Top quotes by Herbert Spencer

The more specific idea of Evolution now reached is - a change from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a definite, coherent heterogeneity, accompanying the dissipation of motion and integration of matter. Votes: 15

People are beginning to see that the first requisite to success in life is to be a good animal. Votes: 15

Love is life's end, but never ending. Love is life's wealth, never spent, but ever spending. Love's life's reward, rewarded in rewarding. Votes: 15

A living thing is distinguished from a dead thing by the multiplicity of the changes at any moment taking place in it. Votes: 13

The fact disclosed by a survey of the past that majorities have been wrong must not blind us to the complementary fact that majorities have usually not been entirely wrong. Votes: 13

Objects we ardently pursue bring little happiness when gained; most of our pleasures come from unexpected sources. Votes: 12

The great aim of education is not knowledge but action. Votes: 12

Divine right of kings means the divine right of anyone who can get uppermost. Votes: 11

Hero-worship is strongest where there is least regard for human freedom. Votes: 10

The wise man must remember that while he is a descendant of the past, he is a parent of the future. Votes: 9

Conservatism defends those coercive arrangements which a still-lingering savageness makes requisite. Radicalism endeavours to realize a state more in harmony with the character of the ideal man. Votes: 9

Science is organized knowledge. Votes: 8

Marriage: a ceremony in which rings are put on the finger of the lady and through the nose of the gentleman. Votes: 7

In science the important thing is to modify and change one's ideas as science advances. Votes: 7

Feudalism, serfdom, slavery, all tyrannical institutions, are merely the most vigorous kind to rule, springing out of, and necessarily to, a bad state of man. The progress from these is the same in all cases - less government. Votes: 7

Mother, when your children are irritable, do not make them more so by scolding and fault-finding, but correct their irritability by good nature and mirthfulness. Irritability comes from errors in food, bad air, too little sleep, a necessity for change of scene and surroundings; from confinement in close rooms, and lack of sunshine. Votes: 6

Music must take rank as the highest of the fine arts - as the one which, more than any other, ministers to the human spirit. Votes: 6

The behavior of men to the lower animals, and their behavior to each other, bear a constant relationship. Votes: 5

It is a mistake to assume that government must necessarily last forever. The institution marks a certain stage of civilization-is natural to a particular phase of human development. It is not essential, but incidental. As amongst the Bushmen we find a state antecedent to government, so may there be one in which it shall have become extinct. Votes: 5

Opinion is ultimately determined by the feelings, and not by the intellect. Votes: 5

An argument fatal to the communist theory, is suggested by the fact, that a desire for property is one of the elements of our nature. Votes: 4

Be bold, be bold, and everywhere be bold. Votes: 4

Education has for its object the formation of character. To curb restive propensities, to awaken dormant sentiments, to strengthen the perceptions, and cultivate the tastes, to encourage this feeling and repress that, so as finally to develop the child into a man of well proportioned and harmonious nature, this is alike the aim of parent and teacher. Votes: 4

There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation. Votes: 4

The existence of a first cause of the universe is a necessity of thought ... Amid the mysteries which become more mysterious the more they are thought about, there will remain the one absolute certainty that we are over in the presence of an Infinite, Eternal Energy from which all things proceed. Votes: 3

To play billiards well was a sign of an ill-spent youth Votes: 3

To play billiards well is the sign of a misspent youth. Votes: 3

The authoritarian sets up some book, or man, or tradition to establish the truth. The freethinker sets up reason and private judgment to discover the truth... It takes the highest courage to utter unpopular truths. Votes: 3

We have unmistakable proof that throughout all past time, there has been a ceaseless devouring of the weak by the strong. Votes: 2

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools. Votes: 2

In the supremacy of self-control consists one of the perfections of the ideal man. Votes: 0

When you take comprehensive, then we're dealing with certain issues like full citizenship ... And whatever else we disagree on, I think we would agree on that that's a more toxic and contentious issue, granting full amnesty. Votes: 0

Organs, faculties, powers, capacities, or whatever else we call them; grow by use and diminish from disuse, it is inferred that they will continue to do so. And if this inference is unquestionable, then is the one above deduced from it-that humanity must in the end become completely adapted to its conditions-unquestionable also. Progress, therefore, is not an accident, but a necessity. Votes: 0

Life is the continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations. Votes: 0

