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Emil Cioran
Emil Cioran
1 week 2 days ago
Great joys, why do they bring...

Great joys, why do they bring us sadness? Because there remains from these excesses only a feeling of irrevocable loss and desertion which reaches a high degree of negative intensity. At such moments, instead of a gain, one keenly feels loss. sadness accompanies all those events in which life expends itself. its intensity is equal to its loss. Thus death causes the greatest sadness.

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Philosophical Maxims
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
1 month 2 weeks ago
Philosophical knowledge is the knowledge gained...

Philosophical knowledge is the knowledge gained by reason from concepts; mathematical knowledge is the knowledge gained by reason from the construction of concepts.

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A 713, B 741
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
1 month 1 week ago
As for us, my little friend,...

As for us, my little friend, we entered [the Communist Party] because we were tired of dying of hunger.

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Act 3, sc. 2
Philosophical Maxims
William James
William James
1 month 1 week ago
No concrete test of what is...

No concrete test of what is really true has ever been agreed upon.

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"The Will to Believe" p. 15
Philosophical Maxims
John Dewey
John Dewey
4 days ago
The application of scientific formulations of...

The application of scientific formulations of the principle of probability statistically determined is thus a logical corollary of the principle already stated, that the subject matter of scientific findings is relational, not individual. It is for this reason that it is safe to predict the ultimate triumph of the statistical doctrine.

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Philosophical Maxims
Charles Sanders Peirce
Charles Sanders Peirce
1 week 2 days ago
It is ...easy to be certain....

It is ...easy to be certain. One has only to be sufficiently vague.

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Vol. IV, par. 237
Philosophical Maxims
George Santayana
George Santayana
5 days ago
Injustice in this world is not...

Injustice in this world is not something comparative; the wrong is deep, clear, and absolute in each private fate.

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Ch. IV: The Aristocratic Ideal
Philosophical Maxims
Epictetus
Epictetus
1 month 3 weeks ago
It is difficulties that show what...

It is difficulties that show what men are.

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Book I, ch. 24, 1.
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Nagel
Thomas Nagel
1 month 3 days ago
The problem is one of opposition...

The problem is one of opposition between subjective and objective points of view. There is a tendency to seek an objective account of everything before admitting its reality. But often what appears to a more subjective point of view cannot be accounted for in this way. So either the objective conception of the world is incomplete, or the subjective involves illusions that should be rejected.

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"Subjective and Objective" (1979), p. 196.
Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
1 week 6 days ago
Nor is there any embarrassment in...

Nor is there any embarrassment in the fact that we're ridiculous, isn't it true? For it's actually so, we are ridiculous, light-minded, with bad habits, we're bored, we don't know how to look, how to understand, we're all like that, all, you, and I, and they! Now, you're not offended when I tell you to your face that you're ridiculous? And if so, aren't you material? You know, in my opinion it's sometimes even good to be ridiculous, if not better: we can the sooner forgive each other, the sooner humble ourselves; we can't understand everything at once, we can't start right out with perfection! To achieve perfection, one must first begin by not understanding many things! And if we understand too quickly, we may not understand well. This I tell you, you, who have already been able to understand. .. and not understand ... so much. I'm not afraid for you now.

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Part 4, Chapter ?
Philosophical Maxims
comfortdragon
comfortdragon
3 months 1 week ago
If only it were true...
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Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
2 months 1 week ago
Probably, the most-often-repeated lesson in history...

Probably, the most-often-repeated lesson in history is that foreigners who are called in to help one side in a civil war take over for themselves. It is a lesson that seems never to be learned despite endless repetition.

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Philosophical Maxims
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
1 month 3 weeks ago
Nothing is terrible except….

Nothing is terrible except fear itself.

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De Augmentis Scientiarum, Book II, "Fortitudo"
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
2 months 1 week ago
Seulement, il faut du temps pour...

Seulement, il faut du temps pour être heureux. Beaucoup de temps. Le bonheur lui aussi est une longue patience. Only it takes time to be happy. A lot of time. Happiness, too, is a long patience.

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Philosophical Maxims
Iris Murdoch
Iris Murdoch
4 days ago
People from a planet without flowers...

People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us.

