500 Best English Quotes by Philosophers

English Quotes by Philosophers

At a time when life becomes difficult, our minds and soul should be encouraged and motivated by a philosophical attitude. Quotes from philosophy can be a great source of inspiration. So, we have given some famous philosopher’s quotes here. We hope you will love these quotes very much.

Top 5 Philosophers Quotes

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Aquinas believes that natural reason can demonstratively prove God’s existence. The first step is to show that, for everything in the changeable world around us, there is a first cause, or prime mover, in virtue of which all other things have their existence, their motion, their qualities, and direction.

Best Philosophers Quotes by Thomas Aquinas

Check: Thomas Aquinas Quotes

“Every judgment of conscience, be it right or wrong, be it about things evil in themselves or morally indifferent, is obligatory, in such wise that he who acts against his conscience always sins.”
“To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.”
“Temperance is simply a disposition of the mind which binds the passion.”

“Better to illuminate than merely to shine, to deliver to others contemplated truths than merely to contemplate.”

“A man has free choice to the extent that he is rational.” – Thomas Aquinas

“We must love them both, those whose opinions we share and those whose opinions we reject, for both have labored in the search for truth, and both have helped us in finding it.”

“Happiness is secured through virtue; it is a good attained by man’s own will.”

“The things that we love tell us what we are.”

“All the efforts of the human mind cannot exhaust the essence of a single fly.” – Thomas Aquinas

“There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.”

“Fear is such a powerful emotion for humans that when we allow it to take us over, it drives compassion right out of our hearts.”

“We must love them both, those whose opinions we share and those whose opinions we reject, for both have labored in the search for truth, and both have helped us in finding it.”

“The soul is like an uninhabited world that comes to life only when God lays His head against us.”

“The highest manifestation of life consists in this: that a being governs its own actions. A thing which is always subject to the direction of another is somewhat of a dead thing.”

“To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.”

“Three things are necessary for the salvation of man: to know what he ought to believe; to know what he ought to desire, and to know what he ought to do.” –

“Faith has to do with things that are not seen and hope with things that are not at hand.”

“The truth of our faith becomes a matter of ridicule among the infidels if any Catholic, not gifted with the necessary scientific learning, presents as dogma what scientific scrutiny shows to be false.”

“Grant me, O Lord my God, a mind to know you, a heart to seek you, wisdom to find you, conduct pleasing to you, faithful perseverance in waiting for you, and a hope of finally embracing you. Amen.”

“Because we cannot know what God is, but only what He is not, we cannot consider how He is but only how He is not.”

“How can we live in harmony? First, we need to know we are all madly in love with the same God.”
“If, then, you are looking for the way by which you should go, take Christ because He Himself is the way.”
“Law is nothing other than a certain ordinance of reason for the common good, promulgated by the person who has the care of the community.”

“Freedom of conscience entails more dangers than authority and despotism.”

“We are freer than we think.”

“Do not ask who I am and do not ask me to remain the same.”

“If forgers and malefactors are put to death by the secular power, there is much more reason for excommunicating and even putting to death one convicted of heresy.”

“Wonder is the desire of knowledge.”

“Reason in man is rather like God in the world.”

“By nature, all men are equal in liberty, but not in other endowments.”

“It is necessary to posit something which is necessary of itself, and has no cause of its necessity outside of itself but is the cause of necessity in other things. And all people call this thing God.”

“Because philosophy arises from awe, a philosopher is bound in his way to be a lover of myths and poetic fables. Poets and philosophers are alike in being big with wonder.”

“The Study of philosophy is not that we may know what men have thought, but what the truth of things is.”

“There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.”

“Love takes up where knowledge leaves off.”

“Moral science is better occupied when treating of friendship than of justice.”

“The study of truth requires a considerable effort – which is why few are willing to undertake it out of love of knowledge.”

“Most men seem to live according to sense rather than reason.” – Thomas Aquinas

“Not everything that is more difficult is more meritorious.”

“The happy man in this life needs friends.”

“Friendship is the source of the greatest pleasures, and without friends even the most agreeable pursuits become tedious.”