A jury is composed of twelve men of average ignorance. Votes: 0

Lusts are like agues; the fit is not always on, and yet the man is not rid of his disease; and some men's lusts, like some agues, have not such quick returns as others. Votes: 0

Marriage: A word which should be pronounced "mirage". Votes: 0

How often misused words generate misleading thoughts. Votes: 0

This survival of the fittest which I have here sought to express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr. Darwin has called "natural selection", or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. Votes: 0

Education has for its object to develop the child into a man of well proportioned and harmonious nature-this is alike the aim of parent and teacher. Votes: 0

Volumes might be written upon the impiety of the pious. Votes: 0

The preservation of health is a duty. Few seem conscious that there is such a thing as physical morality. Votes: 0

Old forms of government finally grow so oppressive that they must be thrown off even at the risk of reigns of terror. Votes: 0

The Republican form of government is the highest form of government: but because of this it requires the highest type of human nature, a type nowhere at present existing. Votes: 0

Even the absurdest report may in nearly every instance be traced to an actual occurrence; and had there been no such actual occurrence, this preposterous misrepresentation of it would never have existed. Though the distorted or magnified image transmitted to us through the refracting medium of rumour, is utterly unlike the reality; yet in the absence of the reality there would have been no distorted or magnified image. Votes: 0

A stern discipline pervades all nature, which is a little cruel that it may be very kind Votes: 0

The behavior of men to the lower animals, and their behavior to each other, bear a constant relationship Votes: 0

They who employ force by proxy are as much responsible for that force as though they employed it themselves. Votes: 0

If a single cell, under appropriate conditions, becomes a man in the space of a few years, there can surely be no difficulty in understanding how, under appropriate conditions, a cell may, in the course of untold millions of years, give origin to the human race. Votes: 0

This survival of the fittest implies multiplication of the fittest.{The phrase 'survival of the fittest' was not originated by Charles Darwin, though he discussed Spencer's 'excellent expression' in a letter to Alfred Russel Wallace (Jul 1866).} Votes: 0

This survival of the fittest which I have here sought to express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr. Darwin has called 'natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. Votes: 0

Evolution is an integration of matter and concomitant dissipation of motion during which the matter passes from an indefinite incoherent homogeneity to a definite coherent heterogeneity, and during which the retained motion undergoes a parallel transformation. Votes: 0

No man is equal to his book. All the best products of his mental activity go into his book, where they come separated from the mass of inferior products with which they are mingled in his daily talk. Votes: 0

We too often forget that not only is there 'a soul of goodness in things evil,' but very generally also, a soul of truth in things erroneous. Votes: 0

Our lives are universally shortened by our ignorance. Votes: 0

... those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded... Sad, indeed, is it to see how men occupy themselves with trivialities, and are indifferent to the grandest phenomena - care not to understand the architecture of the heavens, but are deeply interested in some contemptible controversy about the intrigues of Mary Queen of Scots! Votes: 0

That feelings of love and hate make rational judgments impossible in public affairs, as in private affairs, we can clearly enough see in others, though not so clearly in ourselves. Votes: 0

What a cage is to the wild beast, law is to the selfish man. Votes: 0

All evil results from the non-adaptation of constitution to conditions. This is true of everything that lives. Does a shrub dwindle in poor soil, or become sickly when deprived of light, or die outright if removed to a cold climate? it is because the harmony between its organization and its circumstances has been destroyed. Votes: 0

The saying that beauty is but skin deep, is but a skin-deep saying. Votes: 0

All socialism involves slavery. Votes: 0

Let men learn that a legislature is not 'our God upon earth,' though, by the authority they ascribe to it, and the things they expect from it, they would seem to think it is. Let them learn rather that it is an institution serving a purely temporary purpose, whose power, when not stolen, is at the best borrowed. Votes: 0

This survival of the fittest implies multiplication of the fittest. Votes: 0

It cannot but happen?that those will survive whose functions happen to be most nearly in equilibrium with the modified aggregate of external forces? This survival of the fittest implies multiplication of the fittest. Votes: 0

Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded. Votes: 0

We all decry prejudice, yet are all prejudiced. Votes: 0

We do not commonly see in a tax a diminution of freedom, and yet it clearly is one. Votes: 0

Civilization is a progress from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity toward a definite, coherent heterogeneity. Votes: 0

