Philosphy Quotes

“Only the very weak-minded refuse to be influenced by literature and poetry.”
― Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Angel

“I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies, for the hardest victory is over self.”
― Aristotle

“Progress just means bad things happen faster.”
― Terry Pratchett, Witches Abroad

“It is only through mystery and madness that the soul is revealed”
― Thomas Moore, Care of the Soul: A Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life

“What is a woman's place in this modern world? Jasnah Kholin's words read. I rebel against this question, though so many of my peers ask it. The inherent bias in the inquiry seems invisible to so many of them. They consider themselves progressive because they are willing to challenge many of the assumptions of the past.

They ignore the greater assumption--that a 'place' for women must be defined and set forth to begin with. Half of the population must somehow be reduced to the role arrived at by a single conversation. No matter how broad that role is, it will be--by-nature--a reduction from the infinite variety that is womanhood.

I say that there is no role for women--there is, instead, a role for each woman, and she must make it for herself. For some, it will be the role of scholar; for others, it will be the role of wife. For others, it will be both. For yet others, it will be neither.

Do not mistake me in assuming I value one woman's role above another. My point is not to stratify our society--we have done that far to well already--my point is to diversify our discourse.

A woman's strength should not be in her role, whatever she chooses it to be, but in the power to choose that role. It is amazing to me that I even have to make this point, as I see it as the very foundation of our conversation.”
― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance

“If we believe in nothing, if nothing has any meaning and if we can affirm no values whatsoever, then everything is possible and nothing has any importance.”
― Albert Camus, The Rebel

“There was just such a man when I was young—an Austrian who invented a new way of life and convinced himself that he was the chap to make it work. He tried to impose his reformation by the sword, and plunged the civilized world into misery and chaos. But the thing which this fellow had overlooked, my friend, was that he had a predecessor in the reformation business, called Jesus Christ. Perhaps we may assume that Jesus knew as much as the Austrian did about saving people. But the odd thing is that Jesus did not turn the disciples into storm troopers, burn down the Temple at Jerusalem, and fix the blame on Pontius Pilate. On the contrary, he made it clear that the business of the philosopher was to make ideas available, and not to impose them on people.”
― T.H. White, The Once and Future King

“When people say they hate life, to what are they comparing it to? The alternative isn't any more appealing.”
― Carroll Bryant

“Arrogance on the part of the meritorious is even more offensive to us than the arrogance of those without merit: for merit itself is offensive.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“If we're always guided by other people's thoughts, what's the point in having our own?”
― Oscar Wilde

“Men are punished by their sins, not for them.”
― Elbert Hubbard, Love, Life and Work

“Prove to me that you are not a figment of my imagination.
Am I a computer simulation?
Does the door swing both ways?
How can something come from nothing?
How do you know a line is straight?
If animals wanted to be eaten, would it be okay?
If time stopped then stared again, would we know about it?
What happens when you get scared half to death twice?
What is creationism?
What is ethical?”
― Jessica Park, Flat-Out Love

“Hope is believing in something that eludes you. It's a desperate feeling in a desperate situation.”
― Carroll Bryant

“I feel like I am either on the cusp of something great, or standing on the edge of my abyss, discovering something brand new, or uncovering somebody elses lost imagination.”
― Carroll Bryant

“A human being is a problem in search of a solution.”
― Robert Ardrey, Thunder Rock

“The past may show the right way to behave if you live in the past, Stil, but circumstances change.”
― Frank Herbert, Children of Dune

“He, too, was in the grip of rage and rhetoric. I saw that, attractive though his side of the political spectrum was. A cancerous violence had eaten into every political idea, had taken over the ideas themselves, and for so many, all that mattered was the willingness to do something. Action led to action, free of any moorings, and the way to be someone, the way to catch the attention of the young and recruit them to one's cause, was to be enraged. It seemed as if the only way this lure of violence could be avoided was by having no causes, by being magnificiently isolated from loyalties. But was that not an ethical lapse graver than rage itself?”
― Teju Cole, Open City

“You are the only one who can.”
― Carroll Bryant

“Free will is the cutting edge of Creation, don’t you see? The word spontaneity derives from the Latin sponte, meaning ‘of one’s free will.’ Spontaneity is the impulse, the purest expression of freedom, and the impulse wants to do whatever it wants to do. But you are afraid of what others think, others who are just as afraid of what you think, and so you pussyfoot along the perimeter of the free-will zone, wilting like a wallflower.”
― Tony Vigorito

“It is a meaningful thing for a scientist of the stature of Ibn Sina, certainly one of the best scientific minds in the whole history of mankind, to often resort to prayer to seek God's help in solving his philosophical and scientific problems. And it is also perfectly understandable why the purification of the soul is considered an integral part of the methodology of knowledge.”
― Osman Bakar, Tawhid and Science

“Pretend you are a foolish to the tyrant – because if he realizes you are a genius, he might use you to harm others.”
― A Gentlemen

“Some days I like to wander to old and warn our places, forests ripped apart by man and streams that carry stagnant water where it use to flow. There is a sense of clarity in these places, a reflection of who I am or atleast who I have been. Broken, yet still incredibly beautiful.”
― Nikki Rowe

“...but come bad chance
And wee joyne to it our strength
And wee teach it art and length
It selfe o'er us to advance.”
― John Donne

“Panic is never your best first option.”
― Suzanne Ferrell

“Color is the taste buds of perception.”
― Zephyr McIntyre

“إني لا زلت حيا، و الحياة، على الأقل، لم تبتكرها الأخلاق: إنها تريد الوهم، و بالوهم تحيا...”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, I إنسان مفرط في إنسانيته

“As Hegel said, tragedy was not the conflict between right and wrong but right and right, a dilemma none of us who wanted to participate in history could escape. The major had the right to live, and I was right to kill him. Wasn't I?”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer

“I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail for replacement in as many decades”
― Aldo Leopond

“He has reason, as all the philosophic and poetic class have: but he has also, what they have not.--this strong solving sense to reconcile his poetry with the appearances of the world, and build a bridge from the streets of cities to the Atlantis.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

“If we have just partaken of a philosopher's wisdom, we go through the streets feeling as if we had been transformed and had become great; for we encounter only people who do not know this wisdom, and thus we have to deliver a new, unheard-of judgement about everything; because we have acknowledged a book of laws, we also think we now have to act like judges”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits