhwm: flhdf ldhy nlHqh mHjwb `n dy'man . . Hyn trGb ft@ shb@ fy lzwj fhy trGb fy shy tjhlh tmman. wlshb ldhy yrkD wr lmjd l ymlk 'dn~ fkr@ `n lmjd. ldhlk, fn lshy ldhy y`Ty m`n~ ltSrftn shy njhlh tmman. sbyn 'yDan tjhl m hw lhdf mn rGbth fy lkhyn@. 'ykwn lhdf mnh lwSwl l~ lkhf@ Gyr lmHtml@ llky'n? mndh rHylh `n jnyf why tqtrb 'kthr f'kthr mn hdh lhdf. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
b4d08d6 "The Yogic path is about disentangling the built-in glitches of the human condition, which I'm going to over-simply define here as the heartbreaking inability to sustain contentment. Different schools of thought over the centuries have found different explanation for man's apparently inherently flawed state. Taoists call it imbalance, Buddism calls it ignorance, Islam blames our misery on rebellion against God, and the Judeo-Christian tradition attributes all our suffering to original sin. Freudians say that unhappiness is the inevitable result of the clash between our natural drives and civilization's needs. (As my friend Deborah the psychologist explains it: "Desire is the design flaw.") The Yogis, however, say that human discontentment is a simple case of mistaken identity. We're miserable because we think that we are mere individuals, alone with our fears and flaws and resentments and mortality. We wrongly believe that our limited little egos constitute our whole entire nature. We have failed to recognize our deeper divine character. We don't realize that, somewhere within us all, there does exist a supreme Self who is eternally at peace. That supreme Self is our true identity, universal and divine. Before you realize this truth, say the Yogis, you will always be in despair, a notion nicely expressed in this exasperated line from the Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus: "You bear God within you, poor wretch, and know it not." philosophy epictetus yogic-path eat-pray-love elizabeth-gilbert Elizabeth Gilbert
9d4a325 "We don't really want to get what we think that we want. I am married to a wife and relationship with her are cold and I have a mistress. And all the time I dream oh my god if my wife were to disappear - I'm not a murderer but let us say- that it will open up a new life with the mistress.Then, for some reason, the wife goes away, you lose the mistress. You thought this is all I want, when you have it there, you turn out it was a much more complex situation. marriage people philosophy Slavoj Žižek
344d837 The rich fop Francis of Assisi was bored all his life--until he fell in love with Christ and gave all his stuff away and became the troubadour of Lady Poverty. christianity philosophy francis-of-assisi lady-poverty saint-francis st-francis-of-assisi troubadour jesus-shock catholicism theology christ Peter Kreeft
003e291 God gives us not only the truth but also the ability to believe it; not only the new thing to see but also the new eye to see it with. christianity faith spirituality god philosophy truth jesus-shock theology Peter Kreeft
022e0c9 hl SHyH 'nh yjb `lyn 'n nrf` Swtn Hyn yuskt 'Hdhm rjlan? n`m. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
05e8540 Small talk... Bernie resented it more than life itself. The weather, sports scores, frivolous gossip... nothing real, nothing serious, nothing meaningful about it. People were experts at wasting their brief, precious years on earth with small talk. life philosophy small-talk serious meaningful small talk waste Rebecca McNutt
f4a1123 A philosophy professor at my college, whose baby became enamored of the portrait of David Hume on a Penguin paperback, had the cover laminated in plastic so her daughter could cut her teeth on the great thinker. philosophy Anne Fadiman
761265d "Bouldering isn't really a sport. It's a climbing activity with metaphysical, mystical, and philosophical overtones." -John Gill-" philosophy climbing sport Jon Krakauer
7af5990 'thn lnhr, knt tyryz tHwl jhd@ (lkn dwn 'n ttmkn f`lan) l'n tSdq m yqwlh twms w'n tkwn s`yd@ km f`lt Ht~ lan. Gyr 'n lGyr@ lmkbwt@ fy lnhr knt tZhr bshkl 'kthr `nfan fy 'Hlmh lty tnthy dy'man bnHyb l ynqT` l Hyn ywqZh twms. knt 'Hlmh ttkrr `l~ shkl Hlqt mtnw`@ 'w mslslin tlfzywny. thm@ Hlw kn ytkrr bstmrr `l~ sbyl lmthl, whw Hlm lhrr@ lty tqfz l~ wjhh munshb@ mkhlbh fy jldh. fy lHqyq@ ymkn tfsyr hdh lHlm bshwl@: lhr@ fy llG@ ltshyky@ klm@ `my@ t`ny ft@ jmyl@. knt tyryz dhan tsh`r 'nh mhdd@ mn lns, kl lns. flns kluWhn `shyqt mHtmlt ltwms wlhdh fhy tkhf mnhn. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
2461186 ybdw 'n fy ldmG mnTq@ khS@ tmman wymkn tsmyth b<>, why lty tsjWl kl l'shy lty sHrtn 'w lty j`ltn nnf`l 'mmh, wkl m y`Ty lHytn jmlh. mdh t`rWf twms l~ tyryz, lm y`d l'y mr'@ lHq fy 'n ttrk 'thran wlw `bran fy hdhh lmnTq@ mn dmGh. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
