Philosophies Quotes

At the bottom of enmity between strangers lies indifference.
- Soren Kierkegaard

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- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Face the facts of being what you are,
for that is what changes what you are.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Our life always expresses the result of our dominant thoughts.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Life can only be understood backwards;
but it must be lived forwards.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Life has its own hidden forces which you can only discover by living.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Most men pursue pleasure with such breathless haste
that they hurry past it.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The tyrant dies and his rule is over,
the martyr dies and his rule begins
- Soren Kierkegaard

To dare is to lose one's footing momentarily.
Not to dare is to lose oneself.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Far from idleness being the root of all evil,
it is rather the only true good.
- Soren Kierkegaard

During the first period of a man's life
the greatest danger is not to take the risk.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The highest and most beautiful things in life
are not to be heard about, nor read about, nor seen but,
if one will, are to be lived.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Faith is the highest passion in a human being.
Many in every generation may not come that far, but none comes further.
- Soren Kierkegaard

It seems essential, in relationships and all tasks,
that we concentrate only
on what is most significant and important.
- Soren Kierkegaard

If I am capable of grasping God objectively,
I do not believe, but precisely because
I cannot do this I must believe.
- Soren Kierkegaard

A man who as a physical being
is always turned toward the outside,
thinking that his happiness lies outside him,
finally turns inward and
discovers that the source is within him.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The function of prayer is not to influence God,
but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The truth is a snare:
you cannot have it, without being caught.
You cannot have the truth
in such a way that you catch it,
but only in such a way that it catches you.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Never cease loving a person, and never give up hope for him,
for even the prodigal son who had fallen most low,
could still be saved; the bitterest enemy
and also he who was your friend could again be your friend;
love that has grown cold can kindle
- Soren Kierkegaard

The minority is always stronger than the majority,
because the minority is generally formed by those
who really have an opinion.
- Soren Kierkegaard

There is nothing with which every man is so afraid
as getting to know how enormously much
he is capable of doing and becoming.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Where am I? Who am I? How did I come to be here?
What is this thing called the world?
How did I come into the world?
Why was I not consulted?
And If I am compelled to take part in it,
Where is the director? I want to see him.
- Soren Kierkegaard

People understand me so poorly that they don't even understand
my complaint about them not understanding me.
- Soren Kierkegaard

People hardly ever make use of the freedom which they have,
for example, freedom of thought;
instead they demand freedom of speech as a compensation.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The more a man can forget, the greater the number
of metamorphoses which his life can undergo,
the more he can remember, the more divine his life becomes.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Do you not know that there comes a midnight hour
when every one has to throw off his mask?
Do you believe that life will always let itself be mocked?
Do you think you can slip away a little before midnight
in order to avoid this? Or are you not terrified by it?
I have seen men in real life who so long deceived others
that at last their true nature could not reveal itself;...
In every man there is something which to a certain degree
prevents him from becoming perfectly transparent to himself;
and this may be the case in so high a degree,
he may be so inexplicably woven into relationships of life
which extend far beyond himself that he almost cannot reveal himself.
But he who cannot reveal himself cannot love,
and he who cannot love is the most unhappy man of all.
- Soren Kierkegaard

I never considered a difference of opinion
in politics, in religion, in philosophy,
as cause for withdrawing from a friend.
- Thomas Jefferson

Ordinary people seem not to realize
that those who really apply themselves
in the right way to philosophy
are directly and of their own accord
preparing themselves for dying and death.
- Socrates

One's philosophy is not best expressed in words;
it is expressed in the choices one makes...
and the choices we make
are ultimately our responsibility.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

A discussion of philosophy is like a cat chasing its tail -
it may be an amusing diversion but
it has no chance for a satisfying conclusion.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

If I am happy in spite of my deprivations,
if my happiness is so deep that it is a faith,
so thoughtful that it becomes a philosophy of life.
If, in short, I am an optimist,
my testimony to the creed of optimism is worth hearing.
- Helen Keller
...
Helen Keller (1880-1968) overcame being both deaf and blind
to become a famous author, lecturer, and activist
for women's suffrage, workers' rights, and ending war.

