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“Nature hath given us us a particular emotion, to wit, that of ridicule, which seems intended for this very purpose of putting out of countenance what is absurd, either in opinion or practice. This weapon, when properly applied, cuts with as keen an edge as argument. Nature has furnished us with the first to expose absurdity; as with the last to refute error.”
― Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man
― Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man
“Philosophy has no other root but the principles of common sense.; it grows out from them, and draws its nourishment from them; severed from this root, its honours wither up, its sap is dried up, it dies and rots.”
― Essays on the Active Powers of the Human Mind ; An Inquiry Into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense ; and An Essay on Quantity
― Essays on the Active Powers of the Human Mind ; An Inquiry Into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense ; and An Essay on Quantity
“The best cure for Christianity is reading the Bible. –Mark Twain”
―
―
“1.
Metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct; but to find these reasons is no less an instinct.
2.
The world is the best of all possible worlds, and everything in it is a necessary evil.
3.
There are those who so dislike the nude that they find something indecent in the naked truth.
4.
Eclecticism. Every truth is so true that any truth must be false.
5.
True penitence condemns to silence. What a man is ready to recall he would be willing to repeat.
6.
We say that a girl with her doll anticipates the mother. It is more true, perhaps, that most mothers are still but children with playthings.
7.
Our live experiences, fixed in aphorisms, stiffen into cold epigrams. Our heart's blood, as we write it, turns to mere dull ink.”
―
Metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct; but to find these reasons is no less an instinct.
2.
The world is the best of all possible worlds, and everything in it is a necessary evil.
3.
There are those who so dislike the nude that they find something indecent in the naked truth.
4.
Eclecticism. Every truth is so true that any truth must be false.
5.
True penitence condemns to silence. What a man is ready to recall he would be willing to repeat.
6.
We say that a girl with her doll anticipates the mother. It is more true, perhaps, that most mothers are still but children with playthings.
7.
Our live experiences, fixed in aphorisms, stiffen into cold epigrams. Our heart's blood, as we write it, turns to mere dull ink.”
―
“No man has ever been able to set out for us, distinctly and methodically, all the operations of the thinking principle within himself, but if some philosopher did achieve this feat, this would reveal only the anatomy of one particular subject , and if applied to human nature on general it would be both incomplete and wrong. For you don't have to think very hard to realize that the differences among human minds are greater than the differences among any other beings that we regard as belonging to the same species.”
― An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense: A Critical Edition
― An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense: A Critical Edition
Paul’s 2023 Year in Books
Take a look at Paul’s Year in Books. The good, the bad, the long, the short—it’s all here.
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