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We Are All Visionaries, And What We See Is Our Soul In Things.

-Henri Frederic Amiel

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We Are All Visionaries,

Henri Frederic Amiel

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We Are All Visionaries, And What We See Is Our Soul In Things.

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There Is No Repose For The Mind Except In The Absolute; For Feeling, Except In The Infinite; For The Soul, Except In The Divine.

Uncertainty Is The Refuge Of Hope.

We Are Always Making God Our Accomplice, That So We May Legalize Our Own Iniquities. Every Successful Massacre Is Consecrated By A Te Deum, And The Clergy Have Never Been Wanting In Benedictions For Any Victorious Enormity.

As It Is Impossible To Be Outside God, The Best Is Consciously To Dwell In Him.

The Test Of Every Religious, Political, Or Educational System Is The Man That It Forms.

Analysis Kills Spontaneity. The Grain Once Ground Into Flour Springs And Germinates No More.

Woman Is The Salvation Or The Destruction Of The Family. She Carries Its Destiny In The Folds Of Her Mantle.

Faith Is Certitude Without Proofs ... Faith Is A Sentiment, For It Is A Hope; It Is An Instinct, For It Precedes All Outward Instruction.

Great Men Are The Real Men, In Them Nature Has Succeeded.

What We Call Little Things Are Merely The Causes Of Great Things; They Are The Beginning, The Embryo, And It Is The Point Of Departure Which, Generally Speaking, Decides The Whole Future Of An Existence. One Single Black Speck May Be The Beginning Of Gangrene, Of A Storm, Of A Revolution.

War Is A Brutal And Fierce Means Of Pacification; It Means The Suppression Of Resistance By The Destruction Or Enslavement Of The Conquered.

Doubt Is The Accomplice Of Tyranny.

Let Mystery Have Its Place In You ; Do Not Be Always Turning Up Your Whole Soil With The Ploughshare Of Self-examination, But Leave A Little Fallow Corner In Your Heart Ready For Any Seed The Winds May Bring.

Sadness Takes Up The Pen More Readily Than Joy.

I Wonder Whether I Should Gain Anything By The Attempt To Assume A Character Which Is Not Mine. My Wavering Manner, Born Of Doubt And Scruple, Has At Least The Advantage Of Rendering All The Different Shades Of My Thought, And Of Being Sincere. If It Were To Become Terse, Affirmative, Resolute, Would It Not Be A Mere Imitation?

Time Is But The Measure Of The Difficulty Of A Conception. Pure Thought Has Scarcely Any Need Of Time, Since It Perceives The Two Ends Of An Idea Almost At The Same Moment.

As It Is Impossible To Be Outside God, The Best Is Consciously To Dwell In Him.

Philosophy Starts With Doubt And Loves Only Truth.

Men Don't Achieve Truth Because They Lack Humility And Love Of Truth. They Won't Criticize Their Own Beliefs. Truth Would Overwhelm Them.

Our Duty Is To Be Useful, Not According To Our Desires But According To Our Powers.

Joy Is The Vital Air Of The Soul.

In Order To See Christianity, One Must Forget All The Christians.

Philosophy Starts With Doubt And Loves Only Truth.

I Find Myself Regarding Existence As Though From Beyond The Tomb, From Another World; All Is Strange To Me; I Am, As It Were, Outside My Own Body And Individuality; I Am Depersonalized, Detached, Cut Adrift. Is This Madness?

Society Lives By Faith, And Develops By Science.

What Governs Men Is The Fear Of Truth.

Before Crime Is Committed Conscience Must Be Corrupted, And Every Bad Man Who Succeeds In Reaching A High Point Of Wickedness Begins With This.

True Love Is That Which Ennobles The Personality, Fortifies The Heart, And Sanctifies The Existence.

Clever People Will Recognize And Tolerate Nothing But Cleverness.

The Philosopher Is Like A Man Fasting In The Midst Of Universal Intoxication. He Alone Perceives The Illusion Of Which All Creatures Are The Willing Playthings; He Is Less Duped Than His Neighbor By His Own Nature. He Judges More Sanely, He Sees Things As They Are. It Is In This That His Liberty Consists - In The Ability To See Clearly And Soberly, In The Power Of Mental Record.

It Is Not What He Had, Or Even What He Does Which Expresses The Worth Of A Man, But What He Is.