be2aa36 If I didn't try to assume responsibility for my own existence, it would seem utterly absurd to go on existing. freedom philosophy the-age-of-reason the-roads-to-freedom jean-paul-sartre french-literature Jean-Paul Sartre
cf25fa0 As understanding deepens, the further removed it becomes from knowledge. understanding philosophy the-mind self-reflection logical-thinking rationality knowledge psychology C.G. Jung
e1941b7 Religion is tied to the deepest feelings people have. The love that arises from that stewing pot is the sweetest and strongest, but the hate is the hottest, and the anger is the most violent. religion love philosophy Orson Scott Card
d943e5a The one who merely flees is not yet free. In fleeing he is still conditioned by that from which he flees. escape freedom philosophy flee fleeing german-idealism Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
905dbb4 "You want to know what's wrong with the world?" Dad paused. "It's this alienation that permeates every aspect of humanity." christianity humanity philosophy world-views objectivism ayn-rand Mark David Henderson
a6ed2fd You talk a lot about this amazing flow of time but you hardly see it. you see a women, you think that one day she'll be old, only you don't see her grow old. But there are moments when you think you see her grow old and feel yourself growing old with her: this is the feeling of adventure. philosophy Jean-Paul Sartre
5b8c3cb For that moment I touched an emotion beyond the common range of men, yet one the poor brutes we dominate know only too well. I felt as a rabbit might feel returning to his burrow, and suddenly confronted by the work of a dozen busy navvies digging the foundations of a house. I felt the first inkling of a thing that presently grew quite clear in my mind, that oppressed me for many days, a sense of dethronement, a persuasion that I was no longer master, but an animal among animals; under the Martian heel. philosophy master power H.G. Wells
225dc7b It is not an unusual life curve for Westerners - to live i n and be shaped by the bigness, sparseness, space clarity & hopefulness of the West, to go away for study and enlargement and the perspective that distance and dissatisfaction can give, and then to return to what pleases the sight and enlists the loyalty and demands the commitment. life-and-living philosophy vastness west western Wallace Stegner
9bf6970 "The last of the cherry blossom. On the tree, it turns ever more perfect. And when it's perfect, it falls. And then of course once it hits the philosophy perfect David Mitchell
b08bdc5 kn bmkn anW 'n tnhy Hyth bTryq@ 'khr~ mkhtlf@ tmman. wlkn Hfz lmHT@ wlmwt, hdh lHfz ldhy l yuns~ lqtrnh bbdy@ lHb, kn yjdhbh fy lHZt ly's, bjmlh lqy'm. flnsn ynsj Hyth `l~ Gyr `lm mnh wfqan lqwnyn ljml Ht~ fy lHZt ly's l'kthr qtm@. l ymkn dhan 'n y'khdh 'Hd `l~ rwy@ fttnh bltfq lGmD llSdf. (mthlan, tlqy frwnsky wanW wlrSyf wlmwt 'w tlqy bythwvn wtwms wtyryz wk's lkwnyk). lkn ymkn 'n yw'khdh biHqinW `l~ lnsn Hyn yu`my `ynyh `n hdhh lSdf fyHrm bltly Hyth mn bu`d ljml. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
306de19 Philosophy is not a spectator sport. philosophy spectator sport Nigel Warburton
8ce942d Yet she could see by their shocked and altered faces that even their virtues were being burned away. philosophy Flannery O'Connor
ad43a51 So he came to realize that learning a language was perhaps the most profound thing a man could do. Not only did it require wrapping different sounds around the very movement of your soul, it involved learning things somehow already known, as though much of what he was somehow existed apart from him. A kind of enlightenment accompanied these first lessons, a deeper understanding of self. philosophy R. Scott Bakker
354dbd4 If the world was made for us, then it BELONGS to us and we can do what we damn well please with it. philosophy exploitation Daniel Quinn
a6d9c8c As Plato: We become more worthy the more we bend our minds to the impersonal. We become better as we take in the universe, thinking more about the largeness that it is and laugh about the smallness that is us. philosophy theology Rebecca Goldstein
9c0bbde If you've a notion of what man's heart is, wouldn't you say that maybe the whole effort of man on earth to build a civilization is simply man's frantic and frightened attempt to hide himself from himself? That there is a part of man that man wants to reject? That man wants to keep from knowing what he is? That he wants to protect himself from seeing that he is something awful? And that this 'awful' part of himself might not be as awful as he thinks, but he finds it too strange and he does not know what to do with it? We talk about what to do with the atom bomb...But man's heart, his spirit is the deadliest thing in creation. Are not all cultures and civilizations just screens which men have used to divide themselves, to put between that part of themselves which they are afraid of and that part of themselves which they wish, in their deep timidity, to try to preserve? Are not all of man's efforts at order an attempt to still man's fear of himself? man fear philosophy culture Richard Wright