‘Sorrow can be alleviated by good sleep, a bath and a glass of wine.”

“Because philosophy arises from awe, a philosopher is bound in his way to be a lover of myths and poetic fables. Poets and philosophers are alike in being big with wonder.”

“Better to illuminate than merely to shine to deliver to others contemplated truths than merely to contemplate.”

“How is it they live in such harmony, the billions of stars, when most men can barely go a minute without declaring war in their minds?”

“Man cannot live without joy; therefore, when he is deprived of true spiritual joys it is necessary that he become addicted to carnal pleasures.”

“I would rather feel compassion than know the meaning of it. I would hope to act with compassion without thinking of personal gain.”

“Rarely affirm, seldom deny, always distinguish.”

“Friendship is the source of the greatest pleasures, and without friends even the most agreeable pursuits become tedious.’

“Love follows knowledge.”

“Well-ordered self-love is right and natural.” – Thomas Aquinas

“Love is a binding force, by which another is joined to me and cherished by myself.”

“Love must precede hatred, and nothing is hated save through being contrary to a suitable thing which is loved. And hence it is that every hatred is caused by love.”

Best English Quotes by Michel Foucault

“Visibility is a trap.”
“All teaching systems, which appear simply to disseminate knowledge, are made to maintain a certain social class in power.”
“This book is intended as a correlative history of the modern soul and of a new power to judge.”
“Every educational system is a political means of maintaining or of modifying the appropriation of discourse, with the knowledge and the powers it carries with it.”

“The Panopticon is a marvelous machine which, whatever use one may wish to put it to, produces homogeneous effects of power.”

“Truth is linked in a circular relation with systems of power which produce and sustain it.”

“A penal system must be conceived as a mechanism … to administer illegalities differentially, not to eliminate them.”

. “The fascism in us all that causes us to love power, to desire the very thing that dominates and exploits us.”

“We are now far away from the country of tortures, dotted with wheels, gibbets, gallows, pillories; we are far, too, from that dream of the reformers, less than fifty years before.”

“Is it surprising that prisons resemble factories, schools, barracks, hospitals, which all resemble prisons?”

“Discipline ‘makes’ individuals; it is the specific technique of a power that regards individuals as objects.”

“Schools serve the same social functions as prisons and mental institutions.”

“Where there is power, there is resistance.”

“Surveillance is permanent in its effects, even if it is discontinuous in its action.”

“The soul is the prison of the body.”

“Delinquency is a politically or economically less dangerous—and … usable—form of illegality.”

“The ‘Enlightenment’, which discovered the liberties, also invented the disciplines.”

“The public execution is to be understood not only as a judicial, but also as a political ritual.”

“Set the force that drove the criminal to the crime against itself.”

“Discipline is a political anatomy of detail.”

“I don’t feel that it is necessary to know exactly what I am. The main interest in life and work is to become someone else that you were not in the beginning.”

‘Truth’ is to be understood as a system of ordered procedures for the production, regulation, distribution, circulation and operation of statements. ‘Truth’ is linked in a circular relation with systems of power which produce and sustain it, and to effects of power which it induces and which extend it. A ‘regime’ of truth.”

“Where there is power, there is resistance.”

“From the idea that the self is not given to us, I think there is only one practical consequence: we have to create ourselves as a work of art.”

“Power is not an institution, and not a structure; neither is it a certain strength we are endowed with; it is the name that one attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society.”

“We have then a public execution and a timetable. They do not punish the same type of crimes or the same type of delinquent. But they each define a certain penal style.”

“The age of sobriety in punishment had begun.”

“Are the prisons overpopulated, or is the population over-imprisoned?”

“Search for what is good and strong and beautiful in your society and elaborate from there. Push outward. Always create from what you already have. Then you will know what to do.”

“In this scene of terror, the role of the people was an ambiguous one.”

“The strategic adversary is fascism.”

“Is it surprising that prisons resemble factories, schools, barracks, hospitals, which all resemble prisons?”

“The ‘Enlightenment’, which discovered the liberties, also invented the disciplines.”

“The strategic adversary is fascism… the fascism in us all, in our heads and in our everyday behavior, the fascism that causes us to love power, to desire the very thing that dominates and exploits us.”

“I’m no prophet. My job is making windows where there were once walls.”

“Power is everywhere…because it comes from everywhere.”

“Knowledge is not for knowing: knowledge is for cutting.”

“People know what they do; frequently they know why they do what they do; but what they don’t know is what they do does.”

“It would not be true to say that the prison was born with the new codes.”

“Power is also exerted over the body, not so much as physical punishment, but as ideological orders.”

“The need for punishment without torture was … formulated as a cry from the heart or … from an outraged nature.”

“What I seek is a permanent opening of possibilities.”

“Public punishment is the ceremony of immediate recoding.”

“There is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations”

“Total surveillance is increasingly the general condition of society as a whole.”

“I am hopelessly in love with a memory. An echo from another time, another place.”

“To change something in the minds of people – that’s the role of an intellectual.”

“A critique is not a matter of saying that things are not right as they are. It is a matter of pointing out on what kinds of assumptions, what kinds of familiar, unchallenged, unconsidered modes of thought the practices that we accept rest.”

“One cannot attend to oneself, take care of oneself, without a relationship to another person.”

“The judges of normality are present everywhere. We are in the society of the teacher-judge, the doctor-judge, the educator-judge, the social worker-judge.”

Best Philosophers Quotes by David Hume

“Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them, and each mind perceives a different beauty.”

“Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.”

“Disbelief in futurity loosens in a great measure the ties of morality, and may be for that reason pernicious to the peace of civil society.”

“How could politics be a science, if laws and forms of government had not a uniform influence upon society?”

“It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.”

“There is no such thing as freedom of choice unless there is freedom to refuse.”

“Nothing is more surprising than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few.”

“The richest genius, like the most fertile soil, when uncultivated, shoots up into the rankest weeds.”

“What a peculiar privilege has this little agitation of the brain which we call ‘thought’.”

“It is possible for the same thing both to be and not to be.”

“It’s when we start working together that the real healing takes place… it’s when we start spilling our sweat, and not our blood.”

“But such is the nature of the human mind, that it always lays hold on every mind that approaches it.”
“Avarice, or the desire of gain, is a universal passion which operates at all times, at all places, and upon all persons.”

“When men are most sure and arrogant, they are commonly most mistaken, giving views to passion without that proper deliberation which alone can secure them from the grossest absurdities.”

“The great end of all human industry is the attainment of happiness.”

“It is, therefore, a just political maxim, that every man must be supposed a knave.”

“He is happy whose circumstances suit his temper but he is more excellent who can suit his temper to any circumstances.”

“Superstition is an enemy to civil liberty.”

“No human testimony can have such force as to prove a miracle, and make it a just foundation for any such system of religion.”

“Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, and Natural Religion, are in some measure dependent on the science of man; since they lie under the cognizance of men, and are judged of by their powers and faculties.”

Heaven and Hell suppose two distinct species of men, the Good and the Bad. But the greatest part of mankind float betwixt vice and virtue.”

“It is an absurdity to believe that the Deity has human passions, and one of the lowest of human passions, a restless appetite for applause.”

“What would become of history, had we not a dependence on the veracity of the historian, according to the experience, what we have had of mankind?”

“Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.”

“The memory, senses, and understanding are, therefore, all of them founded on the imagination, or the vivacity of our ideas.”

“Tis not unreasonable for me to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.”

“Judgments. A mistake, therefore, of right may become a species.”

“A man who hides himself, confesses as evidently the superiority of his enemy, as another who fairly delivers his arms.”

“All the philosophy… in the world, and all the religion, which is nothing but a species of philosophy, will never be able to carry us beyond the usual course of experience.”

“The heights of popularity and patriotism are still the beaten road to power and tyranny.”

“Character is the result of a system of stereotyped principals.”

“No man ever threw away life while it was worth keeping.”