Love Is Like Swallowing Hot Chocolate Before It Has Cooled Off. It Takes You By Surprise At First, But Keeps You Warm For A Long Time.

We Are Never More Discontented With Others Than When We Are Discontented With Ourselves.

Our True History Is Scarcely Ever Deciphered By Others. The Chief Part Of The Drama Is A Monologue, Or Rather An Intimate Debate Between God, Our Conscience, And Ourselves. Tears, Grieves, Depressions, Disappointments, Irritations, Good And Evil Thoughts, Decisions, Uncertainties, Deliberations --all These Belong To Our Secret, And Are Almost All Incommunicable And Intransmissible, Even When We Try To Speak Of Them, And Even When We Write Them Down.

Our Greatest Illusion Is To Believe That We Are What We Think Ourselves To Be.

Man Never Knows What He Wants; He Aspires To Penetrate Mysteries And As Soon As He Has, Wants To Re-establish Them. Ignorance Irritates Him And Knowledge Cloys.

Wisdom Consists In Rising Superior Both To Madness And To Common Sense, And Is Lending Oneself To The Universal Illusion Without Becoming Its Dupe.

The Great Majority Of Men Are But Tangled Skeins, Imperfect Keyboards, So Many Specimens Of Restless Or Stagnant Chaos--and What Makes Their Situation Almost Hopeless Is The Fact That They Take Pleasure In It. There Is No Curing A Sick Man Who Believes Himself In Health.

Criticism Is Above All A Gift, An Intuition, A Matter Of Tact And Flair; It Cannot Be Taught Or Demonstrated--it Is An Art.

Time Is The Supreme Illusion. It Is But The Inner Prism By Which We Decompose Being And Life, The Mode Under Which We Perceive Successively What Is Simultaneous In Idea.

The Man Who Insists Upon Seeing With Perfect Clearness Before He Decides, Never Decides. Accept Life, And You Must Accept Regret.

The History Of Man Is Essentially Zoological; It Becomes Human Late In The Day, And Then Only In The Beautiful Souls, The Souls Alive To Justice, Goodness, Enthusiasm, And Devotion. The Angel Shows Itself Rarely And With Difficulty Through The Highly-organized Brute.

Obstinacy Is Will Asserting Itself Without Being Able To Justify Itself. It Is Persistence Without A Reasonable Motive. It Is The Tenacity Of Self-love Substituted For That Of Reason And Conscience.

The Soul May Be Immortal Because She Is Fitted To Rise Towards That Which Is Neither Born Nor Dies, Towards That Which Exists Substantially, Necessarily, Invariably, That Is To Say Towards God.

Thankfulness Is The Beginning Of Gratitude. Gratitude Is The Completion Of Thankfulness. Thankfulness May Consist Merely Of Words. Gratitude Is Shown In Acts.

In Order To See Christianity, One Must Forget All The Christians.

Self-interest Is An Inexhaustible Source Of Convenient Illusions. The Number Of Beings Who Wish To See Truly Is Extraordinarily Small.

Happiness Does Away With Ugliness, And Even Makes The Beauty Of Beauty.

Conquering Any Difficulty Always Gives One A Secret Joy, For It Means Pushing Back A Boundary-line And Adding To One's Liberty.

Cleverness Is Serviceable For Everything, Sufficient For Nothing.

Heroism Is The Brilliant Triumph Of The Soul Over The Flesh - Over Fear...heroism Is The Dazzling And Glorious Concentration Of Courage.

Every Landscape Is, As It Were, A State Of The Soul, And Whoever Penetrates Into Both Is Astonished To Find How Much Likeness There Is In Each Detail.

Sacrifice, Which Is The Passion Of Great Souls, Has Never Been The Law Of Societies.

In Every Loving Woman There Is A Priestess Of The Past - A Pious Guardian Of Some Affection, Of Which The Object Has Disappeared.

We Become Actors Without Realizing It, And Actors Without Wanting To.

It Would Have Been A Joy To Me To Be Smiled Upon, Loved, Encouraged, Welcomed, And To Obtain What I Was So Ready To Give, Kindness And Goodwill. But To Hunt Down Consideration And Reputation - To Force The Esteem Of Others - Seemed To Me An Effort Unworthy Of Myself, Almost A Degradation.

Happiness Does Away With Ugliness, And Even Makes The Beauty Of Beauty.

Our Greatest Illusion Is To Believe That We Are What We Think Ourselves To Be.

