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George Santayana Quotes - Page 15

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The mind of the Renaissance was not a pilgrim mind, but a sedentary city mind, like that of the ancients.

The mind of the Renaissance was not a pilgrim mind, but a sedentary city mind, like that of the ancients.

George Santayana
Cities, Mind, Renaissance
George Santayana “The works of George Santayana”

America is a young country with an old mentality.

George Santayana
Country, America, Young
George Santayana (1998). “The Genteel Tradition: Nine Essays”, p.39, U of Nebraska Press

All living souls welcome whatsoever they are ready to cope with; all else they ignore, or pronounce to be monstrous and wrong, or deny to be possible.

George Santayana
Life, Sad, Soul
"Dialogues in Limbo" by George Santayana, (Ch. 3, p. 62), 1926.

Columbus gave the world another world.

George Santayana
World, Columbus, Another World

The hunger for facile wisdom is the root of all false philosophy.

George Santayana
Wisdom, Philosophy, Roots
George Santayana (2009). “The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress”, p.568, The Floating Press

Music is essentially useless, as is life.

George Santayana
Music, Musician, Useless

Chaos is perhaps at the bottom of everything.

George Santayana
Chaos, Bottom
George Santayana (1995). “Dominations and Powers: Reflections on Liberty, Society, and Government”, p.33, Transaction Publishers

Emotion is primarily about nothing and much of it remains about nothing to the end.

George Santayana
Emotional, Feelings, Ends
George Santayana, Marianne S. Wokeck, Martin A. Coleman, James Gouinlock (2015). “The Life of Reason Or The Phases of Human Progress: Reason in Art, Volume VII, Book Four”, p.36, MIT Press

Guard you thoughts as you would your wallet. Habit is stronger than reason.

George Santayana
Stronger, Reason, Habit

An artist may visit a museum but only a pedant can live there.

George Santayana
Artist, Museums, May
George Santayana, Marianne S. Wokeck, Martin A. Coleman, James Gouinlock (2015). “The Life of Reason Or The Phases of Human Progress: Reason in Art, Volume VII, Book Four”, p.80, MIT Press

Uselessness is a fatal accusation to bring against any act which is done for its presumed utility, but those which are done for their own sake are their own justification.

George Santayana
Experience, Done, Sake
George Santayana (2012). “The Sense of Beauty”, p.18, Courier Corporation

I love moving water, I love ships, I love the sharp definition, the concentrated humanity, the sublime solitude of life at sea. The dangers of it only make present to us the peril inherent in all existence, which the stupid, ignorant, un-travelled land-worm never discovers; and the art of it, so mathematical, so exact, so rewarding to intelligence, appeals to courage and clears the mind of superstition, while filling it with humility and true religion.

George Santayana
Art, Stupid, Moving

The primary use of conversation is to satisfy the impulse to talk.

George Santayana
Use, Conversation, Impulse
George Santayana (1937). “The Works of George Santayana”

Towers in a modern town are a frill and a survival; they seem like the raised hands of the various churches, afraid of being overlooked, and saying to the forgetful public, Here I am! Or perhaps they are rival lightning rods, saying to the emanations of divine grace, "Please strike here!

George Santayana
Hands, Here I Am, Grace

The more rational an institution is the less it suffers by making concessions to others.

George Santayana
Suffering, Institutions, Rational
George Santayana, Martin A. Coleman (2009). “The Essential Santayana: Selected Writings”, p.424, Indiana University Press

To keep beauty in its place is to make all things beautiful.

George Santayana
Beauty, Beautiful, All Things
George Santayana, Martin A. Coleman (2009). “The Essential Santayana: Selected Writings”, p.319, Indiana University Press

. . . until the curtain was rung down on the last act of the drama (and it might have no last act!) he wished the intellectual cripples and the moral hunchbacks not to be jeered at; perhaps they might turn out to be the heroes of the play.

George Santayana
Drama, Hero, Medicine
George Santayana (2014). “Character and Opinion in the United States”, p.47, The Floating Press

Love is a brilliant illustration of a principle everywhere discoverable: namely, that human reason lives by turning the friction of material forces into the light of ideal goods.

George Santayana
Love, Light, Illustration
George Santayana, Marianne S. Wokeck, Martin A. Coleman, James Gouinlock (2013). “The Life of Reason or The Phases of Human Progress: Reason in Society, Volume VII, Book Two”, p.27, MIT Press

An ideal cannot wait for its realization to prove its validity.

George Santayana
Waiting, Realization, Prove It
George Santayana (1934). “Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana”, p.26, Рипол Классик

Spirit itself is not human; it may spring up in any life... it may exist in all animals, and who know in how many undreamt-of beings, or in the midst of what worlds?

George Santayana
Spring, Animal, World
George Santayana (1937). “The Works of George Santayana”

Nothing can be meaner than the anxiety to live on, to live on anyhow and in any shape.

George Santayana
Anxiety, Shapes
George Santayana (1934). “Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana”, p.164, Рипол Классик

I have imagination, and nothing that is real is alien to me.

George Santayana
Real, Imagination, Fantasy
George Santayana (1934). “Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana”, p.99, Рипол Классик

That life is worth living is the most necessary of assumptions, and were it not assumed, the most impossible of conclusions.

George Santayana
Impossible, Aging, Assumption
The Life of Reason vol. 1, ch. 10 (1905)

A dream is always simmering below the conventional surface of speech and reflection.

George Santayana
Dream, Reflection, Speech
George Santayana (2011). “The Life of Reason: Introduction and Reason in Common Sense”, p.33, MIT Press

Lovely promise and quick ruin are seen nowhere better than in Gothic architecture.

George Santayana
Lovely, Promise, Ruins
George Santayana (1944). “Persons and Places”

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