1f993c8 "It comes as no surprise to find [Norman] Mailer embracing [in the book ] a form of Manicheanism, pitting the forces of light and darkness against each other in a permanent stand-off, with humanity as the battlefield. (When asked if Jesus is part of this battle, he responds rather loftily that he thinks it is a distinct possibility.) But it is at points like this that he talks as if all the late-night undergraduate talk sessions on the question of theism had become rolled into one. 'How can we not face up to the fact that if God is All-Powerful, He cannot be All-Good. Or She cannot be All-Good.' Mailer says that questions such as this have bedevilled 'theologians', whereas it would be more accurate to say that such questions, posed by philosophers, have attempted to put theologians out of business. A long exchange on the probability of reincarnation (known to Mailer sometimes as "karmic reassignment") manages to fall slightly below the level of those undergraduate talk sessions. The Manichean stand-off leads Mailer, in closing, to speculate on what God might desire politically and to say: 'In different times, the heavens may have been partial to monarchy, to communism, and certainly the Lord was interested in democracy, in capitalism. (As was the Devil!)' I think it was at this point that I decided I would rather remember Mailer as the author of good-and-evil jesus politics religion god philosophy omnibenevolence omnipotence norman-mailer theology theism monarchy reincarnation capitalism democracy communism devil Christopher Hitchens
61950f2 He had a look of composed dissatisfaction, as if he understood life thoroughly. education philosophy insight Flannery O'Connor
47b6f0b "The true philosopher is a man who says "All right," and goes to sleep in his armchair." philosophy resignation P.G. Wodehouse
0f60470 You have to be an artist and a madman... life philosophy truth-of-life Vladimir Nabokov
58733c9 For everyone now strives most of all to seperate his person, wishing to experience the fullness of life within himself, and yet what comes of all his efforts is not the fullness of life, but full suicide, for instead of the fullness of self-definition, they fall into complete isolation. philosophy self Fyodor Dostoyevsky
787bddd I receive your love and I give you mine. Not the love of a man for women, not the love of a father for a child, not the love of God for his creatures, but a love with no name and no explanation, like a river that cannot explain why it follows sometimes we need to be strangers to ourselves. Then the hidden light in our soul will illuminate what we need to see. philosophy Paulo Coelho
b8facd2 Art is whatever you can get away with. philosophy communications media Marshall McLuhan
cfe0237 Everyone knows that dragons don't exist. But while this simplistic formulation may satisfy the layman, it does not suffice for the scientific mind. The School of Higher Neantical Nillity is in fact wholly unconcerned with what does exist. Indeed, the banality of existence has been so amply demonstrated, there is no need for us to discuss it any further here. The brilliant Cerebron, attacking the problem analytically, discovered three distinct kinds of dragon: the mythical, the chimerical, and the purely hypothetical. They were all, one might say, nonexistent, but each non-existed in an entirely different way. existence science philosophy non-existence Stanisław Lem
43b5548 From being a movement aiming for universal freedom, communism turned into a system of universal despotism. That is the logic of utopia. suffering philosophy despotism utopia John Gray
b3ee46d L'etude du beau est un duel ou l'artiste crie de frayeur avant d'etre vaincu. philosophy Charles Baudelaire
83958e4 Staring at a world too horrible to comprehend, believing -- by dint of ignorance and innocence -- that beneath this unbearable contract of guilt and blame there is always an older contract that may bind and release in a more salutary way. hope philosophy dorothy witch innocence wicked ignorance Gregory Maguire
86cfdfe Morality can provide at most only a severely limited and insufficient answer to the question of how a person should live. love philosophy Harry G. Frankfurt
5bcb784 "[Men] prefer the foolish belief and the passions of the earth [to the enlightenment of their souls]. They believe the absurd and shrink from the truth." "No, they do not. They are afraid, that is all. And they must remain on earth until they come to the way of leaving it." "And how do they leave? How is the ascent made? Must one learn virtue?" Here she laughs. "You have read too much, and learned too little. Virtue is a road, not a destination. Man cannot be virtuous. Understanding is the goal. When that is achieved, the soul can take wing." mankind understanding virtue enlightenment fear philosophy truth soul Iain Pears