Marriage: A word which should be pronounced 'mirage'. Votes: 0

A function to each organ, and each organ to its own function, is the law of all organization. Votes: 0

A man's liberties are none the less aggressed upon because those who coerce him do so in the belief that he will be benefited. Votes: 0

A nation's institutions and beliefs are determined by it's character. Votes: 0

A stern discipline pervades all nature, which is a little cruel that it may be very kind. Votes: 0

Absolute morality is the regulation of conduct in such a way that pain shall not be inflicted. Votes: 0

Aggression which is flagitious when committed by one, is not sanctioned when committed by a host. Votes: 0

Agnostics are people who, like myself, confess themselves to be hopelessly ignorant concerning a variety of matters, about which metaphysicians and theologians, both orthodox and heterodox, dogmatize with the utmost confidence. Votes: 0

All socialism involves slavery. That which fundamentally distinguishes the slave is that he labours under coercion to satisfy anothers desires. Votes: 0

All socialism involves slavery.... That which fundamentally distinguishes the slave is that he labors under coercion to satisfy another's desires. The relation admits of many gradations. Oppressive taxation is a form of slavery of the individual to the community as a whole. The essential question is -- How much is he compelled to labor for other benefit than his own, and how much can he labor for his own benefit? Votes: 0

And yet, strange to say, now that the truth [of natural selection] is recognized by most cultivated people...now more than ever, in the history of the world, are they doing all they can to further the survival of the unfittest. Votes: 0

Any piece of knowledge which the pupil has himself acquired- any problem which he has himself solved, becomes, by virtue of the conquest, much more thoroughly his than it could else be. The preliminary activity of mind which his success implies, the concentration of thought necessary to it, and the excitement consequent on his triumph, conspire to register the facts in his memory in a way that no mere information heard from a teacher, or read in a schoolbook, can be registered. Votes: 0

Anyone who studies the state of things which preceded the French Revolution will see that the tremendous catastrophe came about from so excessive a regulation of men's actions in all their details, and such an enormous drafting away of the products of their actions to maintain the regulating organization, that life was fast becoming impracticable. And if we ask what then made, and now makes, this error possible, we find it to be the political superstition that governmental power is subject to no restraints. Votes: 0

Architecture, sculpture, painting, music, and poetry, may truly be called the efflorescence of civilised life. Votes: 0

As there must be moderation in other things, so there must be moderation in self-criticism. Perpetual contemplation of our own actions produces a morbid consciousness, quite unlike that normal consciousness accompanying right actions spontaneously done; and from a state of unstable equilibrium long maintained by effort, there is apt to be a fall towards stable equilibrium, in which the primitive nature reasserts itself. Retrogression rather than progression may hence result. Votes: 0

Be it or be it not true that Man is shapen in iniquity and conceived in sin, it is unquestionably true that Government is begotten of aggression, and by aggression. Votes: 0

Courage is worthy of respect when displayed in the maintenance of legitimate claims and in the repelling of aggressions, bodily or other. Courage is worthy of yet higher respect when danger is faced in defence of claims common to self and others, as in resistance to invasion. Courage is worthy of the highest respect when risk to life or limb is dared in defence of others. Votes: 0

Do not try to produce an ideal child, it would find no fitness in this world. Votes: 0

During human progress, every science is evolved out of its corresponding art. Votes: 0

Each new ontological theory, propounded in lieu of previous ones shown to be untenable, has been followed by a new criticism leading to a new scepticism. All possible conceptions have been one by one tried and found wanting; and so the entire field of speculation has been gradually exhausted without positive result: the only result reached being the negative one above stated, that the reality existing behind all appearances is, and must ever be, unknown. Votes: 0

Education has for its object the formation of character. Votes: 0

Education is preparation to live completely. Votes: 0

Equity knows no difference of sex. In its vocabulary the word man must be understood in a generic, and not in a specific sense. Votes: 0

Ethical ideas and sentiments have to be considered as parts of the phenomena of life at large. We have to deal with man as a product of evolution, with society as a product of evolution, and with moral phenomena as products of evolution. Votes: 0

Every cause produces more than one effect. Votes: 0

Every man is free to do that which he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man. Votes: 0

Every man may claim the fullest liberty to exercise his faculties compatible with the possession of like liberties by every other man. Votes: 0