A Belief Is Not True Simply Because It Is Useful.

Positive Atheism

Great Men Are The Real Men, In Them Nature Has Succeeded.

The Best Path Through Life Is The Highway.

It Is Not What He Had, Or Even What He Does Which Expresses The Worth Of A Man, But What He Is.

Learn To... Be What You Are, And Learn To Resign With A Good Grace All That You Are Not.

Civilization Is First Of All A Moral Thing. Without Truth, Respect For Duty, Love Of Neighbor, And Virtue, Everything Is Destroyed. The Morality Of A Society Is Alone The Basis Of Civilization.

The Great Artist And Thinker Are The Simplifiers.

Whatever Impatience We May Feel Towards Our Neighbor, And Whatever Indignation Our Race May Rouse In Us, We Are Chained One To Another, And, Companions In Labour And Misfortune, Have Everything To Lose By Mutual Recrimination And Reproach. Let Us Be Silent As To Each Other's Weakness, Helpful, Tolerant, Many, Tender Towards Each Other! Or, If We Cannot Feel Tenderness, May We At Least Feel Pity!

I'm Not Interested In Age. People Who Tell Me Their Age Are Silly. You're As Old As You Feel.

The Tragic Solemnity Of Existence Strikes Us With Terrible Force On That Morning When We Wake To Find The Mournful Words "too Late" Ringing In Our Ears.

To Know Where One Is Going And What One Wishes - This Is Order ... To Organize One's Life To Distribute One's Time ... All This Belong To And Is Included In The Word Order.

It Is Dangerous To Abandon One's Self To The Luxury Of Grief; It Deprives One Of Courage, And Even Of The Wish For Recovery.

Righteous Ends, Thus Approved, Absolve Of Guilt The Most Violent Means.

We Are All Visionaries, And What We See Is Our Soul In Things.

Society Rests Upon Conscience, Not Upon Science.

Any Landscape Is A Condition Of The Spirit.

American Landscape

What Governs Men Is The Fear Of Truth.

The Fire Which Enlightens Is The Same Fire Which Consumes.

Nothing Finite Is True, Is Interesting, Is Worthy To Fix My Attention. All That Is Particular Is Exclusive, And All That Is Exclusive Repels Me.

He Who Is Too Much Afraid Of Being Duped Has Lost The Power Of Being Magnanimous.

Mother Of Marvels, Mysterious And Tender Nature, Why Do We Not Live More In Thee.

Whenever Conscience Speaks With A Divided, Uncertain, And Disputed Voice, It Is Not The Voice Of God. Descend Still Deeper Into Yourself, Until You Hear Nothing But A Clear, Undivided Voice, A Voice Which Does Away With Doubt And Brings With It Persuasion, Light, And Serenity.

The Efficacy Of Religion Lies Precisely In What Is Not Rational, Philosophic, Nor Eternal; Its Efficacy Lies In The Unforeseen, The Miraculous, The Extraordinary. Thus Religion Attracts More Devotion According As It Demands More Faith - That Is To Say, As It Becomes More Incredible To The Profane Mind.

Before Giving Advice We Must Have Secured Its Acceptance, Or, Rather, Have Made It Desired.

A Man Only Understands What Is Akin To Something Already Existing In Himself.

I Am A Spectator, So To Speak, Of The Molecular Whirlwind Which Men Call Individual Life; I Am Conscious Of An Incessant Metamorphosis, An Irresistible Movement Of Existence, Which Is Going On Within Me - And This Phenomenology Of Myself Serves As A Window Opened Upon The Mystery Of The World.

To Feel Keenly The Poetry Of A Morning's Roses, One Has To Have Just Escaped From The Claws Of This Vulture Which We Call Sickness.

To Understand Is To Possess The Thing Understood, First By Sympathy And Then By Intelligence.

[t]he Habit Of Scientific Analysis ... Exhausts The Material Offered To It.

Scientific Method

Whatever Impatience We May Feel Towards Our Neighbor, And Whatever Indignation Our Race May Rouse In Us, We Are Chained One To Another, And, Companions In Labour And Misfortune, Have Everything To Lose By Mutual Recrimination And Reproach. Let Us Be Silent As To Each Other's Weakness, Helpful, Tolerant, Many, Tender Towards Each Other! Or, If We Cannot Feel Tenderness, May We At Least Feel Pity!

Accept Life, And You Must Accept Regret.