“Epicurus’s old questions are still unanswered: Is he (God) willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence evil?”

“It is an absurdity to believe that the Deity has human passions, and one of the lowest of human passions, a restless appetite for applause.”

“Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.”

“Does a man of sense run after every silly tale of hobgoblins or fairies, and canvass particularly the evidence? I never knew anyone, that examined and deliberated about nonsense who did not believe it before the end of his enquiries.”

“Liberty of any kind is never lost all at once.”

“In our reasonings concerning matter of fact, there are all imaginable degrees of assurance, from the highest certainty to the lowest species of moral evidence. A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence.”

“Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.”

“A propensity to hope and joy is real riches; one to fear and sorrow, real poverty..

“Reading and sauntering and lounging and dosing, which I call thinking, is my supreme happiness.”
“But the life of a man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster.”

“A purpose, an intention, a design, strikes everywhere even the careless, the most stupid thinker.”

“The truth springs from arguments amongst friends.”

“When we reflect on the shortness and uncertainty of life, how despicable seem all our pursuits of happiness.”

“Reading and sauntering and lounging and dosing, which I call thinking, is my supreme Happiness.”

“Be a philosopher; but, amidst all your philosophy, be still a man.”

“But the life of a man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster.”

“The truth springs from arguments amongst friends.”

“He is happy whose circumstances suit his temper, but he is more excellent who can suit his temper to his circumstance.”

Philosophers Quotes by Lao-Tzu

“From wonder into wonder existence opens.”

“The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you do anything but be yourself.”

“Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.”

“Knowledge is a treasure, but practice is the key to it.”

“To a mind that is still the whole universe surrenders.”

“To be worn out is to be renewed.”

“There is no disaster greater than not being content; there is no misfortune greater than being covetous.”

“Ambition has one heel nailed in well, though she stretches her fingers to touch the heavens.”

“The reason why the universe is eternal is that it does not live for itself; it gives life to others as it transforms.”

“The flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long.”

“He who knows others is wise; he who knows himself is enlightened.”

“The softest things in the world overcome the hardest things in the world. Through this I know the advantage of taking no action.”

“Give evil nothing to oppose and it will disappear by itself.”

“Do your work, then step back. The only path to serenity.”

“Do you have the patience to wait until your mud settles and the water is clear?”

“When you accept yourself, the whole world accepts you.”

“Sincere words are not fine; fine words are not sincere.”

“The way of heaven is to help and not harm.”

“He who defends with love will be secure; Heaven will save him, and protect him with love.”

“A scholar who cherishes the love of comfort is not fit to be deemed a scholar.”

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.”

“Ordinary men hate solitude. But the Master makes use of it, embracing his aloneness, realizing he is one with the whole universe.”

“Love is of all the passions the strongest, for it attacks simultaneously the head, the heart, and the senses.”

“Music in the soul can be heard by the universe.”

“The way to do is to be”

“Great acts are made up of small deeds.” ~

“It is better to leave a vessel unfilled, than to attempt to carry it when it is full.”

“If the people must be ever fearful of death, then there will always be an executioner.”

“Our enemies are not demons, but human beings like ourselves.”

“Time is a created thing. To say ‘I don’t have time,’ is like saying, ‘I don’t want to.”

“Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know.”

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”

“To know that you do not know is the best.”

“Is it not through her selflessness that she is able to perfect herself?”

“The world belongs to those who let go.”

“Just remain in the center; watching. And then forget that you are there.”

“The way to do is to be.”

“He who talks more is sooner exhausted.”

“As soon as you have made a thought, laugh at it.”

“If you want to know me, look inside your heart.”

“A man with outward courage dares to die; a man with inner courage dares to live.” ~ Lao Tzu

“To think you know when you do not is a disease.”

“Recognizing this disease as a disease is to be free of it.”

“Because of a great love, one is courageous.”

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”

“Be still. Stillness reveals the secrets of eternity.’

“Respond intelligently even to unintelligent treatment.”

“There is a time to live and a time to die but never to reject the moment.”

“The best fighter is never angry.”