47e7cbd So you think money is the root of all evil? Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim you product by tears, or of looters, who can take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil? money morality philosophy money-issues root-of-money Ayn Rand
525ef59 zd `l~ dhlk 'n hdhh l'Hlm, l~ fSHth, knt jmyl@. lqd 'Gfl frwyd hdh ljnb fy nZryth `n l'Hlm. flHlm lys fqT blGan (blGan mrmwzan `nd lqtD) bl hw 'yDan nshT jmly wl`b@ llkhyl. whdhh ll`b@ hy bHd dhth qym@. flHlm hw lbrhn `l~ 'n ltkhyl wtSwWr m lys lh wjwd, hw Hd~ lHjt l'ssy@ llnsn, whn ykmn 'Sl lkhTr lkhd` lkmn fy lHlm. flw 'n lHlm lys jmylan, l'mknn nsynh bshwl@. ldhlk, knt tyryz trj` bstmrr l~ 'Hlmh wt`ydh fy mkhylth wtkhtlq mnh 'sTyr. 'mW twms fkn y`ysh fy knf lsHr lmnwWm, sHr ljml l'lym l'Hlm tyryz. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
958e313 Man has been called a rational being, but rationality is a matter of choice -- and the alternative his nature offers him is: rational being or suicidal animal. Man has to be man -- by choice; he has to hold his life as a value -- by choice; he has to learn to sustain it -- by choice; he has to discover the values it requires and practice his virtues -- by choice. A code of values accepted by choice is a code of morality. virtue man mind good morality choice reason life philosophy john-galt pursuit-of-happiness objectivism rational think thinking morals values evil Ayn Rand
3369504 An ordinary mirror is silvered at the back but the window of the night train has darkness behind the glass. My face and the faces of other travellers were now mirrored on this darkness in a succession of stillnesses. Consider this, said the darkness: any motion at any speed is a succession of stillnesses; any section through an action will show just such a plane of stillness as this dark window in which your seeking face is mirrored. And in each plane of stillness is the moment of clarity that makes you responsible for what you do. philosophy reflection Russell Hoban
667b300 Thinking is man's only basic virtue, from which all the others proceed. And his basic vice, the source of all his evils, is that nameless act which all of you practice, but struggle never to admit: the act of blanking out, the willful suspension of one's consciousness, the refusal to think - not blindness, but the refusal to see; not ignorance, but the refusal to know. It is the act of unfocusing your mind and inducing an inner fog to escape the responsibility of judgment - on the unstated premise that a thing will not exist if only you refuse to identify it, that A will not be A so long as you do not pronounce the verdict 'It is. virtue man mind good morality reason life philosophy truth wisdom john-galt pursuit-of-happiness objectivism rational think thinking morals values evil Ayn Rand
3096657 qlt: <>. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
82664d4 The spruce and cedar on its shores, hung with gray lichens, looked at a distance like the ghosts of trees. Ducks were sailing here and there on its surface, and a solitary loon, like a more living wave, -- a vital spot on the lake's surface, -- laughed and frolicked, and showed its straight leg, for our amusement. philosophy wildlife Henry David Thoreau
2b35498 Buffett does enjoy being a billionaire, but in offbeat ways. As he put it, though money cannot change your health or how many people love you, it lets you be in 'more interesting environments. money philosophy warren-buffett Roger Lowenstein
6bf5fc8 I should go so far as to say that embedded in the surrealistic frame of a television news show is a theory of anticommunication, featuring a type of discourse that abandons logic, reason, sequence and rules of contradiction. In aesthetics, I believe the name given to this theory is Dadaism; in philosophy, nihilism; in psychiatry, schizophrenia. In the parlance of the theater, it is known as vaudeville. television philosophy public-discourse epistemology culture ideology Neil Postman
31092e9 What is humor?' one of their professors had posed, and he had answered, ''nondangerous, unexpectedly inappropriate juxtaposition. philosophy psychology Sena Jeter Naslund
27d2fe3 The State in particular is turned into a quasi-animate personality from whom everything is expected. In reality it is only a camouflage for those individuals who know how to manipulate it. freedom politics philosophy services welfare the-self individualism society state psychology C.G. Jung
