True courage…has so little to...

True courage…has so little to do with Anger, that there lies always the strongest Suspicion against it, where this Passion is highest. The true Courage is the cool and calm. The bravest of Men have the least of a brutal bullying Insolence; and in the very time of Danger are found the most serene, pleasant, and free. Rage, we know, can make a Coward forget himself and fight. But what is done in Fury, or Anger, can never be plac’d to the account of Courage.

That the state is an...

That the state is an entity and in fact the decisive entity rests upon its political character.

Upon the whole, I have...

Upon the whole, I have always considered him, both in his lifetime and since his death, as approaching as nearly to the idea of a perfectly wise and virtuous man, as perhaps the nature of human frailty will permit.

So the majority of the...

So the majority of the highest classes of that age, even the popes and ecclesiastics, really believed in nothing at all. They did not believe in the Church doctrine, for they saw its insolvency; but neither could they follow Francis of Assisi, Kelchitsky, and most of the sectarians in acknowledging the moral, social teaching of Christ, for that undermined their social position. And so these people remained without any religious view of life. And, having none, they could have no standard with which to estimate what was good and what was bad art, but that of personal enjoyment.

But whether the Constitution really...

But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain—that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it.  In either case it is unfit to exist.

Things added to things, as...

Things added to things, as statistics, civil history, are inventories. Things used as language are inexhaustibly attractive.

Do not speak fast, for...

Do not speak fast, for that shows folly.

Evil does not approach us...

Evil does not approach us as pride any more, but on the contrary as slumber, lassitude, concealment of the "I." … It may make us so quickly contented, that any definitive fire will die down. The venomous, breathtaking frigid mist seems able … to harden hearts and fill them with envy, obduracy and resentment, with bloody scorn for the divine image and light, with all the causes of the only true original sin, which is not wanting to be like God.

Here is the picture of...

Here is the picture of this Old Master: a quiet, awkward, forceful Scotchman, whose philosophy has entered everywhere into the life of politics and become a world-force in thought; an impracticable Commissioner of Customs, who has left for the instruction of statesmen the best theory of taxation; an unbusiness-like professor, who established the science of business; a man of books, who is universally honored by men of action; plain, eccentric, learned, inspired. The things that strike us most about him are, his boldness of conception and wideness of outlook, his breadth and comprehensiveness of treatment, and his carefully clarified and beautified style.

The reason for the astonishing...

The reason for the astonishing fact that a majority of working people submit to a handful of idlers who control their labour and their very lives is always and everywhere the same — whether the oppressors and oppressed are of one race or whether, as in India and elsewhere, the oppressors are of a different nation. This phenomenon seems particularly strange in India, for there more than two hundred million people, highly gifted both physically and mentally, find themselves in the power of a small group of people quite alien to them in thought, and immeasurably inferior to them in religious morality. ... the reason lies in the lack of a reasonable religious teaching which, by explaining the meaning of life would supply a supreme law for the guidance of conduct, and would replace the more than dubious precepts of pseudo­religion and pseudo­science and the immoral conclusions deduced from them, commonly called "civilization."

Thus they shall not miss...

Thus they shall not miss this particular branch of the many branches of the Law and will have no need to roam and ramble about in other books in search of information on matters set forth in this treatise.

I have been quoted as...

I have been quoted as saying captious things about travel; but I mean to do justice. I think, there is a restlessness in our people, which argues want of character. All educated Americans, first or last, go to Europe; — perhaps, because it is their mental home, as the invalid habits of this country might suggest. An eminent teacher of girls said, "the idea of a girl's education, is, whatever qualifies them for going to Europe." Can we never extract this tape-worm of Europe from the brain of our countrymen?

All sports are time control...

All sports are time control demonstrations...

The normal present connects the...

The normal present connects the past and the future through limitation. Contiguity results, crystallization by means of solidification. There also exists, however, a spiritual present that identifies past and future through dissolution, and this mixture is the element, the atmosphere of the poet.

By the air which I...

By the air which I breathe, and by the water which I drink, I will not endure to be blamed on account of this discourse.

Do not forget, man, consumed...

Do not forget, man, consumed by lust:you—are the stone, the desert, are death ...

When a person inflates his...

When a person inflates his own importance, he does not see his own sins; and his sins get bigger right along with him.

You will not find it...

You will not find it strange that I mention the explanation of Jonathan, son of Uzziel, whilst I give a different explanation myself; for you will find many of the wise men and the commentators differ from him in the interpretation of some words and in many things respecting the prophets. Why should it be otherwise in these profound matters? Besides, I do not decide in favour of my interpretation. It is for you to learn both—the whole of his explanation, from what I have pointed out to you, and also my own explanation. God knoweth which of the two explanations is in accordance with that which the prophet intended to say.

The young men were born...

The young men were born with knives in their brain, a tendency to introversion, self-dissection, anatomizing of motives.

After working out scenarios for...

After working out scenarios for satisfying what we considered the two most vital bare maximums-external electric energy and internal food supply-we evolved into some of the possible synergetic scenarios that would result from the first moves. The establishment of bare maximum levels of the above throughout the world would engender the need for bare maximums in housing, medical attention, income, communications and travel.

A word is a bud...

A word is a bud attempting to become a twig. How can one not dream while writing? It is the pen which dreams. The blank page gives the right to dream.

The great work of the...

The great work of the present for every man, and every organization of men, who would improve social conditions, is the work of education — the propagation of ideas. It is only as it aids this that anything else can avail. And in this work every one who can think may aid — first by forming clear ideas himself, and then by endeavoring to arouse the thought of those with whom he comes in contact.

