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Tue, 11 Nov 2025 - 02:01

The essential is to cease being free and to obey, in repentance, a greater rogue than oneself. When we are all guilty, that will be democracy.

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Tue, 11 Nov 2025 - 02:01

Since we're all going to die, it's obvious that when and how don't matter.

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Thu, 20 Nov 2025 - 03:19

The first duty of a man is the seeking after and the investigation of truth.

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Fri, 7 Nov 2025 - 03:04

.... In a word, acts of any kind produce habits or characters of the same kind. Hence we ought to make sure that our acts are of a certain kind; for the resulting character varies as they vary. It makes no small difference, therefore, whether a man be trained in his youth up in this way or that, but a great difference, or rather all the difference.

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Fri, 7 Nov 2025 - 03:04

It is the mark of an educated man to look for precision in each class of things just so far as the nature of the subject admits; it is evidently equally foolish to accept probable reasoning from a mathematician and to demand from a rhetorician scientific proofs.

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 04:25

The wise is one only. It is unwilling and willing to be called by the name of Zeus.

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Thu, 6 Nov 2025 - 23:24

If it were so, as conceited sagacity, proud of not being deceived, thinks, that we should believe nothing that we cannot see with our physical eyes, then we first and foremost ought to give up believing in love. ... We can be deceived by believing what is untrue, but we certainly are also deceived by not believing what is true. ... Which deception is more dangerous?

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:11
Art furnishes us with eyes and hands and above all the good conscience to be able to turn ourselves into such a phenomenon.
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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. 6:53-56

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 01:07

Listen widely to remove your doubts and be careful when speaking about the rest and your mistakes will be few. See much and get rid of what is dangerous and be careful in acting on the rest and your causes for regret will be few. Speaking without fault, acting without causing regret: 'upgrading' consists in this.

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Tue, 11 Nov 2025 - 02:01

The absurd does not liberate; it binds. It does not authorize all actions. "Everything is permitted" does not mean that nothing is forbidden.

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Fri, 7 Nov 2025 - 03:04

Wit is cultured insolence.

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 03:51

If you reject absolutely any single sensation without stopping to discriminate with respect to that which awaits confirmation between matter of opinion and that which is already present, whether in sensation or in feelings or in any immediate perception of the mind, you will throw into confusion even the rest of your sensations by your groundless belief and so you will be rejecting the standard of truth altogether. If in your ideas based upon opinion you hastily affirm as true all that awaits confirmation as well as that which does not, you will not escape error, as you will be maintaining complete ambiguity whenever it is a case of judging between right and wrong opinion.

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Tue, 11 Nov 2025 - 02:01

Ironic philosophies produce passionate works. Any thought that abandons unity glorifies diversity! And diversity is the home of art. The only thought to liberate the mind is that which leaves it alone, certain of its limits and of its impending end. No doctrine tempts it. It awaits the ripening of the work and of life.

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Thu, 20 Nov 2025 - 03:19

If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:11
The reasons and purposes for habits are always lies that are added only after some people begin to attack these habits and to ask for reasons and purposes. At this point the conservatives of all ages are thoroughly dishonest: they add lies.
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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

The elders of the Jews answered and said unto Jesus: What shall we see? Firstly, that thou wast born of fornication; secondly, that thy birth in Bethlehem was the cause of the slaying of children; thirdly, that thy father Joseph and thy mother Mary fled into Egypt because they had no confidence before the people. Acts of Pilate, or The Gospel of Nicodemus (ca. 150-255)

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

I don't believe in an afterlife, so I don't have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of heaven would be even worse.

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Fri, 7 Nov 2025 - 03:04

If, then, in the sphere of action there is some one end which we desire for its own sake, and for the sake of which we desire every thing else; and if we do not choose every thing for the sake of something else, for this would go on without limit, and our desire would be idle and futile, it is clear that this must be the supreme good, and the best thing of all.

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Tue, 11 Nov 2025 - 02:01

Nothing can discourage the appetite for divinity in the heart of man.