Every pleasure raises the tide of life; every pain lowers the tide of life. Votes: 0

Every unpunished delinquency has a family of delinquencies. Votes: 0

Evil perpetually tends to disappear. Votes: 0

For what is meant by saying that a government ought to educate the people? Why should they be educated? What is the education for? Clearly, to fit the people for social life - to make them good citizens. And who is to say what are good citizens? The government: there is no other judge. And who is to say how these good citizens may be made? The government: there is no other judge. Hence the proposition is convertible into this - a government ought to mold children into good citizens, using its own discretion in settling what a good citizen is and how the child may be molded into one. Votes: 0

Government is essentially immoral. Votes: 0

Government is essentially immoral. The State employs evil weapons to subjugate evil, and is alike contaminated by the objects with which it deals, and the means by which it works. Votes: 0

How truly language must be regarded as a hindrance to thought, though the necessary instrument of it, we shall clearly perceive on remembering the comparative force with which simple ideas are communicated by signs. To say, "Leave the room," is less expressive than to point to the door. Place a finger on the lips is more forcible than whispering, "Do not speak." A beck of the hand is better than, "Come here." No phrase can convey the idea of surprise so vividly as opening the eyes and raising the eyebrows. A shrug of the shoulders would lose much by translation into words. Votes: 0

However insignificant the minority, and however trifling the proposed trespass against their rights, no such trespass is permissible. Votes: 0

I had a great dislike to the annoyances entailed by baggage; and it was always with some feeling of elation that I cut myself free from everything but what I could carry about me. Like children, portmanteaus and trunks are hostages to fortune. Votes: 0

If every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man, then he is free to drop connection with the state-to relinquish its protection, and to refuse paying toward its support. Votes: 0

If men were wise they would see that the affection that God has implanted in us is amply sufficient, when not weakened by artificial aid, to ensure permanence of union; and if they would have more faith in this all would go well. To tie together by human law what God has tied together by passion, is about as wise as it would be to chain the moon to the earth lest the natural attraction existing between them should not be sufficient to prevent them flying asunder. Votes: 0

If on one day we find the fast-spreading recognition of popular rights accompanied by a silent, growing perception of the rights of women, we also find it accompanied by a tendency towards a system of non-coercive education--that is, towards a practical illustration of the rights of children. Votes: 0

If there be an order in which the human race has mastered its various kinds of knowledge, there will arise in every child an aptitude to acquire these kinds of knowledge in the same order. So that even were the order intrinsically indifferent, it would facilitate education to lead the individual mind through the steps traversed by the general mind. But the order is not intrinsically indifferent; and hence the fundamental reason why education should be a repetition of civilization in little. Votes: 0

If they are sufficiently complete to live, they do live, and it is well they should live. If they are not sufficiently complete to live, they die, and it is best they should die. Votes: 0

In assuming any office besides its essential one, the State begins to lose the power of fulfilling its essential one. Votes: 0

In literary art, as in the art of the architect, the painter, the musician, signs that the artist is thinking of his own achievement more than of his subject always offend me. Votes: 0

In societies of low civilization, there is no money. Votes: 0

Is it stupidity or is it moral cowardice which leads men to continue professing a creed that makes self-sacrifice a cardinal principle, while they urge the sacrificing of others, even to the death, when they trespass against us? Is it blindness, or is it an insance inconsistency, which makes them regard as most admirable the bearing of evil for the benefit of others, while they lavish admiration on those who, out of revenge, inflict great evils in return for small ones suffered? Surely our barbarian code of right needs revision, and our barbarian standard of honour should be somewhat changed. Votes: 0

It becomes possible to admit that plainness may coexist with nobility of nature, and fine features with baseness; and yet to hold that mental and physical perfection are fundamentally connected, and will, when the present causes of incongruity have worked themselves out, be ever found united. Votes: 0

It is a commonly observed fact that the enslavement of women is invariably associated with a low type of social life, and that, conversely, her elevation towards an equality with man uniformly accompanies progress. Votes: 0

It is the function of parents to see that their children habitually experience the true consequences of their conduct. Votes: 0

It must be admitted that the conception of virtue cannot be separated from the conception of happiness-producing conduct. Votes: 0

Liberty is not the right of one, but of all. Votes: 0

Life is not for learning nor is life for working, but learning and working are for life. Votes: 0

