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William James Quotes about War

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The war against war is going to be no holiday excursion or camping party.

The war against war is going to be no holiday excursion or camping party.

William James
War, Party, Holiday
William James (1987). “Writings, 1902-1910”, p.1281, Library of America

One hears of the mechanical equivalent of heat. What we now need to discover in the social realm is the moral equivalent of war: something heroic that will speak to men as universally as war does, and yet will be as compatible with their spiritual selves as war has proved itself to be incompatible.

William James
Spiritual, War, Men
The Varieties of Religious Experience Lectures 14 - 15 (1902)

Man lives by habits indeed, but what he lives for is thrill and excitements. ... From time immemorial war has been ... the supremely thrilling excitement.

William James
War, Men, Thrill

So far war has been the only force that can discipline a whole community, and until an equivalent discipline is organized, I believe that war must have its way.

William James
War, Believe, Discipline
William James, Robert D Richardson (2010). “The Heart of William James”, p.312, Harvard University Press

The war-function has grasped us so far; but the constructive interests may some day seem no less imperative, and impose on the individual a hardly lighter burden.

William James
War, May, Individual
William James (2016). “William James: Essays and Lectures”, p.311, Routledge

For morality life is a war, and the service of the highest is a sort of cosmic patriotism which also calls for volunteers.

William James
War, Volunteer, Political
William James (2013). “The Varieties of Religious Experience”, p.45, Courier Corporation

The subjectivist in morals, when his moral feelings are at war with the facts about him, is always free to seek harmony by toningdown the sensitiveness of the feelings.

William James
War, Feelings, Facts
William James (1970). “Essays in Pragmatism”, Simon and Schuster

The nation blest above all nations is she in whom the civic genius of the people does the saving day by day, by acts without external picturesqueness; by speaking, writing, voting reasonably; by smiting corruption swiftly; by good temper between parties; by the people knowing true men when they see them, and preferring them as leaders to rabid partisans and empty quacks.

William James
War, Party, Writing
"Essays in Religion and Morality".

So long as antimilitarists propose no substitute for war's disciplinary function, no moral equivalent of war, analogous, as one might say, to the mechanical equivalent of heat, so long they fail to realize the full inwardness of the situation.

William James
War, Long, Might
William James (2016). “William James: Essays and Lectures”, p.308, Routledge

Modern war is so expensive that we feel trade to be a better avenue to plunder; but modern man inherits all the innate pugnacity and all the love of glory of his ancestors.

William James
War, Men, Glory
William James (2016). “William James: Essays and Lectures”, p.275, Routledge

Hardly ever can a youth transferred to the society of his betters unlearn the nasality and other vices of speech bred in him by the associations of his growing years. Hardly ever, indeed, no matter how much money there be in his pocket, can he ever learn to dress like a gentleman-born. The merchants offer their wares as eagerly to him as to the veriest swell, but he simply cannot buy the right things.

William James
War, Years, Gentleman
William James (2012). “The Principles of Psychology”, p.122, Courier Corporation

In modern eyes, precious though wars may be they must not be waged solely for the sake of the ideal harvest. Only when forced upon one, is a war now thought permissible.

William James
War, Eye, May
William James (1987). “Writings, 1902-1910”, p.1281, Library of America

The war for our Union, with all the constitutional issues which it settled, and all the military lessons which it gathered in, has throughout its dilatory length but one meaning in the eyes of history. It freed the country from the social plague which until then had made political development impossible in the United States. More and more, as the years pass, does the meaning stand forth as the sole meaning.

William James
Country, War, Military

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