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 03:51

A true friend will partake of the wants and sorrows of his friend, as if they were his own; if he be in want, he will relieve him; if he be in prison, he will visit him; if he be sick, he will come to him; nay-situations may occur, in which he would not scruple to die for him. It cannot then be doubted, that friendship is one of the most useful means of procuring a secure, tranquil, and happy life.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. 19:4-6 (KJV)

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 01:07

They who know the truth are not equal to those who love it, and they who love it are not equal to those who delight in it.

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Tue, 11 Nov 2025 - 02:01

When the throne of God is overturned, the rebel realizes that it is now his own responsibility to create the justice, order, and unity that he sought in vain within his own condition, and in this way to justify the fall of God. Then begins the desperate effort to create, at the price of crime and murder if necessary, the dominion of man.

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 01:07

A young man should serve his parents at home and be respectful to elders outside his home. He should be earnest and truthful, loving all, but become intimate with humaneness. After doing this, if he has energy to spare, he can study literature and the arts.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

Science is a systematic method for studying and working out those generalizations that seem to describe the behavior of the universe. It could exist as a purely intellectual game that would never affect the practical life of human beings either for good or evil, and that was very nearly the case in ancient Greece, for instance. Technology is the application of scientific findings to the tools of everyday life, and that application can be wise or unwise, useful or harmful. Very often, those who govern technological decisions are not scientists and know little about science.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight. All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. 11:25-30 (KJV)

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Fri, 7 Nov 2025 - 03:04

Men seem to pursue honour in order that they may believe themselves to be good. Accordingly, they seek to be honoured by the wise, and by those who know them well, and on the score of virtue; it is clear, therefore, that in their opinion at any rate, virtue is superior to honour. Perhaps, then, one ought to say that virtue rather than honour is the end of the political life; yet even virtue is plainly too imperfect: for it seems that a man might have all the virtues and yet be asleep, or fail to achieve anything all his life; moreover, such a person may suffer the greatest evils and misfortunes. And no one, in this case, would call a man, who passed his life in this manner, happy, except for argument's sake.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:11
If each us had a different kind of sense perception — if we could only perceive things now as a bird, now as a worm, now as a plant, or if one of us saw a stimulus as red, another as blue, while a third even heard the same stimulus as a sound, then no one would speak of such a regularity of nature, rather, nature would be grasped only as a creation which is subjective in the highest degree. After all, what is a law of nature as such for us? We are not acquainted with it in itself, but only with its effects, which means in its relation to other laws of nature which, in turn, are known to us only as sums of relations. Therefore all these relations always refer again to others and are thoroughly incomprehensible to us in their essence.
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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

I don't say it was deliberate fraud. He was probably madly sincere, and sincerely mad.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

Self-preservation has frequently knuckled under to that tremendous yearning to get even.

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Wed, 19 Nov 2025 - 03:18

Come the Day of Judgment, some believe that the body will be different from our present body. This is only transient, that will be eternal. For this also there are religious arguments.

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Thu, 6 Nov 2025 - 23:24

Oh, can I really believe the poet's tales, that when one first sees the object of one's love, one imagines one has seen her long ago, that all love like all knowledge is remembrance, that love too has its prophecies in the individual. ... it seems to me that I should have to possess the beauty of all girls in order to draw out a beauty equal to yours; that I should have to circumnavigate the world in order to find the place I lack and which the deepest mystery of my whole being points towards, and at the next moment you are so near to me, filling my spirit so powerfully that I am transfigured for myself, and feel that it's good to be here.

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Thu, 6 Nov 2025 - 23:24

Concepts, like individuals, have their histories, and are just as incapable of withstanding the ravages of time as are individuals.

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Thu, 6 Nov 2025 - 23:24

And thus Christianity is played in, Christendom. Artists in dramatic costumes make their appearance in artistic buildings-there really is no danger at all, anything but that: the teacher is a royal functionary, steadily promoted, making a career-and how he dramatically plays Christianity, in short, he plays comedy. He lectures about renunciation, but he himself is being steadily promoted; he teaches all that about despising worldly titles and rank, but he himself is making a career.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

Q. You do not consider your statement a disloyal one? A. No, sir. Scientific truth is beyond loyalty and disloyalty. Q. You are sure that your statement represents scientific truth? A. I am.

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Thu, 6 Nov 2025 - 23:24

And how does the God's existence emerge from the proof? Does it follow straightway, without any breach of continuity? Or have we not here an analogy to the behavior of the little Cartesian dolls? As soon as I let go of the doll it stands on its head. As soon as I let it go, I must therefore let it go. So also with the proof. As long as I keep my hold on the proof, i.e., continue to demonstrate, the existence does not come out, if for no other reason than that I am engaged in proving it; but when I let the proof go, the existence is there. But this act of letting go is surely also something; it is indeed a contribution of mine. Must not this also be taken into the account, this little moment, brief as it may be – it need not be long, for it is a leap. However brief this moment, if only an instantaneous now, this "now" must be included in the reckoning.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

What, then, of human activities? Is humankind itself hastening its own end? Man has, for instance, been burning carbon-containing fuel — wood, coal, oil, gas — at a steadily accelerating rate. All these fuels form carbon dioxide. Some is absorbed by plants and the oceans but not as fast as it is produced. This means the carbon dioxide content of the air is going up — slightly but nevertheless up. Carbon dioxide retains heat, and even a small rise means a warming of the Earth's atmosphere. This may result in the melting of the polar ice caps with unusual speed, flooding the world before we have learned climate control. In reverse, our industrial civilization is making our atmosphere dustier so that it reflects more sunlight away and cools the Earth slightly — thus making possible a glacial advance in a few centuries, also before we have learned climate control.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 01:04

They despised everything but virtue, caring little for their present state of life, and thinking lightly of the possession of gold and other property, which seemed only a burden to them; neither were they intoxicated by luxury; nor did wealth deprive them of their self-control; but they were sober, and saw clearly that all these goods are increased by virtue and friendship with one another, whereas by too great regard and respect for them, they are lost and friendship with them.

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 01:07

Let the superior man never fail reverentially to order his own conduct, and let him be respectful to others and observant of propriety: then all within the four seas, all men are brothers. What has the superior man to do with being distressed because he has no brothers?

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee. 9:2 (KJV) Said to a man sick of the palsy.

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 03:51

A wise man, who puts himself under the government of reason, will be able to receive an injury with calmness, and to treat the person who committed it with lenity; for he will rank injuries among the casual events of life, and will prudently reflect that he can no more stop the natural current of human passions, than he can curb the stormy winds.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me. 19:21 (KJV)

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Fri, 7 Nov 2025 - 03:04

Rhetoric is the counterpart of Dialectic. Both alike are concerned with such things as come, more or less, within the general ken of all men and belong to no definite science. Accordingly, all men make use, more or less, of both; for to a certain extent all men attempt to discuss statements and to maintain them, to defend themselves and to attack others.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

I am not a visual person. I have spent so many bounded years in my childhood that I have grown used to having books as my window on reality.

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Mon, 10 Nov 2025 - 02:44

If anyone can be considered the greatest writer who ever lived, it is Shakespeare.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:58

Whoever blasphemes against the Father will be forgiven, and whoever blasphemes against the Son will be forgiven, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven either on earth or in heaven. (44)

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Tue, 18 Nov 2025 - 04:25

Men are at variance with the one thing with which they are in the most unbroken communion, the reason that administers the whole universe.

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Wed, 5 Nov 2025 - 03:11
He who humbleth himself wants to be exalted.
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Thu, 6 Nov 2025 - 23:24

Human justice is very prolix, and yet at times quite mediocre; divine justice is more concise and needs no information from the prosecution, no legal papers, no interrogation of witnesses, but makes the guilty one his own informer and helps him with eternity's memory.

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