Mental power cannot be got from ill-fed brains. Votes: 0

Morality knows nothing of geographical boundaries, or distinctions of race. Votes: 0

Much dearer be the things which come through hard distress. Votes: 0

Music may appeal to crude and coarse feelings or to refined and noble ones; and in so far as it does the latter it awakens the higher nature and works an effect, though but a transitory effect, of a beneficial kind. But the primary purpose of music is neither instruction nor culture but pleasure; and this is an all-sufficient purpose. Votes: 0

Music ministers to human welfare more than any other art. Votes: 0

Never educate a child to be a gentleman or lady alone, but to be a man, a woman. Votes: 0

No one can be perfectly free till all are free; no one can be perfectly moral till all are moral; no one can be perfectly happy till all are happy. Votes: 0

No one can be perfectly happy till all are happy. Votes: 0

No philosopher's stone of a constitution can produce golden conduct from leaden instincts. Votes: 0

No phrase can convey the idea of surprise so vividly as opening the eyes and raising the eyebrows. A shrug of the shoulders would lose much by translation into words. Votes: 0

No physiologist who calmly considers the question in connection with the general truths of his science, can long resist the conviction that different parts of the cerebrum subserve different kinds of mental action. Localization of function is the law of all organization whatever: separateness of duty is universally accompanied with separateness of structure: and it would be marvellous were an exception to exist in the cerebral hemispheres. Votes: 0

No place, no company, no age, no person is temptation-free; let no man boast that he was never tempted, let him not be high-minded, but fear, for he may be surprised in that very instant wherein he boasteth that he was never tempted at all. Votes: 0

Noiseless falls the foot of time That only treads on flowers. Votes: 0

Of all the knowledge, that most worth having is knowledge about health! The first requisite of a good life is to be a healthy person. Votes: 0

Only when Genius is married to Science can the highest results be produced. Votes: 0

Originally, ethics has no existence apart from religion, which holds it in solution. Votes: 0

People ... become so preoccupied with the means by which an end is achieved, as eventually to mistake it for the end. Just as money, which is a means of satisfying wants, comes to be regarded by a miser as the sole thing to be worked for, leaving the wants unsatisfied; so the conduct men have found preferable because most conducive to happiness, has come to be thought of as intrinsically preferable: not only to be made a proximate end (which it should be), but to be made an ultimate end, to the exclusion of the true ultimate end. Votes: 0

Policeman are soldiers who act alone; soldiers are policeman who act in unison. Votes: 0

Progress is not an accident, not a thing within human control, but a beneficent necessity ... due to the working of a universal law. So surely must the things we call evil and immorality disappear; so surely must man become perfect. Votes: 0

Progress, therefore, is not an accident, but a necessity"¦It is a part of nature. Votes: 0

Regarding language as an apparatus of symbols for the conveyance of thought, we may say that, as in a mechanical apparatus, the more simple and the better arranged its parts, the greater will be the effect produced. Votes: 0

Religion has been compelled by science to give up one after another of its dogmas. . . . Votes: 0

Religion is the recognition that all things are manifestations of a Power which transcends our knowledge. Votes: 0

Rightness expresses of actions, what straightness does of lines; and there can no more be two kinds of right action than there can be two kinds of straight lines. Votes: 0

So far from science being irreligious, as many think, it is the neglect of science that is irreligious-it is the refusal to study the surrounding creation that is irreligious. Votes: 0

So long as selfishness makes government needful at all, it must make every government corrupt, save one in which all men are represented. Votes: 0

Society exists for the benefit of its members - not the members for the benefit of society. Votes: 0

Strong as it looks at the outset, State-agency perpetually disappoints every one. Puny as are its first stages, private efforts daily achieve results that astound the world. Votes: 0

Sundry manifestations of nature in men and women, are greatly perverted by existing social conventions upheld by both. There are feelings which, under our predatory régime, with its adapted standard of propriety, it is not considered manly to show; but which, contrariwise, are considered admirable in women. Hence repressed manifestations in the one case, and exaggerated manifestations in the other; leading to mistaken estimates. Votes: 0

Surely in much talk there cannot choose but be much vanity. Loquacity is the fistula of the mind,--ever-running and almost incurable, let every man, therefore, be a Phocion or Pythagorean, to speak briefly to the point or not at all; let him labor like them of Crete, to show more wit in his discourse than words, and not to pour out of his mouth a flood of the one, when he can hardly wring out of his brains a drop of the other. Votes: 0

The "Creed of Christendom" is alien to my nature, both emotional and intellectual. Votes: 0

The belief, not only of the socialist but of those so-called liberals who are diligently preparing the way for them is that by due skill an ill working humanity may be framed into well-working initiations. It is delusion. The defective natures of citizens will show themselves in bad acting of whatever social structure they are arranged into. There is no political alchemy by which you can get golden conduct out of laden instincts. Votes: 0

The chief arguments that are urged against an established religion, may be used with equal force against an established charity. The dissenter submits, that no party has a right to compel him to contribute to the support of doctrines, which do not meet his approbation. The rate-payer may as reasonably argue, that no one is justified in forcing him to subscribe towards the maintenance of persons, whom he does not consider deserving of relief. Votes: 0

The child takes most of his nature of the mother, besides speech, manners, and inclination. Votes: 0

The cruelty of a Fijian god, who, represented as devouring the souls of the dead, may be supposed to inflict torture during the process, is small compared with the cruelty of a God who condemns men to tortures which are eternal. Votes: 0

The defects of the children mirror the defects of the parents. Votes: 0

The essential trait in the moral consciousness, is the control of some feeling or feelings by some other feeling or feelings. Votes: 0

The forces which are working out the great scheme of perfect happiness, taking no account of incidental suffering, exterminate such sections of mankind as stand in their way, with the same sternness that they exterminate beasts of prey and herds of useless ruminants. Votes: 0

The freest form of government is only the least objectionable form. The rule of the many by the few we call tyranny: the rule of the few by the many is tyranny also; only of a less intense kind. Votes: 0

The greatest of all infidelities is the fear that the truth will be bad. Votes: 0

The home is the most important factor in civilization, and that civilization is to be measured at different stages largely by the development in the home. Votes: 0

The idea of disembodied spirits is wholly unsupported by evidence, and I cannot accept it. Votes: 0

The ideal form for a poem, essay, or fiction, is that which the ideal writer would evolve spontaneously. One in whom the powers of expression fully responded to the state of feeling, would unconsciously use that variety in the mode of presenting his thoughts, which Art demands. Votes: 0

The law is the survival of the fittest.... The law is not the survival of the 'better' or the 'stronger,' if we give to those words any thing like their ordinary meanings. It is the survival of those which are constitutionally fittest to thrive under the conditions in which they are placed; and very often that which, humanly speaking, is inferiority, causes the survival. Votes: 0

The liberty the citizen enjoys is to be measured not by governmental machinery he lives under, whether representative or other, but by the paucity of restraints it imposes upon him. Votes: 0

The more numerous public instrumentalities become, the more is there generated in citizens the notion that everything is to be done for them, and nothing by them. Every generation is made less familiar with the attainment of desired ends by individual actions or private agencies; until, eventually, governmental agencies come to be thought of as the only available agencies. Votes: 0

The most important attribute of man as a moral being is the faculty of self-control. Votes: 0

The poverty of the incapable, the distresses that come upon the imprudent, the starvation of the idle, and those shoulderings aside of the weak by the strong, which leave so many "in shallows and in miseries," are the decrees of a large, far-seeing benevolence. Votes: 0

The present relationship existing between husband and wife, where one claims a command over the actions of the other, is nothing more than a remnant of the old leaven of slavery. It is necessarily destructive of refined love; for how can a man continue to regard as his type of the ideal a being whom he has, be denying an equality of privilege with himself, degraded to something below himself? Votes: 0

The presumption that any current opinion is not wholly false, gains in strength according to the number of its adherents. Votes: 0

The primary use of knowledge is for such guidance of conduct under all circumstances as shall make living complete. All other uses of knowledge are secondary. Votes: 0

The pursuit of individual happiness within those limits prescribed by social conditions, is the first requisite to the attainment of the greatest general happiness. Votes: 0

The question of questions for the politicians should ever be-What type of social structure am I tending to produce? But this is a question he never entertains. Votes: 0

The tyrant is nothing but a slave turned inside out. Votes: 0

The universal basis of co-operation is the proportioning of benefits received to services rendered. Votes: 0