“If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading”

Best Philosophers English Quotes by Niccolo Machiavelli

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“It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles.”

“There is no other way to guard yourself against flattery than by making men understand that telling you the truth will not offend you.”

“The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.”

“Make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth. Develop the strength to do bold things, not to suffer.”
“Rome remained free for four hundred years and Sparta eight hundred, although their citizens were armed all that time; but many other states that have been disarmed have lost their liberties in less than forty years.”

“Ability and perseverance are the weapons of weakness.”

“A sign of intelligence is an awareness of one’s own ignorance.”

“A government which does not trust its citizens to be armed is not itself to be trusted.”

“It is better to act and repent than not to act and regret.”

“The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.”

“Entrepreneurs are simply those who understand that there is little difference between obstacle and opportunity and are able to turn both to their advantage.”

“Never do an enemy a small injury.”

“Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin among the great number who are not good.”

“Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.”

“It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things.”

“Men intrinsically do not trust new things that they have not experienced themselves.”

“Politics have no relation to morals.”

“Men are so stupid and concerned with their present needs, they will always let themselves be deceived.”

“The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.”

“He who becomes a Prince through the favor of the people should always keep on good terms with them; which it is easy for him to do, since all they ask is not to be oppressed.”

“Princes and governments are far more dangerous than other elements within society.”

“For whoever believes that great advancement and new benefits make men forget old injuries is mistaken.”

“There is no avoiding war, it can only be postponed to the advantage of your enemy.”

“Alexander never did what he said, Cesare never said what he did.”

“Princes and governments are far more dangerous than other elements within society.”

“It is essential that in entering a new province you should have the good will of its inhabitants.”

“The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.”

“Always assume incompetence before looking for a conspiracy.”

“Tardiness often robs us opportunity, and the dispatch of our forces.”

“It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles.”

“He who is highly esteemed is not easily conspired against;”

“One who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived.”

“A battle that you win cancels all your mistakes.”

“There is nothing as likely to succeed as what the enemy believes you cannot attempt.”

“Men are driven by two principal impulses, either by love or by fear.”

“Make no small plans for they have no power to stir the soul.”

“Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experiences what you really are.”

“He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command.”

“Never was anything great achieved without danger.”

“Appear as you may wish to be”

“There is no surer sign of decay in a country than to see the rites of religion held in contempt.”

“We work in the Dark, to serve the Light.”

“The ends justifies the means.”

“I’m not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.”

“Gold will not always get you good soldiers, but good soldiers can get you gold.”

“There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to the advantage of others.”

“Impetuosity and audacity often achieve what ordinary means fail to achieve.”

“Power is the pivot on which everything hinges. He who has the power is always right; the weaker is always wrong.”

“Therefore, the best fortress is to be found in the love of the people, for although you may have fortresses, they will not save you if you are hated by the people.”

“Minds are of three kinds: one is capable of thinking for itself; another is able to understand the thinking of others; and a third can neither think for itself nor understand the thinking of others. The first is of the highest excellence, the second is excellent, and the third is worthless.”

“All courses of action are risky, so prudence is not in avoiding danger (it’s impossible), but calculating risk and acting decisively.”

Best Philosophers English Quotes by John Stuart Mill

“Liberty lies in the rights of that person whose views you find most odious.”

“I have learned to seek my happiness by limiting my desires, rather than in attempting to satisfy them.”

“After the primary necessities of food and raiment, freedom is the first and strongest want of human nature.”

“If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”

“There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home.”

“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that.”

“Life has a certain flavor for those who have fought and risked all that the sheltered and protected can never experience.”

“A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them for the injury.”

“All good things which exist are the fruits of originality.”

“When one’s ideas are not challenged, one’s ability to defend them weakens.”

“How can great minds be produced in a country where the test of great minds is agreeing in the opinion of small minds?”

“There is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides.”

“Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.”

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.”

“In this age, the man who dares to think for himself and to act independently does a service to his race.”

“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.”

“The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of the opinion is, that it is robbing the human race.”