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A Fairly Honourable Defeat (1970); 2001, p. 170.
Philosophical Maxims
Max Horkheimer
Max Horkheimer
3 days ago
When an active individual of sound...

When an active individual of sound common sense perceives the sordid state of the world, desire to change it becomes the guiding principle by which he organizes given facts and shapes them into a theory. The methods and categories as well as the transformation of the theory can be understood only in connection with his taking of sides. This, in turn, discloses both his sound common sense and the character of the world. Right thinking depends as much on right willing as right willing on right thinking.

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p. 162.
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
1 month 2 weeks ago
You must not murder. (Exodus 20:13)...

You must not murder. (Exodus 20:13) Q. What does this mean? A. We should fear and love God so that we may not hurt or harm our neighbor in his body, but help and befriend him in every bodily need [in every need and danger of life and body].

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Philosophical Maxims
John Dewey
John Dewey
4 days ago
I do not think that the...

I do not think that the dancing and singing of even little children can be explained wholly on the basis of unlearned and unformed responses to then existing objective conditions. Clearly there must be something in the present to evoke happiness. But the act is expressive only a there is in it a unison of something stored from past experience, something therefore generalized, with present conditions. In the case of expressions of happy children the marriage of past values and present incidents takes place easily; there are few obstructions to be overcome, few wounds to heal, few conflicts to resolve. With maturer persons, the reverse is the case. Accordingly the achievement of complete unison is rare; but when it occurs it is so on a deeper level and with a fuller content of meaning. And then, even though after long incubation and after precedent pangs of labor, the final expression may issue with the spontaneity of the cadenced speech or rhythmic movement of happy childhood.

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p. 74
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
2 weeks 4 days ago
But man is a Noble Animal,...

But man is a Noble Animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous in the grave, solemnizing Nativities and Deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting Ceremonies of Bravery, in the infamy of his nature. Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible Sun within us.

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Chapter V
Philosophical Maxims
Herbert Marcuse
Herbert Marcuse
5 days ago
The transition from Hegel to Marx...

The transition from Hegel to Marx is, in all respects, a transition to an essentially different order of truth, no to be interpreted in terms of philosophy. We shall see that all the philosophical concepts of Marxian theory are social and economic categories, whereas Hegel's social and economic categories are all philosophical concepts.

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P. 258
Philosophical Maxims
C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
1 month 1 week ago
If you read history you will...

If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next... It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth "thrown in": aim at earth and you will get neither.

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Book III, Chapter 10, "Hope"
Philosophical Maxims
Heraclitus
Heraclitus
2 months 2 days ago
Greater fates gain greater rewards.

Greater fates gain greater rewards.

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Philosophical Maxims
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
1 week 6 days ago
And now once again I asked...

And now once again I asked myself the question: do I love her? And once more I could not answer, that is to say, again, for the hundredth time, I answered that I hated her.

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Philosophical Maxims
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
1 month 1 week ago
The language of excitement is at...

The language of excitement is at best but picturesque merely. You must be calm before you can utter oracles.

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Pearls of Thought (1881) p. 80
Philosophical Maxims
Aristotle
Aristotle
2 months 1 week ago
All things as subsist from nature...

All things as subsist from nature appear to contain in themselves a principle of motion and permanency; some according to place, others according to increase and diminuation; and others according to change in quality. 

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Book II, Ch. I, p. 88.
Philosophical Maxims
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
2 weeks 3 days ago
The debates of that great assembly...

The debates of that great assembly are frequently vague and perplexed, seeming to be dragged rather than to march, to the intended goal. Something of this sort must, I think, always happen in public democratic assemblies.

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Book One, Chapter XXI.
Philosophical Maxims
Martin Luther
Martin Luther
1 month 2 weeks ago
As to why some are touched...

As to why some are touched by the law and others not, so that some receive and others scorn the offer of grace...[this is the] hidden will of God, Who, according to His own counsel, ordains such persons as He wills to receive and partake of the mercy preached and offered.

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p. 169
Philosophical Maxims
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas
2 months 1 day ago
Suppose a person entering a house...

