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Bertrand Russell QUOTES

101 " So long as there is death there will be sorrow, and so long as there is sorrow it can be no part of the duty of human beings to increase its amount, in spite of the fact that a few rare spirits know how to transmute it. "

― Bertrand Russell , Marriage and Morals

102 " Happiness, as is evident, depends partly upon external circumstances and partly upon oneself. "

― Bertrand Russell

103 " All human activity is prompted by desire. "

― Bertrand Russell

104 " We know too much and feel too little. At least, we feel too little of those creative emotions from which a good life springs. "

― Bertrand Russell , Authority and the Individual

105 " The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. "

― Bertrand Russell

106 " The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd; indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widely spread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible. "

― Bertrand Russell , Marriage and Morals

107 " I wish to propose for the reader's favourable consideration a doctrine which may, I fear, appear wildly paradoxical and subversive. The doctrine in question is this: that it is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatever for supposing it true. "

― Bertrand Russell , Sceptical Essays

108 " William James used to preach the 'will to believe.' For my part, I should wish to preach the 'will to doubt' ... what is wanted is not the will to believe, but the wish to find out, which is the exact opposite. "

― Bertrand Russell , Sceptical Essays

109 " When two men of science disagree, they do not invoke the secular arm; they wait for further evidence to decide the issue, because, as men of science, they know that neither is infallible. But when two theologians differ, since there is no criteria to which either can appeal, there is nothing for it but mutual hatred and an open or covert appeal to force. "

― Bertrand Russell

110 " Intellectually, what is stimulating to a young man is a problem of obvious practical importance. A young man learning economics, for example, ought to hear lectures from individualists and socialists, protectionists and free-traders, inflationists and believers in the gold standard. He ought to be encouraged to read the best books of the various schools, as recommended by those who believe in them. This would teach him to weigh arguments and evidence, to know that no pinion is certainly right, and to judge men by their quality rather than by their consonance with preconceptions. "

― Bertrand Russell , Sceptical Essays

Bertrand Russell QUOTES

111 " The 'practical' man, as this word is often used, is one who recognizes only the material needs, who realizes that men must have food for the body, but is oblivious of the necessity of providing food for the mind. "

― Bertrand Russell , The Problems of Philosophy

112 " Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth -- more than ruin, more even than death. "

― Bertrand Russell

113 " ...what is the use of making everybody rich if the rich themselves are miserable? "

― Bertrand Russell

114 " We see, surrounding the narrow raft illuminated by the flickering light of human comradeship, the dark ocean on whose rolling waves we toss for a brief hour; all the loneliness of humanity amid hostile forces is concentrated on the individual soul, which must struggle alone, with what of courage it can command, against the whole weight of a universe that cares nothing for its hopes and fears. Victory, in this struggle with the powers of darkness, is the true baptism into the glorious company of heroes, the true initiation into the overmastering beauty of human existence. "

― Bertrand Russell , Why I Am Not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects

115 " There is a widespread philosophical tendency towards the view which tells us that Man is the measure of all things, that truth is man-made, that space and time and the world of universals are properties of the mind, and that, if there be anything not created by the mind, it is unknowable and of no account for us. This view, if our previous discussions were correct, is untrue; but in addition to being untrue, it has the effect of robbing philosophic contemplation of all that gives it value, since it fetters contemplation to Self. What it calls knowledge is not a union with the not-Self, but a set of prejudices, habits, and desires, making an impenetrable veil between us and the world beyond. The man who finds pleasure in such a theory of knowledge is like a man who never leaves the domestic circle for fear his word might not be law. "

― Bertrand Russell , The Problems of Philosophy

116 " The belief that personality is mysterious and irreducible has no scientific warrant, and is accepted chiefly because it is flattering to our human self esteem. "

― Bertrand Russell

117 " It is a curious and painful fact that almost all the completely futile treatments that have been believed in during the long history of medical folly have been such as caused acute suffering to the patient. When anesthetics were discovered, pious people considered them an attempt to evade the will of God. It was pointed out, however, that when God extracted Adam's rib He put him into a deep sleep. This proved that anesthetics are all right for men; women, however, ought to suffer, because of the curse of Eve. "

― Bertrand Russell ,

118 " There was a footpath leading across fields to New Southgate, and I used to go there alone to watch the sunset and contemplate suicide. I did not, however, commit suicide, because I wished to know more of mathematics. "

― Bertrand Russell

119 " ...love must feel the ego of the beloved person as important as one's own ego, and must realize the other's feelings and wishes as though they were one's own. "

― Bertrand Russell , Marriage and Morals

120 " All who are not lunatics are agreed about certain things. That it is better to be alive than dead, better to be adequately fed than starved, better to be free than a slave. Many people desire those things only for themselves and their friends; they are quite content that their enemies should suffer. These people can be refuted by science: mankind has become so much one family that we cannot insure our own prosperity except by insuring that of everyone else. If you wish to be happy yourself, you must resign yourself to seeing others also happy. "

― Bertrand Russell