d83cc15 Hence the sterile, uninspiring futility of a great many theoretical discussions of ethics, and the resentment which many people feel towards such discussions: moral principles remain in their minds as floating abstractions, offering them a goal they cannot grasp and demanding that they reshape their souls in its image, thus leaving them with a burden of undefinable moral guilt. philosophy ethics Ayn Rand
ffff59f I've noticed...that whenever a man is asked to be realistic he is being asked to betray something in which he believes. It is the favorite argument of those who believe that only the end matters, not the means. philosophy truth wisdom Louis L'Amour
b3a591b Survival, it is called. Often it is accidental, sometimes it is engineered by creatures or forces that we have no conception of, always it is temporary. philosophy survival Wallace Stegner
fbf8f64 Manlius ... took care in his invitations, actively sought to exclude from his circle crude and vulgar men like Caius Valerius. But they were all around; it was Manlius who lived in a dream world, and his bubble of civility was becoming smaller and smaller. Caius Valerius, powerful member of a powerful family, had never even heard of Plato. A hundred, even fifty years before, such an absurdity would have been inconceivable. Now it was surprising if such a man did know anything of philosophy, and even if it was explained, he would not wish to understand. understanding education philosophy like-mindedness crudeness plato vulgarity civilization materialism knowledge power Iain Pears
b412a98 "I have brought peace to this land, and security," he began. "And what of your soul, when you use the cleverness of argument to cloak such acts? Do you think that the peace of a thousand cancels out the unjust death of one single person? It may be desirable, it may win you praise from those who have happily survived you and prospered from your deeds, but you have committed ignoble acts, and have been too proud to own them. I have waited patiently here, hoping that you would come to me, for if you understood, then some of your acts would be mitigated. But instead you send me this manuscript, proud, magisterial, and demonstrating only that you have understood nothing at all." "I returned to public life on your advice, madam," he said stiffly. "Yes; I advised it. I said if learning must die it should do so with a friend by its bedside. Not an assassin." -- virtue injustice killing good learning philosophy public-office doctrine prosperity peace pride vice soul values evil Iain Pears
f12aa7c Philosophy cannot be extinguished, though men will try ... The spirit seeks the light, that is its nature. It wishes to return to its origin, and must forever try to reach enlightenment. philosophy human-spirit Iain Pears
fb61cc2 The options available to a creative person are ever limited by the choices offered by a philosopher. science philosophy interesting Neil deGrasse Tyson
d53b12a If God created our will, then he's responsible for every choice we make... So-- as I recall, the official philosophical answer is that free will doesn't exist. Only the illusion of free will, because the causes of hour behavior are so complex that we can't trace them back. If you've got one line of dominoes knocking each other down, one by one, then you can always say, look, this domino fell because that one pushed it. But when you have an infinite number of dominoes that can be traced back in an infinite number of directions, you can never find where the causal chain begins. So you think, That domino fell because it wanted to... Even if there is no such thing as free will, we have to treat each other as if there were free will in order to live together in society. want freedom philosophy dominoes Orson Scott Card
c10cea1 You look at these mountains now, and they look so permanent and peaceful, but they're changing all the time and the changes aren't always peaceful. Underneath us, beneath us here right now, there are forces that can tear this whole mountain apart. nature philosophy mountains Robert M. Pirsig
278bdde The only Thought which Philosophy brings with it to the contemplation of History, is the simple conception of Reason; that Reason is the Sovereign of the World; that the history of the world, therefore, presents us with a rational process. reason philosophy Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
cdb619d lm tkn lrwH qdr@ `l~ shH@ bSrh `n shy'b@ lwld@ lmstdyr@ lsmr fwq l`n@ tmman; knt lrwH tr~ fy hdhh lshy'b@ khtman wsmt bh ljsd, wknt tjd 'n tHrk `Dw Gryb `l~ mqrb@ jdan mn hdh lkhtm lmqds, 'mr fyh tjdyf. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
2d6c166 kn ykhsh~ fy 'Glb l'Hyn 'n yjdh jls@ `l~ 'rD ldkn ldhy tshtry mnh lsjy'r. sex psychological political religion love philosophy جنس friedrich-nietzche milan-kundera neitzsche اجتماع كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة religion-and-philoshophy حب philosophy-of-life friedrich-nietzsche sociology novel psychology ميلان كونديرا