Suppose a person entering a house were to feel heat on the porch, and going further, were to feel the heat increasing, the more they penetrated within. Doubtless, such a person would believe there was a fire in the house, even though they did not see the fire that must be causing all this heat. A similar thing will happen to anyone who considers this world in detail: one will observe that all things are arranged according to their degrees of beauty and excellence, and that the nearer they are to God, the more beautiful and better they are.

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Art. 1
Philosophical Maxims
Jean Paul Sartre
Jean Paul Sartre
1 month 1 week ago
If you are not already dead,...

If you are not already dead, forgive. Rancor is heavy, it is worldly; leave it on earth: die light.

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Act 1
Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
1 week 1 day ago
Labour is the source of all...

Labour is the source of all wealth, the political economists assert. And it really is the source -- next to nature, which supplies it with the material that it converts into wealth. But it is even infinitely more than this. It is the prime basic condition for all human existence, and this to such an extent that, in a sense, we have to say that labour created man himself.

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The Part Played by Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man
Philosophical Maxims
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
1 month 1 week ago
It may indeed be said that...

It may indeed be said that since Philosophy began to take a place in Germany, it has never looked so badly as at the present time - never have emptiness and shallowness overlaid it so completely, and never have they spoken and acted with such arrogance, as though all power were in their hands ! To combat the shallowness, to strive with German earnestness and honesty, to draw Philosophy out of the solitude into which it has wandered - to do such work as this we may hope that we are called by the higher spirit of our time.

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p. xi Ibid
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
2 months 1 week ago
Outside of that single fatality of...

Outside of that single fatality of death, everything, joy or happiness, is liberty.

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Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
1 month 2 weeks ago
I do like clarity and exact...

I do like clarity and exact thinking and I believe that very important to mankind because when you allow yourself to think inexactly your prejudices, your bias, your self interest comes in in ways you don't notice and you do bad things without knowing that you are doing them: self deception is very easy. So that I do think clear thinking immensely important.

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Television interview ("On clarity and exact thinking" - available on youtube)
Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
1 month 1 week ago
The end of the human race...

The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.

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Civilization
Philosophical Maxims
Jesus
Jesus
5 days ago
I am he that liveth, and...

I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death. Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter.

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Revelation 1:18-19
Philosophical Maxims
A. J. Ayer
A. J. Ayer
1 week 2 days ago
I see philosophy as a fairly...

I see philosophy as a fairly abstract activity, as concerned mainly with the analysis of criticism and concepts, and of course most usefully of scientific concepts.

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As quoted in Profile of Sir Alfred Ayer (June 1971) by Euro-Television, quoted in A.J. Ayer: A Life (1999), p. 2
Philosophical Maxims
Slavoj Žižek
Slavoj Žižek
5 months 2 weeks ago
Ideology is a symptom

This is probably the fundamental dimension of 'ideology': ideology is not simply a 'false consciousness', an illusory representation of reality, it is rather this reality itself which is already to be conceived as 'ideological' - 'ideological' is a social reality whose very existence implies the non-knowledge of its participants as to its essence -that is, the social effectivity, the very reproduction of which implies that the individuals 'do not know what they are doing'. 'Ideological is not the false consciousness of a (social) being but this being itself in so far as it is supported by "false consciousness"'. Thus we have finally reached the dimension of the symptom, because one of its possible definitions would also be 'a formation whose very consistency implies a certain non-knowledge on the part of the subject': the subject can 'enjoy his symptom' only in so far as its logic escapes him - the measure of the success of its interpretation is precisely its dissolution.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
1 month 1 week ago
A good symbol is the best...

A good symbol is the best argument and is a missionary to persuade thousands.

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Poetry and Imagination
Philosophical Maxims
Pythagoras
Pythagoras
3 weeks 3 days ago
Many words befall men, mean and...

Many words befall men, mean and noble alike; do not be astonished by them, nor allow yourself to be constrained. If a lie is told, bear with it gently. But whatever I tell you, let it be done completely. Let no one persuade you by word or deed to do or say whatever is not best for you.

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As quoted in Divine Harmony: The Life and Teachings of Pythagoras by John Strohmeier and Peter Westbrook.
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
1 month 1 week ago
Capitalist production does not exist at...

Capitalist production does not exist at all without foreign commerce.

