Quotes About Philosophy

Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, then that of blindfolded fear.

The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus by the Supreme Being in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.

My theory has always been, that if we are to dream, the flatteries of hope are as cheap, and pleasanter, than the gloom of despair.

Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear.

Question with boldness even the existance of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.

This institution will be based upon the illimitable freedom of the human mind. For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.

Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions any more than our opinions in physics or geometry...

What good does it do to speak learnedly about the Trinity if, lacking humility, you displease the Trinity? Indeed it is not learning that makes a man holy and just, but a virtuous life makes him pleasing to God. I would rather feel contrition than know how to define it. For what would it profit us to know the whole Bible by heart and the principles of all the philosophers if we live without grace and the love of God? Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone.

And cranky old Jacques Derrida notwithstanding, we do love our dichotomies.

The fundamental question of classical political philosophy is whether there are some conventions (nomoi) which are natural, i.e., whose force is not due simply to arbitrary human invention.

The thinkers and works of the past are studied here not as dated museum pieces or objects of antiquarian curiosity; they are confronted as powerful voices that challenge us to join in searching debates. The point is not to learn about these thinkers and texts, but from them.

Just as Marx is not simply a materialist, insofar as he is a historical materialist, so Nietzsche is not simply an atheist, insofar as he is a historical atheist: Zarathustra is 'the most pious of all those, who do not believe in God'.

THERE HE REMAINED for almost two years, cut off from every other scholar or mathematician. The isolation suited him. "In those days," he would recall half a century later, "I was in the prime of my age for invention & minded Mathematics & Philosophy more than at any time since.

It has always seemed to me that my existence consisted purely and exclusively of nothing but the most outrageous nonsense.

The pessimist's credo, or one of them, is that nonexistence never hurt anyone and existence hurts everyone.

A: There is no grand scheme of things. B: If there were a grand scheme of things, the fact – the fact – that we are not equipped to perceive it, either by natural or supernatural means, is a nightmarish obscenity. C: The very notion of a grand scheme of things is a nightmarish obscenity.

Nothing belongs to us. Everything is something that is rented out. Our very heads are filled with rented ideas passed on from one generation to the next.

The major part of our species seems able to undergo any trauma without significantly re-examining its household mantras, including "everything happens for a reason," "the show must go on," "accept the things you cannot change," and any other adage that gets people to keep their chins up.

Man is a self-conscious Nothing,

If we must think, it should be done only in circles, outside of which lies the unthinkable.

the knowledge that life is worthless is the flower of all human wisdom.

In plain language, we cannot live except as self-deceivers who must lie to ourselves about ourselves, as well as about our unwinnable situation in this world.

Amnesia may well be the highest sacrament in the great gray ritual of existence.

God was long gone before Nietzsche made his death certificate into a slogan, but no one has yet written the obituary of the Devil.