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Bertrand Russell Quotes - Page 31

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It is only through imagination that men become aware of what the world might be; without it, ‘progress’ would become mechanical and trivial.

It is only through imagination that men become aware of what the world might be; without it, ‘progress’ would become mechanical and trivial.

Bertrand Russell
Men, Imagination, Progress
Bertrand Russell (2014). “On Education”, p.23, Routledge

Self-respect will keep a man from being abject when he is in the power of enemies, and will enable him to feel that he may be in the right when the world is against him.

Bertrand Russell
Character, Men, Self
Bertrand Russell (2009). “Authority and the Individual”, p.51, Routledge

I have found, for example, that if I have to write upon sum rather difficult topic, the best plan is to think about it with very great intensity-the greatest intensity of which I am capable-for a few hours or days, and at the end of that time give orders, so to speak (to my subconscious mind) that the work is to proceed underground. After some months I return consciously to the topic and find that the work has been done.

Bertrand Russell
Writing, Thinking, Order

Conquer the world by intelligence, and not merely by being slavishly subdued by the terror that comes from it.

Bertrand Russell
Fear, Conquer The World, Terror
Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.23, Simon and Schuster

Civilized life, if it is to be stable, must provide a harmless outlets for the impulses which our remote ancestors satisfied in hunting. In Australia, where people are few, and rabbits are many, I watched the whole populace satisfying the primitive impulse in the primitive manner by the skilful slaughter of many thousands of rabbits.

Bertrand Russell
Hunting, Australia, People
Bertrand Russell (2009). “Bertrand Russell's Best”, p.5, Routledge

What is best in mathematics deserves not merely to be learnt as a task, but to assimilated as a part of daily thought, and brought again and again before the mind with ever-renewed encouragement.

Bertrand Russell
Encouragement, Learning, Science
Bertrand Russell (1985). “Contemplation and Action, 1902-14”, p.86, Psychology Press

How much longer is the world willing to endure this spectacle of wanton cruelty?

Bertrand Russell
World, Cruelty, Endure
Bertrand Russell, Ray Perkins (Jr.) (2002). “Yours Faithfully, Bertrand Russell: A Lifelong Fight for Peace, Justice, and Truth in Letters to the Editor”, p.411, Open Court Publishing

A good world needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not need a regretful hankering after the past or a fettering of the free intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men.

Bertrand Russell
Motivational, Courage, Atheist
Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.23, Simon and Schuster

Brief and powerless is man's life; on him and all his race the slow, sure doom falls pitiless and dark.

Bertrand Russell
Life, Death, Fall
Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.115, Simon and Schuster

With the introduction of agriculture mankind entered upon a long period of meanness, misery, and madness, from which they are only now being freed by the beneficent operation of the machine.

Bertrand Russell
Agriculture, Long, Machines
Bertrand Russell (2013). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.57, W. W. Norton & Company

Some care is needed in using Descartes' argument. "I think, therefore I am" says rather more than is strictly certain. It might seem as though we are quite sure of being the same person to-day as we were yesterday, and this is no doubt true in some sense. But the real Self is as hard to arrive at as the real table, and does not seem to have that absolute, convincing certainty that belongs to particular experiences.

Bertrand Russell
Real, Thinking, Self
Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Problems of Philosophy”, p.10, Lulu.com

Mysticism is, in essence, little more than a certain intensity and depth of feeling in regard to what is believed about the universe.

Bertrand Russell
Essence, Feelings, Depth
Bertrand Russell (2016). “Mysticism and Logic”, p.9, Bertrand Russell

That Plato's Republic should have been admired, on its political side, by decent people, is perhaps the most astonishing example of literary snobbery in all history.

Bertrand Russell
Plato, Should Have, People
Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.436, Routledge

If the youth is content to abandon his previous associates and to throw in his lot whole-heartedly with the rulers, he may, after suitable tests, be promoted, but if he shows any regrettable solidarity with his previous associates, the rulers will reluctantly conclude that there is nothing to be done with him except to send him to the lethal chamber before his ill-disciplined intelligence has had time to spread revolt. This will be a painful duty to the rulers, but I think they will not shrink from performing it.

Bertrand Russell
Thinking, Done, May

Science is what we know, and philosophy is what we don't know.

Bertrand Russell
Philosophy, Knowledge, Science
Bertrand Russell, John G. Slater, Peter Köllner (1997). “Last Philosophical Testament: 1943-68”, p.378, Psychology Press

Civilized people cannot fully satisfy their sexual instinct without love.

Bertrand Russell
Sex, People, Instinct
Bertrand Russell (2009). “Marriage and Morals”, p.76, Routledge

It is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatever for supposing it true

Bertrand Russell
Atheist, Philosophy, Believe
Sceptical Essays (1928) "On the Value of Scepticism"

Italy, and the spring and first love all together should suffice to make the gloomiest person happy.

Bertrand Russell
Happiness, Happy, Spring
Bertrand Russell (2014). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell”, p.127, Routledge

No nation was ever so virtuous as each believes itself, and none was ever so wicked as each believes the other.

Bertrand Russell
Believe, Humility, Wicked
Bertrand Russell (2007). “Justice in War-time”, p.68, Cosimo, Inc.

Collective wisdom, alas, is no adequate substitute for the intelligence of individuals. Individuals who opposed received opinions have been the source of all progress, both moral and intellectual. They have been unpopular, as was natural.

Bertrand Russell
Intellectual, Progress, Adequate
Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I am not a Christian, and other essays on religion and related subjects”, Touchstone

A word is used "correctly" when the average hearer will be affected by it in the way intended. This is a psychological, not a literary, definition of "correctness". The literary definition would substitute, for the average hearer, a person of high education living a long time ago; the purpose of this definition is to make it difficult to speak or write correctly.

Bertrand Russell
Writing, Average, Long
Bertrand Russell (2015). “The Analysis of Mind: Top Philosophy Collections”, p.115, 谷月社

It will be found, as men grow more tolerant in their instincts, that many uniformities now insisted upon are useless and even harmful.

Bertrand Russell
Men, Useless, Instinct
Bertrand Russell (2016). “Political Ideals”, p.23, Bertrand Russell

Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.

Bertrand Russell
Philosophy, Ignorance, Knowing
Bertrand Russell (1996). “Unpopular Essays”, p.38, Psychology Press

What is new in our time is the increased power of the authorities to enforce their prejudices.

Bertrand Russell
Time, Prejudice, Authority
Bertrand Russell (2012). “The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell Volume 29: Détente or Destruction, 1955-57”, p.152, Routledge

Is there any knowledge in the world which is so certain that no reasonable man could doubt it?

Bertrand Russell
Men, Doubt, World
Bertrand Russell (2016). “The Problems of Philosophy”, Bertrand Russell

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