The white light of truth, in traversing the many sided transparent soul of the poet, is refracted into iris-hued poetry. Votes: 0

There can be little question that good composition is far less dependent upon acquaintance with its laws, than upon practice and natural aptitude. A clear head, a quick imagination, and a sensitive ear, will go far towards making all rhetorical precepts needless. Votes: 0

There is a story of some mountains of salt in Cumana, which never diminished, though carried away in much abundance by merchants; but when once they were monopolized to the benefit of a private purse, then the salt decreased; till afterward all were allowed to take of it, when it had a new access and increase. The truth of this story may be uncertain, but the application is true; he that envies others the use of his gifts decays then, but he thrives most that is most diffusive. Votes: 0

There is no origin for the idea of an afterlife, save the conclusion which the savage draws from the notion suggested by dreams. Votes: 0

Those who cavalierly reject the Theory of Evolution, as not adequately supported by facts, seem quite to forget that their own theory it supported by no facts at all. Votes: 0

Those whose hardships are set forth in pamphlets and proclaimed in sermons and speeches which echo throughout society, are assumed to be all worthy souls, grievously wronged; and none of them are thought of as bearing the penalties of their misdeeds. Votes: 0

Though, probably, no competent geologist would contend that the European classification of strata is applicable to all other parts of the globe, yet most, if not all geologists, write as though it were so. Votes: 0

Thus poetry, regarded as a vehicle of thought, is especially impressive partly because it obeys all the laws of effective speech, and partly because in so doing it imitates the natural utterances of excitement. Votes: 0

Time is that which a man is always trying to kill, but which ends in killing him. Votes: 0

To have a specific style is to be poor in speech. Votes: 0

Truth generally lies in the coordination of antagonistic opinions. Votes: 0

Under the natural course of things each citizen tends towards his fittest function. Those who are competent to the kind of work they undertake, succeed, and, in the average of cases, are advanced in proportion to their efficiency; while the incompetent, society soon finds out, ceases to employ, forces to try something easier, and eventually turns to use. Votes: 0

Unlike private enterprise which quickly modifies its actions to meet emergencies - unlike the shopkeeper who promptly finds the wherewith to satisfy a sudden demand - unlike the railway company which doubles its trains to carry a special influx of passengers; the law-made instrumentality lumbers on under all varieties of circumstances at its habitual rate. By its very nature it is fitted only for average requirements, and inevitably fails under unusual requirements. Votes: 0

We have a priori reasons for believing that in every sentence there is some one order of words more effective than any other; and that this order is the one which presents the elements of the proposition in the succession in which they may be most readily put together. Votes: 0

We have repeatedly observed that while any whole is evolving, there is always going on an evolution of the parts into which it divides itself; but we have not observed that this equally holds of the totality of things, which is made up of parts within parts from the greatest down to the smallest. Votes: 0

We must infer that a plant or animal of any species, is made up of special units, in all of which there dwells the intrinsic aptitude to aggregate into the form of that species: just as in the atoms of a salt, there dwells the intrinsic aptitude to crystallize in a particular way."Ž Votes: 0

What, then, do they want a government for? Not to regulate commerce; not to educate the people; not to teach religion, not to administer charity; not to make roads and railways; but simply to defend the natural rights of man -- to protect person and property -- to prevent the aggressions of the powerful upon the weak -- in a word, to administer justice. This is the natural, the original, office of a government. It was not intended to do less: it ought not to be allowed to do more. Votes: 0

Whatever fosters militarism makes for barbarism; whatever fosters peace makes for civilization. Votes: 0

When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has the greater will be his confusion. Votes: 0

When men hire themselves out to shoot other men to order, asking nothing about the justice of their cause, I don't care if they are shot themselves. Votes: 0

Without painting, sculpture, music, poetry, and the emotions produced by natural beauty of every kind, life would lose half its charm. Votes: 0

If men use their liberty in such a way as to surrender their liberty, are they thereafter any the less slaves? If people by a plebiscite elect a man despot over them, do they remain free because the despotism was of their own making? Votes: 0

Reading is seeing by proxy. Votes: 0

Practical atheism, seeing no guidance for human affairs but its own limited foresight, endeavors itself to play the god, and decide what will be good for mankind and what bad. Votes: 0

With a higher moral nature will come a restriction on the multiplication of the inferior. Votes: 0