4200425 The willing are led by fate, the reluctant are dragged. philosophy epictetus stoic marcus-aurelius seneca stoicism Cleanthes of Assos
3a71a5f Independence is the recognition of the fact that yours is the responsibility of judgment and nothing can help you escape it--that no substitute can do your thinking--that the vilest form of self-abasement and self-destruction is the subordination of your mind to the mind of another, the acceptance of an authority over your brain, the acceptance of his assertions as facts, his say-so as truth, his edicts as middle-man between your consciousness and your existence. virtue pain man mind good independence morality reason happiness life philosophy truth wisdom john-galt pursuit-of-happiness objectivism rational think thinking morals values evil Ayn Rand
13ff5cd A farm regulated to production of raw commodities is not a farm at all. It is a temporary blip until the land is used up, the water polluted, the neighbors nauseated, and the air unbreathable. The farmhouse, the concrete, the machinery, and outbuildings become relics of a bygone vibrancy when another family farm moves to the city financial centers for relief. philosophy Joel Salatin
56f7d48 Imagine a problem in psychology: to find a way of getting people in our day and age - Christians, humanitarians, nice, kind people - to commit the most heinous crimes without feeling any guilt. There is only one solution - doing just what we do now: you make them governors, superintendents, officers or policemen, a process which, first of all, presupposes acceptance of something that goes by the name of government service and allows people to be treated like inanimate objects, precluding any humane or brotherly relationships, and, secondly, ensures that people working for this government service must be so interdependent that responsibility for any consequences of the way they treat people never devolves on any one of them individually. people philosophy law society resurrection Leo Tolstoy
ee1e7bd One must try to make one's life as pleasant as possible. I'm alive and it's not my fault, which means I must somehow go on living the best I can, without bothering anybody, until I die.' 'But what makes you live? With such thoughts, you'll sit without moving, without undertaking anything...' 'Life won't leave one alone as it is. meaning philosophy purpose Leo Tolstoy
abca5c4 Even a feeble-minded man wants to be like other men. A child may not know how to feed itself, or what to eat, yet it knows hunger. philosophy science-fiction psychology Daniel Keyes
60b729b "I have often noticed that these things, which obsess me, neither bother nor impress other people even slightly. I am horribly apt to approach some innocent at a gathering, and like the ancient mariner, fix him with a wild, glitt'ring eye and say, "Do you know that in the head of the caterpillar of the ordinary goat moth there are two hundred twenty-eight separate muscles?" The poor wretch flees. I am not making chatter; I mean to change his life." fate seeing free light poem prayer nature poetry freedom joy spirit wonder faith beauty religion science god philosophy enoughness exultant illumination intricacy joyfulness living-in-the-present-moment religious-diversity stalking-the-gaps the-tree-with-the-lights-in-it gaps philosopher-s-stone multiplicity praying prayers hallelujah life-force seeking exploration praise joyful mindfulness epiphany tolerance grace energy disbelief watching growth belief fearless humility consciousness walking fire mystery curiosity power soul poet creation Annie Dillard
98a01e0 - Vzemete koito shchete moriak, gazil v d'lboki vodi i sreshchal sm'rtta tolkova p'ti, kolkoto men, drasnete go s nok't po kozhata i otdolu shche namerite filosof. Zasukanite dumi shche sa mu chuzhdi, garantiram vi, no shche namerite d'lbok i traen uset za miastoto mu v sveta. world life philosophy българия bulgaria магьосник майстор философ bulgarian feist raymond амос война място разлом реймънд фийст живот more philosopher saga бард български place filosofia sea Raymond E. Feist
109db25 Once I got away from him, I was smart enough to stay away from him. To hunt that one is as wise as to go hunting a porcupine. I cannot leave this alone, Nighteyes. I understand. I am the same about porcupines. philosophy laugh-out-loud Robin Hobb
d7c3c90 How keen everyone is to make this world their home forgetting its impermanence It's like trying to see and name constellations in a fireworks display. literature philosophy Nadeem Aslam
