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Margaret Benson Quotes

The cat is, above all things, a dramatist.

The cat is, above all things, a dramatist.

Margaret Benson
Cat, Animal, Humanity
Margaret Benson (1901). “The soul of a cat: and other stories”

Dogs have owners, cats have staff.

Margaret Benson
Dog, Cat, Staff

He lives in the halflights in secret places, free and alone, this mysterious little great being whom his mistress calls, My cat.

Margaret Benson
Cat, Secret Places, Mistress
Margaret Benson (1901). “The soul of a cat: and other stories”

The spiritual is not the emotional; we may receive spiritual things emotionally, but to receive them rationally we must receive them with the mind and the will; we must act on them, we must experiment on them, we must let them permeate our consciousness.

Margaret Benson
Spiritual, Emotional, Mind
Margaret Benson (1908). “The Venture of Rational Faith”

A plate is distasteful to a cat, a newspaper still worse; they like to eat sticky pieces of meat sitting on a cushioned chair or a nice Persian rug.

Margaret Benson
Nice, Cat, Meat
Margaret Benson (1901). “The soul of a cat: and other stories”

But none of us wants to be average. That we are so is a melancholy fact borne in upon us in middle life, and we do not always relish it.

Margaret Benson
Average, Mediocrity, Want
Margaret Benson (1908). “The Venture of Rational Faih”

Reason cannot remain a bare intellectual faculty; it must become a faculty of judgment dealing with the question of values.

Margaret Benson
Intellectual, Judgment, Reason
Margaret Benson (1908). “The Venture of Rational Faih”

All progress in knowledge takes place through the correction of that which has been received on authority.

Margaret Benson
Progress, Authority, Has Beens
Margaret Benson (1908). “The Venture of Rational Faith”

apparent contradiction ... is often the opportunity for new discovery in science; and it even may be said that the absence of apparent contradiction is due to our want of perception, since our knowledge of laws and causes is so small compared to their total sum.

Margaret Benson
Opportunity, Discovery, Law
Margaret Benson (1908). “The Venture of Rational Faith”

... all progress in knowledge takes place through the correction of that which has been received on authority ... without the huge body of traditional knowledge, accurate and inaccurate together, there would be nothing even to correct. Progress is not made in spite of authority, but by means of it.

Margaret Benson
Mean, Together, Progress
Margaret Benson (1908). “The Venture of Rational Faith”

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