Clever People Will Recognize And Tolerate Nothing But Cleverness.

Joy Is The Vital Air Of The Soul.

Put Personal Ambition Away From You, And Then You Will Find Consolation In Living Or In Dying, Whatever May Happen To You.

Love Is Faith And One Faith Leads To Another.

Criticism Is Above All A Gift, An Intuition, A Matter Of Tact And Flair; It Cannot Be Taught Or Demonstrated--it Is An Art.

Life Is Short And We Have Never Too Much Time For Gladdening The Hearts Of Those Who Are Travelling The Dark Journey With Us. Oh Be Swift To Love, Make Haste To Be Kind.

Composition Is A Process Of Combination, In Which Thought Puts Together Complementary Truths, And Talent Fuses Into Harmony The Most Contrary Qualities Of Style. So That There Is No Composition Without Effort, Without Pain Even, As In All Bringing Forth. The Reward Is The Giving Birth To Something Living--something, That Is To Say, Which, By A Kind Of Magic, Makes A Living Unity Out Of Such Opposed Attributes As Orderliness And Spontaneity, Thought And Imagination, Solidity And Charm.

To Depersonalize Man Is The Dominant Drift Of Our Times.

Our Dependence Outweighs Our Independence, For We Are Independent Only In Our Desire, While We Are Dependent On Our Health, On Nature, On Society, On Everything In Us And Outside Us.

Truth Above All, Even When It Upsets Us And Overwhelms Us.

To Be Always Ready A Man Must Be Able To Cut A Knot, For Everything Cannot Be Untied.

Man Is Saved By Love And Duty, And By The Hope That Springs From Duty, Or Rather From The Moral Facts Of Consciousness, As A Flower Springs From The Soil.

He Who Floats With The Current, Who Does Not Guide Himself According To Higher Principles, Who Has No Ideal, No Convictions-such A Man Is . . . A Thing Moved, Instead Of A Living And Moving Being-an Echo, Not A Voice. The Man Who Has No Inner-life Is A Slave Of His Surroundings As The Barometer Is The Obedient Servant Of The Air.

Nothing Finite Is True, Is Interesting, Is Worthy To Fix My Attention. All That Is Particular Is Exclusive, And All That Is Exclusive Repels Me.

The Germs Of All Things Are In Every Heart, And The Greatest Criminals As Well As The Greatest Heroes Are But Different Modes Of Ourselves.

Self-interest Is But The Survival Of The Animal In Us. Humanity Only Begins For Man With Self-surrender.

There Is No Curing A Sick Man Who Believes Himself To Be In Health.

Time And Space Are Fragments Of The Infinite For The Use Of Finite Creatures.

Order Means Light And Peace, Inward Liberty And Free Command Over One's Self; Order Is Power.

Criticism Is Above All A Gift, An Intuition, A Matter Of Tact And Flair; It Cannot Be Taught Or Demonstrated--it Is An Art. Critical Genius Means An Aptitude For Discerning Truth Under Appearances Or In Disguises Which Conceal It; For Discovering It In Spite Of The Errors Of Testimony, The Frauds Of Tradition, The Dust Of Time, The Loss Or Alteration Of Texts. It Is The Sagacity Of The Hunter Whom Nothing Deceives For Long, And Whom No Ruse Can Throw Off The Trail.

What We Do Not Understand We Have No Right To Judge

We Are Never More Discontented With Others Than When We Are Discontented With Ourselves. The Consciousness Of Wrong-doing Makes Us Irritable, And Our Heart, In Its Cunning, Quarrels With What Is Outside It, In Order That It May Deafen The Clamor Within.

We Are Never More Discontented With Others Than When We Are Discontented With Ourselves.

Self-interest Is An Inexhaustible Source Of Convenient Illusions. The Number Of Beings Who Wish To See Truly Is Extraordinarily Small.

So Long As A Person Is Capable Of Self-renewal They Are A Living Being. -henri

Christianity, If It Is To Triumph Over Pantheism, Must Absorb It. To Our Pusillanimous Eyes Jesus Would Have Borne The Marks Of A Hateful Pantheism, For He Confirmed The Biblical Phrase "ye Are Gods," And So Would St. Paul, Who Tells Us That We Are Of "the Race Of God." Our Century Wants A New Theology - That Is To Say, A More Profound Explanation Of The Nature Of Christ And Of The Light Which It Flashes Upon Heaven And Upon Humanity.

Materialism Coarsens And Petrifies Everything, Making Everything Vulgar, And Every Truth False.

About Jesus We Must Believe No One But Himself.

Tell Me What You Feel In Your Room When The Full Moon Is Shining In Upon You And Your Lamp Is Dying Out, And I Will Tell You How Old You Are, And I Shall Know If You Are Happy.

The Best Path Through Life Is The Highway.

Philosophy Means The Complete Liberty Of The Mind, And Therefore Independence Of All Social, Political Or Religious Prejudice... It Loves One Thing Only... Truth.

The Obscure Only Exists That It May Cease To Exist. In It Lies The Opportunity Of All Victory And All Progress. Whether It Call Itself Fatality, Death, Night, Or Matter, It Is The Pedestal Of Life, Of Light, Of Liberty And The Spirit. For It Represents Resistance -- That Is To Say, The Fulcrum Of All Activity, The Occasion For Its Development And Its Triumph.

The Ideal Doctor Would Be A Man Endowed With Profound Knowledge Of Life And Of The Soul, Intuitively Divining Any Suffering Or Disorder Of Whatever Kind, And Restoring Peace By His Mere Presence.

Medical Knowledge

I Do Not Deny The Rights Of Democracy, But I Have No Illusions As To The Uses That Will Be Made Of Those Rights So Long As Wisdom Is Rare And Pride Abundant

There Is An Illusion Of Central Position, Justifying One's Own Purposes As Right And Everybody Else¹s As Wrong, And Providing A Proper Degree Of Paranoia. Righteous Ends, Thus Approved, Absolve Of Guilt The Most Violent Means.

At Bottom There Is But One Subject Of Study: The Forms And Metamorphoses Of Mind. All Other Subjects May Be Reduced To That; All Other Studies Bring Us Back To This Study.

The Stationary Condition Is The Beginning Of The End

Learn To Limit Yourself; To Content Yourself With Some Definite Work; Dare To Be What You Are And Learn To Resign With A Good Grace All That You Are Not; And To Believe In Your Own Individuality.

The Spirit Of Sarcasm Lives And Thrives In The Midst Of Universal Wreck; Its Balls Are Enchanted And Itself Invulnerable, And It Braves Retaliations And Reprisals Because Itself Is A Mere Flash, A Bodiless And Magical Nothing.

The Test Of Every Religious, Political, Or Educational System, Is The Man Which It Forms. If A System Injures The Intelligence It Is Bad. If It Injures The Character It Is Vicious. If It Injures The Conscience It Is Criminal.

To Be Misunderstood Even By Those Whom One Loves Is The Cross And Bitterness Of Life. It Is The Secret Of That Sad And Melancholy Smile On The Lips Of Great Men Which So Few Understand.

Do Not Despise Your Situation; In It You Must Act, Suffer, And Conquer. From Every Point On Earth We Are Equally Near To Heaven And To The Infinite.

How True It Is That Our Destinies Are Decided By Nothings And That A Small Imprudence Helped By Some Insignificant Accident, As An Acorn Is Fertilized By A Drop Of Rain, May Raise The Trees On Which Perhaps We And Others Shall Be Crucified.

The Great Artist And Thinker Are The Simplifiers.

In Every Loving Woman There Is A Priestess Of The Past - A Pious Guardian Of Some Affection, Of Which The Object Has Disappeared.

At Bottom, Everything Depends Upon The Presence Or Absence Of One Single Element In The Soul - Hope

Order Is Man's Greatest Need, And His True Well-being.

I Do Not Deny The Rights Of Democracy, But I Have No Illusions As To The Uses That Will Be Made Of Those Rights So Long As Wisdom Is Rare And Pride Abundant

Righteous Ends, Thus Approved, Absolve Of Guilt The Most Violent Means.

A Thousand Things Advance; Nine Hundred And Ninety Nine Retreat; That Is Progress.

Every Situation Is An Equilibrium Of Forces; Every Life Is A Struggle Between Opposing Forces Working Within The Limits Of A Certain Equilibrium

The Growth And Development Of The Soul Is More Important Than Power And Glory.

The Philosopher Aspires To Explain Away All Mysteries, To Dissolve Them Into Light. Mystery On The Other Hand Is Demanded And Pursued By The Religious Instinct; Mystery Constitutes The Essence Of Worship, The Power Of Proselytism.