We can conceive of various...

We can conceive of various kinds of democracy. But my intention is not to treat of every kind, but of that only, "wherein all, without exception, who owe allegiance to the laws of the country only, and are further independent and of respectable life, have the right of voting in the supreme council and of filling the offices of the dominion."

Nature is an Æolian Harp,...

Nature is an Æolian Harp, a musical instrument; whose tones again are keys to higher strings in us.

The wind is blowing, adore...

The wind is blowing, adore the wind.

The good generally displeases us...

The good generally displeases us when it is beyond our ken.

Tostoy's message has not grown...

Tostoy's message has not grown out-of-date. In the present "end of an age" when fear and anxiety and collective crime have expanded beyond even Tolstoy's conception of the possibilities, these essays come to us with prophetic force and urgency. He strides like a giant over all the pettifogging economists and politicians and confronts us with his unanswerable accusations, his scorn and his love of life and humanity.

The second class of evils...

The second class of evils comprises such evils as people cause to each other, when, e.g., some of them use their strength against others. These evils are more numerous than those of the first kind... they likewise originate in ourselves, though the sufferer himself cannot avert them.

Wilt thou seal up the...

Wilt thou seal up the avenues of ill? Pay every debt, as if God wrote the bill!

Unity is plural and, at...

Unity is plural and, at minimum, is two.

An important recurring theme in...

An important recurring theme in George is the purposeful corruption of the science of economics in order to serve and apologize for wealthy special interests. As a self trained economist, the academics preferred to ignore the uncomfortable realities George’s work exposed.

Not frequently man from man.

Not frequently man from man.

In trying to solve the...

In trying to solve the terrifying problems that face us in the world today, we naturally turn to the things we do best. We play from strength, and our strength is science and technology. To contain a population explosion, we look for better methods of birth control. Threatened by a nuclear holocaust, we build bigger deterrent forces and anti-ballistic missile systems. We try to stave off world famine with new foods and better ways of growing them. Improved sanitation and medicine will, we hope, control disease; better housing and transportation will solve the problems of the ghettos, and new ways of reducing or disposing of waste will stop the pollution of the environment. We can point to remarkable achievements in all these fields, and it is not surprising that we should try to extend them. But things grow steadily worse, and it is disheartening to find that technology itself is increasingly at fault. Sanitation and medicine have made the problems of population more acute, war has acquired a new horror with the invention of nuclear weapons, and the affluent pursuit of happiness is largely responsible for pollution. As Darlington has said, ‘Every new source from which man has increased his power on the earth has been used to diminish the prospects of his successors. All his progress has been at the expense of damage to his environment which he cannot repair and could not foresee.’

Don't get involved in partial...

Don't get involved in partial problems, but always take flight to where there is a free view over the whole single great problem, even if this view is still not a clear one.

Even when a person suffers...

Even when a person suffers pain in consequence of a thorn having entered into his hand, although it is at once drawn out, it is a punishment that has been inflicted on him, and the least pleasure he enjoys is a reward; all this is meted out by strict justice; as is said in the Scripture, "all His ways are judgement" (Deut. xxxii. 4); we are only ignorant of the working of that judgement.

The imagination is not a...

The imagination is not a talent of some men but is the health of every man.

The nearest each of us...

The nearest each of us can come to God is by loving the truth.

In a word, neither death,...

In a word, neither death, nor exile, nor pain, nor anything of this kind is the real cause of our doing or not doing any action, but our inward opinions and principles.

The best and greatest winning...

The best and greatest winning is a true friend; and the greatest loss is the loss of time.

I am my world. (The...

I am my world. (The microcosm.) (5.63)

Those who believe that... detailed...

Those who believe that... detailed rules originate in a certain cause, are as far from the truth as those who assume that the whole law is useless.

Every man is a new...

Every man is a new method.

We are here as local...

We are here as local information harvesters, local problem-solvers in support of the integrity of eternally regenerative Universe. The fact that we get away from physical problems doesn't mean we go away from problems. The problems are really rarely physical.

The Triad has a special...

The Triad has a special beauty and fairness beyond all numbers, primarily because it is the very first to make actual the potentiality of the Monad — oddness, perfection, proportionality, unification, limit.

What is the first business...

What is the first business of one who practices philosophy? To get rid of self-conceit. For it is impossible for anyone to begin to learn that which he thinks he already knows.

Let us suppose that we...

Let us suppose that we have set the problem of finding a solution to the equation \scriptstyle x^2=2. \, This is a problem for which the Babylonians around 1700 BC found the excellent approximation \scriptstyle \sqrt{2}. ...This is the identical problem which Pythagoras asserted had no fractional solution and in whose honor he was supposed to have sacrificed a hecatomb of oxen—the problem which caused the existentialist crisis in ancient Greek mathematics. The \scriptstyle \sqrt{2} exists (as the diagonal of the unit square); yet it does not exist (as a fraction)!

The Turks teach women that...

The Turks teach women that they have no souls, and are unworthy to enter paradise. The French would persuade them that they have no intellects, and are not made to engage in mental labors, and to tread the paths of art and science.

People are deeply imbedded in...

People are deeply imbedded in philosophical, i.e., grammatical confusions. And to free them presupposes pulling them out of the immensely manifold connections they are caught up in.

Enjoy your life without comparing...

Enjoy your life without comparing to that of others. It is enough for you to know that you are good, without examining whether others are as good as you.

Never self-possessed, or prudent, love...

Never self-possessed, or prudent, love is all abandonment.