This is my simple religion.
There is no need for temples;
no need for complicated philosophy.
Our own brain, our own heart is our temple;
the philosophy is kindness.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live
that his happiness shall depend
as little as possible on external things.
- Epictetus

Truth always rests with the minority,
and the minority is always stronger than the majority,
because the minority is generally formed by those
who really have an opinion,
while the strength of a majority is illusory,
formed by the gangs who have no opinion -
and who, therefore, in the next instant
(when it is evident that the minority is the stronger)
assume its opinion... while truth again reverts to a new minority.
- Soren Kierkegaard

God creates out of nothing. Wonderful you say.
Yes, to be sure, but he does what is still more wonderful:
he makes saints out of sinners.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The test of all beliefs is their practical effect in life.
If it be true that optimism compels the world forward,
and pessimism retards it, then it is dangerous to
propagate a pessimistic philosophy.
- Helen Keller

I've developed a new philosophy...
I only dread one day at a time.
- the character Charlie Brown in Charles M. Schulz' Peanuts comic

I begin with the principle that all men are bores.
Surely no one will prove himself
so great a bore as to contradict me in this.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The self-assured believer is a greater sinner
in the eyes of God than the troubled disbeliever
- Soren Kierkegaard

The philosophy of the school room in one generation
will be the philosophy of government in the next.
- Abraham Lincoln

Since boredom advances and boredom is the root of all evil,
no wonder, then, that the world goes backwards, that evil spreads.
This can be traced back to the very beginning of the world.
The gods were bored; therefore they created human beings.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Listen to the cry of a woman in labor at the hour of giving birth -
look at the dying man's struggle at his last extremity,
and then tell me whether something that begins and ends thus
could be intended for enjoyment.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Socialism is a philosophy of failure,
the creed of ignorance,
and the gospel of envy,
its inherent virtue is
the equal sharing of misery.
- Winston Churchill

I think that there is nothing, not even crime,
more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself
than this incessant business.
- Henry David Thoreau

I am an Epicurean.
I consider the genuine (not the imputed) doctrines of Epicurus
as containing everything rational in moral philosophy
which Greek and Roman leave to us.
- Thomas Jefferson

Appreciate again and again, freshly and naively,
the basic goods of life, with awe,
pleasure, wonder and even ecstasy,
however stale these experiences may have become to others.
- Abraham Maslow

The great pleasure in life is doing
what people say you cannot do.
- Walter Bagehot

To give pleasure to a single heart by a single act
is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

Only he is successful in his business who makes that pursuit
which affords him the highest pleasure sustain him.
- Henry David Thoreau

I believe that every human mind feels pleasure
in doing good to another.
- Thomas Jefferson

There are nine requisites for contented living:
HEALTH enough to make work a pleasure;
WEALTH enough to support your needs;
STRENGTH enough to battle with difficulties and forsake them;
GRACE enough to confess your sins and overcome them;
PATIENCE enough to toil until some good is accomplished;
CHARITY enough to see some good in your neighbor;
LOVE enough to move you to be useful and helpful to others;
FAITH enough to make real the things of God;
HOPE enough to remove all anxious fears concerning the future.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

When one has the feeling of dislike for evil,
when one feels tranquil,
one finds pleasure in listening to good teachings;
when one has these feelings and appreciates them,
one is free of fear.
- The Buddha

If I were to wish for anything,
I should not wish for wealth and power,
but for the passionate sense of potential -
for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible.
Pleasure disappoints; possibility never.
- Soren Kierkegaard

The greatest battle of all is simply... Life.
This is no child's game. This is the big one -
the Super Bowl - the Game of all games.
The rules of Life are unwritten and unknown.
Perhaps, one could say that there are no rules.
The Judge has ultimate power.
She can call the game at any time - for any reason.
The penalties in the Game are completely arbitrary -
in both timing and severity.
Penalty for what, we ask?
The Judge is silent.
How can I win the Game?
"You can never win," comes the answer,
"So just take pleasure in playing the Game."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

There is no pleasure in having nothing to do;
the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it.
- Mary Wilson Little

It gives me great pleasure indeed to see the stubbornness
of an incorrigible nonconformist warmly acclaimed.
- Albert Einstein

My definition of success is to live your life in a way
that causes you to feel a ton of pleasure and very little pain -
and because of your lifestyle, have the people around you feel
a lot more pleasure than they do pain.
- Tony Robbins

A new friend is like new wine;
when it has aged you will drink it with pleasure.
- Ecclesiastes 9:10

Music produces a kind of pleasure
which human nature cannot do without.
- Confucius

Do not bite at the bait of pleasure,
till you know there is no hook beneath it.
- Thomas Jefferson

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May the world be kind to you,
and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

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