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Vol. II, Ch. XX, p. 474 (See also...David Ricardo, The Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, Ch. VII, p. 81).
Philosophical Maxims
Gottfried Leibniz
Gottfried Leibniz
1 month 2 weeks ago
I have seen something of the...

I have seen something of the project of M. de St. Pierre, for maintaining a perpetual peace in Europe. I am reminded of a device in a cemetery, with the words: Pax perpetua; for the dead do not fight any longer: but the living are of another humor; and the most powerful do not respect tribunals at all. Letter 11 to Grimarest: Passages Concerning the Abbe de St. Pierre's 'Project for Perpetual Peace' (June 1712).

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Taken from Leibniz: Political Writings (2nd Edition, 1988), Edited by Patrick Riley.
Philosophical Maxims
William James
William James
1 month 1 week ago
The individual, so far as he...

The individual, so far as he suffers from his wrongness and criticizes it, is to that extent consciously beyond it, and in at least possible touch with something higher, if anything higher exist. Along with the wrong part there is thus a better part of him, even though it may be but a most helpless germ. With which part he should identify his real being is by no means obvious at this stage; but when stage 2 (the stage of solution or salvation) arrives, the man identifies his real being with the germinal higher part of himself; and does so in the following way. He becomes conscious that this higher part is coterminous and continuous with a more of the same quality, which is operative in the universe outside of him, and which he can keep in working touch with, and in a fashion get on board of and save himself when all his lower being has gone to pieces in the wreck.

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Lecture XX, "Conclusions"
Philosophical Maxims
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
1 month 2 weeks ago
Formerly, it was held by philosophers...

Formerly, it was held by philosophers and mathematicians alike that the proofs in Geometry depended on the figure; nowadays, this is known to be false. In the best books there are no figures at all. The reasoning proceeds by the strict rules of formal logic from a set of axioms laid down to begin with.

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Ch. 5: Mathematics and the Metaphysicians
Philosophical Maxims
Karl Marx
Karl Marx
1 month 1 week ago
We cannot always choose the vocation...

We cannot always choose the vocation to which we believe we are called. Our social relations, to some extent, have already begun to form before we are in a position to determine them.

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Writings of the Young Marx on Philosophy and Society, L. Easton, trans. (1967), p. 37
Philosophical Maxims
Albert Camus
Albert Camus
2 months 1 week ago
What will be left of the...

What will be left of the power of example if it is proved that capital punishment has another power, and a very real one, which degrades men to the point of shame, madness, and murder?

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Philosophical Maxims
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
2 months 2 weeks ago
He who humbleth himself wants to...
He who humbleth himself wants to be exalted.
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Philosophical Maxims
George Santayana
George Santayana
5 days ago
Matters of religion should never be...

Matters of religion should never be matters of controversy. We neither argue with a lover about his taste, nor condemn him, if we are just, for knowing so human a passion.

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Ch. VI
Philosophical Maxims
Plotinus
Plotinus
2 months 1 day ago
When the soul has descended into...

When the soul has descended into generation (from its first divine condition) she partakes of evil, and is carried a great way into a state the opposite of her first purity and integrity, to be entirely merged in which, is nothing more than to fall into a dark mire. ...The soul dies as much as it is possible for the soul to die: and the death to her is, while baptized or immersed in the present body, to descend into matter, and be wholly subjected by it; and after departing thence to lie there til it shall arise and turn its face away from the abhorrent filth. This is what is meant by falling asleep in Hades, of those who have come there.

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Philosophical Maxims
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Wittgenstein
1 month 1 week ago
I work quite diligently and wish...

I work quite diligently and wish that I were better and smarter. And these both are one and the same.

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In a letter to Paul Engelmann (1917) as quoted in The Idea of Justice (2010) by Amartya Sen, p. 31
Philosophical Maxims
Voltaire
Voltaire
1 month 2 weeks ago
Virtue supposes liberty…

Virtue supposes liberty, as the carrying of a burden supposes active force. Under coercion there is no virtue, and without virtue there is no religion. Make a slave of me, and I shall be no better for it. Even the sovereign has no right to use coercion to lead men to religion, which by its nature supposes choice and liberty. My thought is no more subject to authority than is sickness or health.

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"Canon Law: Ecclesiastical Ministry", 1771
Philosophical Maxims
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