46fd189 What we encounter in works of art and philosophy are objective versions of our own pains and struggles, evoked and defined in sound, language or image. Artists and philosophers not only show us what we have felt, they present our experiences more poignantly and intelligently than we have been able; they give shape to aspects of our lives that we recognise as our own, yet could never have understood so clearly on our own. They explain our condition to us, and thereby help us to be less lonely with, and confused by it. self-knowledge poetry philosophy Alain de Botton
bdc4243 The best way for you to get that new experience is to change your response to what happens. happiness life philosophy zen-and-the-art-of-happiness zen Chris Prentiss
cec2912 Who you allow into the circle of your life will make the difference in the quality of your life. friendship happiness life philosophy zen-and-the-art-of-happiness zen Chris Prentiss
0305507 Living as human being and as a divinity. moving from tension into relaxation, from relaxation into trance, from trance into a more intense contact with other people. from that contact back into tension and so on, Like The Serpent swallowing its own tail. spiritual philosophy Paulo Coelho
3297c43 Happiness is the successful state of life, pain is an agent of death. Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values. A morality that dares to tell you to find happiness in the renunciation of your happiness--to value the failure of your values--is an insolent negation of morality. virtue man mind good morality reason happiness life philosophy john-galt pursuit-of-happiness objectivism rational think thinking morals values evil Ayn Rand
6659a53 You have sacrificed justice to mercy. You have sacrificed independence to unity. You have sacrificed reason to faith. You have sacrificed wealth to need. You have sacrificed self-esteem to self-denial. You have sacrificed happiness to duty. sacrifice life philosophy john-galt morals values Ayn Rand
f65b159 But, in fact, a person's sexual choice is the result and sum of their fundamental convictions. Tell me what a person finds sexually attractive and I will tell you their entire philosophy of life. sex life philosophy convictions Ayn Rand
d839fda That's one benefit of travelling to your own future, and making the trip part of your past. time lessons future past philosophy decisions James A. Owen
4e4ad66 Most people are like sheep. Nice, harmless creatures who want nothing more than to be left alone so they can graze. But then of course there are wolves. Who want nothing more than to eat the sheep. But there's a third kind of person. The sheepdog. Sheepdogs have fangs like wolves. But their instinct isn't predation. It's protection. All they want, what they live for, is to protect the flock. philosophy sheepdog predation sheep wolves protect police Barry Eisler
35ec3d5 Miss Abbott, don't worry over me. Some people are born not to do things. I'm one of them. life philosophy where-angels-fear-to-tread forster E.M. Forster
1ff72f5 THE PRESOCRATIC PROBLEM [all snap flags] Parmenides named his gun The Hot Power of the Stars. His gun was one, uncreated, imperishable, timeless, changeless, perfect, spherical. Spherical was the problem. poetry religion philosophy Anne Carson
f2f363f "It's astonishing how much trouble one can get oneself into, if one works at it. And astonishing how much trouble one can get oneself out of, if one simply assumes that everything will, somehow or other, work out for the best." -Destruction" confidence happiness philosophy wisdom inspirational essential knowledge-of-self human-nature values Neil Gaiman
9c425e3 Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action. If an organism fails in that action, it dies...It is only the concept of 'Life' that makes the concept of 'Value' possible. It is only to a living entity that things can be good or evil. virtue man mind good morality reason life philosophy john-galt pursuit-of-happiness objectivism think thinking morals values evil Ayn Rand
eb0add4 I am the man who loves his life. I am the man who does not sacrifice his love or his values. philosophy john-galt Ayn Rand
c56297b Sublime natures are seldom clean! philosophy decreation Longinus
5837ee9 "God is triune, and all reality is structured in terms of Him. A brief definition of the Trinity might be this: One God without division in a plurality of Persons, and three Persons without confusion in a unity of essence. philosophy the-one-and-the-many trinity David Chilton
5014ddc Edward Gibbon (1737-1794) in his said that the following five attributes marked Rome at its end: first, a mounting love of show and luxury (that is, affluence); second, a widening gap between the very rich and the very poor (this could be among countries in the family of nations as well as in a single nation); third, an obsession with sex; fourth, freakishness in the arts, masquerading as originality, and enthusiasms pretending to be creativity; fifth, an increased desire to live off the state. It all sounds so familiar. We have come a long road since our first chapter, and we are back in Rome. faith philosophy culture-critique Francis A. Schaeffer