Man Is A Passion Which Brings A Will Into Play, Which Works An Intelligence.

True Love Is That Which Ennobles The Personality, Fortifies The Heart, And Sanctifies The Existence.

He Who Is Silent Is Forgotten; He Who Does Not Advance Falls Back; He Who Stops Is Overwhelmed; Out Distanced, Crushed; He Who Ceases T Grow Becomes Smaller; He Who Leaves Off, Gives Up; The Condition Of Standing Still Is The Beginning Of The End.

Doing Easily What Others Find Difficult Is Talent; Doing What Is Impossible For Talent Is Genius.

Pure Truth Cannot Be Assimilated By The Crowd; It Must Be Communicated By Contagion.

Men Prefer The False Due To Habit, Passion, Will. Preference For Truth Is Rare. Men Are Ruled By Their Fear Of Truth.

Whenever Conscience Speaks With A Divided, Uncertain, And Disputed Voice, It Is Not The Voice Of God. Descend Still Deeper Into Yourself, Until You Hear Nothing But A Clear, Undivided Voice, A Voice Which Does Away With Doubt And Brings With It Persuasion, Light, And Serenity.

If Nationality Is Consent, The State Is Compulsion.

A Journal Takes The Place Of A Confidant, That Is, Of Friend Or Wife; It Becomes A Substitute For Production, A Substitute For Country And Public. It Is A Grief-cheating Device, A Mode Of Escape And Withdrawal; But, Factotum As It Is, Though It Takes The Place Of Everything, Properly Speaking It Represents Nothing At All.

Order Means Light And Peace, Inward Liberty And Free Command Over One's Self; Order Is Power.

The Ideal, After All, Is True Than The Real: For The Ideal Is The Eternal Element In Perishable Things.

Doubt Of The Reality Of Love Ends By Making Us Doubt Everything.

Order Is A Great Person's Need And Their True Well Being.

A Microscopic Phantom Of The Universe; This Is All That We Are Able To Be.

Woman Is The Salvation Or The Destruction Of The Family. She Carries Its Destiny In The Folds Of Her Mantle.

What We Call Little Things Are Merely The Causes Of Great Things; They Are The Beginning, The Embryo, And It Is The Point Of Departure Which, Generally Speaking, Decides The Whole Future Of An Existence. One Single Black Speck May Be The Beginning Of Gangrene, Of A Storm, Of A Revolution.

Nothing Is More Characteristic Of A Man Than The Manner In Which He Behaves Toward Fools.

To Know How To Suggest Is The Art Of Teaching.

Unconsciousness, Spontaneity, Instinct ... Hold Us To The Earth And Dictate The Relatively Good And Useful.

The Immense Majority Of Our Species Are Candidates For Humanity, And Nothing More.

For Purposes Of Action Nothing Is More Useful Than Narrowness Of Thought Combined With Energy Of Will.

Let The Living Live; And You, Gather Together Your Thoughts, Leave Behind You A Legacy Of Feeling And Ideas; You Will Be Most Useful So.

To Know How To Suggest Is The Art Of Teaching.

Life Alone Can Rekindle Life.

I Wonder Whether I Should Gain Anything By The Attempt To Assume A Character Which Is Not Mine. My Wavering Manner, Born Of Doubt And Scruple, Has At Least The Advantage Of Rendering All The Different Shades Of My Thought, And Of Being Sincere. If It Were To Become Terse, Affirmative, Resolute, Would It Not Be A Mere Imitation?

The Ideal Doctor Would Be A Man Endowed With Profound Knowledge Of Life And Of The Soul, Intuitively Divining Any Suffering Or Disorder Of Whatever Kind, And Restoring Peace By His Mere Presence.

Medical Knowledge

Cleverness Is Serviceable For Everything, Sufficient For Nothing.

Common Sense Is The Measure Of The Possible.

The Man Who Insists Upon Seeing With Perfect Clearness Before He Decides, Never Decides. Accept Life, And You Must Accept Regret.

Heroism Is The Brilliant Triumph Of The Soul Over The Flesh - Over Fear...heroism Is The Dazzling And Glorious Concentration Of Courage.

Happiness Gives Us The Energy Which Is The Basis Of Health.

Will Localizes Us, Thought Universalizes Us.

Thought Is A Kind Of Opium; It Can Intoxicate Us, While Still Broad Awake; It Can Make Transparent The Mountains And Everything That Exists.

