Quotes from Émile Durkheim

A monomaniac is a sick person whose mentality is perfectly healthy in all respects but one; he has a single flaw, clearly localized. At times, for example, he has an unreasonable and absurd desire to drink or steal or use abusive language; but all his other acts and all his other thoughts are strictly correct.

The fundamental proposition of the apriorist theory is that knowledge is made up of two sorts of elements, which cannot be reduced into one another, and which are like two distinct layers superimposed one upon the other.

Each new generation is reared by its predecessor; the latter must therefore improve in order to improve its successor. The movement is circular.

The human person, whose definition serves as the touchstone according to which good must be distinguished from evil, is considered as sacred, in what one might call the ritual sense of the word. It has something of that transcendental majesty which the churches of all times have given to their Gods.

The liberal professions, and in a wider sense the well-to-do classes, are certainly those with the liveliest taste for knowledge and the most active intellectual life.

Solidarity is, literally something which the society possesses.

While the State becomes inflated and hypertrophied in order to obtain a firm enough grip upon individuals, but without succeeding, the latter, without mutual relationships, tumble over one another like so many liquid molecules, encountering no central energy to retain, fix and organize them.

Nihil est in intellectu quod non ante fuerit in sensu

Ora, uma vez que abrimos a porta para as exceções, é difícil fechá-la.

Belirli bir gruptaki intihar vakalar?n?n kayda deÄŸer bir ÅŸekilde artmas?, bu grup içindeki toplumsal dayan??man?n zay?flad???n? ve üyelerin, varoluÅŸsal krizlere kar?? grup taraf?ndan art?k yeterince korunamad???n? gösterir.

Todo meio é ele próprio um fim.

Art is not simply an external ornament donned by the cult to conceal its excessively harsh and austere side; rather the cult has an aesthetic aspect in itself.

Constantemente, explicamos por paixões generosas ou considerações elevadas procedimentos que nos foram inspirados por sentimentos mesquinhos ou por cega irreflexão.

man is double…There are two beings in him: an individual being which has its foundation in the organism and the circle of whose activities is therefore strictly limited, and a social being which represents the highest reality in the intellectual and moral order that we can know by observation – I mean society.

Every time a social phenomenon is directly explained by a psychological phenomenon, we may rest assured that the explanation is false".

Quant aux événements privés qui passent généralement pour être les causes prochaines du suicide, ils n'ont d'autre action que celle que leur prêtent les dispositions morales de la victime, écho de l'état moral de la société.

The pathological forms of a phenomenon are no different in nature from the normal ones, and consequently it is necessary to observe both kinds in order to determine what that nature is. Sickness is not opposed to health; they are two varieties of the same species and each throws light on the other. This is a rule long recognized and practiced both in biology and psychology, and one which the sociologist is no less under an obligation to respect.

As all the other beliefs and practices assume less and less religious a character, the individual becomes the object of a sort of religion. We carry on the worship of the dignity of the human person, which, like all strong acts of worship, has already acquired its superstitions.

Society in general, simply by its effect on men's minds, undoubtedly has all that is required to arouse the sensation of the divine. A society is to its members what a god is to its faithful. A god is first of all a being that man conceives of as superior to himself in some respects and one on whom he believes he depends.

Education is a social thing; that is to say, it brings the child into contact with a definite society and not with society in general.

A ciência pode perfeitamente nos dizer de que maneira as causas produzem seus efeitos, não que finalidades devem ser buscadas; ela observa, explica, mas não julga: o bem e o mal não existem para ela.

The progress of a science is proven by the progress toward solution of the problems it treats.

En général, les hommes n'aspirent à s'instruire que dans la mesure où ils sont affranchis du joug de la tradition; car tant que celle-ci est maîtresse des intelligences, elle suffit à tout et ne tolère pas facilement de puissance rivale.

Melancholy suicide. —This is connected with a general state of extreme depression and exaggerated sadness, causing the patient no longer to realize sanely the bonds which connect him with people and things about him. Pleasures no longer attract;