778544c Our problem isn't that we're individualists. It's that our individualism is static rather than dynamic. We value what we think rather than what we do. We forget that we haven't done, or been, what we thought; that the first function of life is action, just as the first property of things is motion. identity philosophy static dynamic motion individualism self Fernando Pessoa
fba57b0 Maybe man is nothing in particular,' Cross said gropingly. 'Maybe that's the terror of it. Man may be just anything at all. And maybe man deep down suspects this, really knows this, kind of dreams that it is true; but at the same time he does not want really to know it? May not human life on this earth be a kind of frozen fear of man at what he could possibly be? And every move he makes might not these moves be just to hide this awful fact? To twist it into something which he feels would make him rest and breathe a little easier? What man is is perhaps too much to be borne by man... man philosophy human-nature Richard Wright
99e1717 "Electrons, when they were first discovered, behaved exactly like particles or bullets, very simply. Further research showed, from electron diffraction experiments for example, that they behaved like waves. As time went on there was a growing confusion about how these things really behaved ---- waves or particles, particles or waves? Everything looked like both. This growing confusion was resolved in 1925 or 1926 with the advent of the correct equations for quantum mechanics. Now we know how the electrons and light behave. But what can I call it? If I say they behave like particles I give the wrong impression; also if I say they behave like waves. They behave in their own inimitable way, which technically could be called a quantum mechanical way. They behave in a way that is like nothing that you have seen before. Your experience with things that you have seen before is incomplete. The behavior of things on a very tiny scale is simply different. An atom does not behave like a weight hanging on a spring and oscillating. Nor does it behave like a miniature representation of the solar system with little planets going around in orbits. Nor does it appear to be somewhat like a cloud or fog of some sort surrounding the nucleus. It behaves like nothing you have seen before. There is one simplication at least. Electrons behave in this respect in exactly the same way as photons; they are both screwy, but in exactly in the same way.... The difficulty really is psychological and exists in the perpetual torment that results from your saying to yourself, "But how can it be like that?" which is a reflection of uncontrolled but utterly vain desire to see it in terms of something familiar. I will not describe it in terms of an analogy with something familiar; I will simply describe it. There was a time when the newspapers said that only twelve men understood the theory of relativity. I do not believe there ever was such a time. There might have been a time when only one man did, because he was the only guy who caught on, before he wrote his paper. But after people read the paper a lot of people understood the theory of relativity in some way or other, certainly more than twelve. On the other hand, I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics. So do not take the lecture too seriously, feeling that you really have to understand in terms of some model what I am going to describe, but just relax and enjoy it. I am going to tell you what nature behaves like. If you will simply admit that maybe she does behave like this, you will find her a delightful, entrancing thing. Do not keep saying to yourself, if you can possible avoid it, "But how can it be like that?" because you will get 'down the drain', into a blind alley from which nobody has escaped. Nobody knows how it can be like that." science philosophy quantum-mechanics physics Richard P. Feynman
8739e48 [N]ow we have a clearer idea what this story is all about: The world was made for man, and man was made to rule it. philosophy exploitation Daniel Quinn
75fb03b How can you possibly hope to reform her after the life she's been leading?' 'It's not her I'm wanting to reform - it's me,' he replied. 'Besides, it's taking me into a world where I can do some good.' 'I can't imagine you happy.' 'That's not the point.' 'Of course it isn't. But if she has a heart, she can't be happy either. She can't want you to do that.' 'No, she doesn't.' 'I see. But life...' 'What about life?' 'Life demands something different.' 'Life only wants us to do the right things,' said Nekhlyudov. -Resurrection love philosophy resurrection Leo Tolstoy
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