Sadness Takes Up The Pen More Readily Than Joy.

The Only Substance Properly So Called Is The Soul.

Women Wish To Be Loved Without A Why Or A Wherefore; Not Because They Are Pretty, Or Good, Or Well-bred, Or Graceful, Or Intelligent, But Because They Are Themselves.

Independent Women

[i]t Is Truth Alone-scientific, Established, Proved, And Rational Truth-which Is Capable Of Satisfying Nowadays The Awakened Minds Of All Classes. We May Still Say Perhaps, 'faith Governs The World,'-but The Faith Of The Present Is No Longer In Revelation Or In The Priest-it Is In Reason And In Science.

The Efficacy Of Religion Lies Precisely In What Is Not Rational, Philosophic, Nor Eternal; Its Efficacy Lies In The Unforeseen, The Miraculous, The Extraordinary. Thus Religion Attracts More Devotion According As It Demands More Faith - That Is To Say, As It Becomes More Incredible To The Profane Mind.

Emancipation From Error Is The Condition Of Real Knowledge.

A Man Must Be Able To Cut A Knot, For Everything Cannot Be Untied; He Must Know How To Disengage What Is Essential From The Detail In Which It Is Enwrapped, For Everything Cannot Be Equally Considered; In A Word, He Must Be Able To Simplify His Duties, His Business And His Life.

Pure Truth Cannot Be Assimilated By The Crowd; It Must Be Communicated By Contagion.

Tears Are The Symbol Of The Inability Of The Soul To Restrain Its Emotion And Retain Its Self Command.

A Man Only Understands What Is Akin To Something Already Existing In Himself.

An Error Is The More Dangerous In Proportion To The Degree Of Truth Which It Contains.

War Is A Brutal And Fierce Means Of Pacification; It Means The Suppression Of Resistance By The Destruction Or Enslavement Of The Conquered.

Our Life Is Nothing, It Is True, But Our Life Is Divine. A Breath Of Nature Annihilates Us, But We Surpass Nature In Penetrating Far Beyond Her Vast Phantasmagoria To The Changeless And The Eternal.

Destiny Has Two Ways Of Crushing Us - By Refusing Our Wishes And By Fulfilling Them.

He Who Is Silent Is Forgotten; He Who Does Not Advance Falls Back; He Who Stops Is Overwhelmed; Out Distanced, Crushed; He Who Ceases T Grow Becomes Smaller; He Who Leaves Off, Gives Up; The Condition Of Standing Still Is The Beginning Of The End.

We Only Understand That Which Already Is Within Us.

A Musical Theme Once Exhausted, Finds Its Due Refuge And Repose In Silence.

Sympathy Is The First Condition Of Criticism.

Man Is A Willful And Covetous Animal, Who Makes Use Of His Intellect To Satisfy His Inclinations, But Who Cares Nothing For Truth, Who Rebels Against Personal Discipline, Who Hates Disinterested Thought And The Idea Of Self-education. Wisdom Offends Him, Because It Rouses In Him Disturbance And Confusion, And Because He Will Not See Himself As He Is.

The Laws Of Animality Govern Almost The Whole Of History.

The Growth And Development Of The Soul Is More Important Than Power And Glory.

To Be Misunderstood Even By Those Whom One Loves Is The Cross And Bitterness Of Life. It Is The Secret Of That Sad And Melancholy Smile On The Lips Of Great Men Which So Few Understand; It Is The Cruelest Trial Reserved For Self-devotion; It Is What Must Have Oftenest Wrung The Heart Of The Son Of Man; And If God Could Suffer, It Would Be The Wound We Should Be Forever Inflicting Upon Him. He Also - He Above All - Is The Great Misunderstood, The Least Comprehended.

The Masses Are The Material Of Democracy, But Its Form-that Is To Say, The Laws Which Express The General Reason, Justice, And Utility-can Only Be Rightly Shaped By Wisdom, Which Is By No Means A Universal Property.

To Know How To Suggest Is The Great Art Of Teaching. To Attain It We Must Be Able To Guess What Will Interest; We Must Learn To Read The Childish Soul As We Might A Piece Of Music. Then, By Simply Changing The Key, We Keep Up The Attraction And Vary The Song.

Let Us Be True: This Is The Highest Maxim Of Art And Of Life, The Secret Of Eloquence And Of Virtue, And Of All Moral Authority.

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