“A party of order or stability, and a party of progress or reform, are both necessary elements of a healthy state of political life.”

“So true is that unnatural generally means only uncustomary and that everything which is usual appears natural.”

“No one can be a great thinker who does not recognize that as a thinker it is his first duty to follow his intellect to whatever conclusions it may lead.”

“To make anyone answerable for doing evil to others, is the rule; to make him answerable for not preventing evil, is, comparatively speaking, the exception.”

“Each is a proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily, or mental or spiritual.”

“Yet, desires and impulses are as much a part of a perfect human being, as beliefs and restraints;”

“Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives.”

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.”

“I have learned to seek my happiness by limiting my desires, rather than in attempting to satisfy them.”

“Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative.”

“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion.”

“It is not because men’s desires are strong that they act ill; it is because their consciences are weak.”

“… the danger which threatens human nature is not the excess, but the deficiency, of personal impulses and preferences.”

“Every man who says frankly and fully what he thinks is so far doing a public service. We should be grateful to him for attacking most unsparingly our most cherished opinions.”

“A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them for the injury.”

“If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”

“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.”

“A state which dwarfs its men, in order that they may be more docile instruments in its hands even for beneficial purposes—will find that with small men no great thing can really be accomplished.

“That so few now dare to be eccentric, marks the chief danger of the time.”

“Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends than that good men should look on and do nothing.”

“Human nature is not a machine to be built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree, which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing.”

“The pupil who is never required to do what he cannot do, never does what he can do.”

“The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people.”

“There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home.”

“Every great movement must experience three stages: ridicule, discussion, adoption.”

“A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.”

“No great improvements in the lot of mankind are possible until a great change takes place in the fundamental constitution of their modes of thought.”

“All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.” ~ John Stuart Mill

“The worth of the state, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it.”

“Truth gains more even by the errors of one who, with due study and preparation, thinks for himself, than by the true opinions of those who only hold them because they do not suffer themselves to think…”

“Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves, than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest.”

“Stupidity is much the same all the world over. A stupid person’s notions and feelings may confidently be inferred from those which prevail in the circle by which the person is surrounded. Not so with those whose opinions and feelings are an emanation from their own nature and faculties.”

“In all intellectual debates, both sides tend to be correct in what they affirm, and wrong in what they deny.”

Best Philosophers Quotes by Friedrich Nietzsche

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“The true man wants two things: danger and play.”

“Be careful, lest in casting out your demon you exorcise the best thing in you.”

“The secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is: to live dangerously!”

“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.”

“Ultimately, it is the desire, not the desired, that we love.”

“Ascetic ideals reveal so many bridges to independence that a philosopher is bound to rejoice and clap his hands when he hears the story of all those resolute men who one day said No to all servitude and went into some desert.”

“One ought to hold on to one’s heart; for if one lets it go, one soon loses control of the head too.”

“The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”

“The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.”

“I’m not upset that you lied to me, I’m upset that from now on I can’t believe you.”

“No one can construct for you the bridge upon which precisely you must cross the stream of life, no one but you yourself alone.”

“Today as always, men fall into two groups: slaves and free men. Whoever does not have two-thirds of his day for himself, is a slave, whatever he may be: a statesman, a businessman, an official, or a scholar.”

“There are no beautiful surfaces without a terrible depth.”

“Silence is worse; all truths that are kept silent become poisonous.”

“I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.”

“The lonely one offers his hand too quickly to whomever he encounters.”

“You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.”

“Man is the cruelest animal.”
“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.”

“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.”

“When you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.”

“Nothing on earth consumes a man more quickly than the passion of resentment.”

“Become who you are.”

“It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”

“A pair of powerful spectacles has sometimes sufficed to cure a person in love.”

“The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason, he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything.”

“What does your conscience say? — ‘You should become the person you are.”

“Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders.”

“He who humbleth himself wants to be exalted.”

“In the end things must be as they are and have always been — the great things remain for the great, the abysses for the profound, the delicacies and thrills for the refined, and, to sum up shortly, everything rare for the rare.”

“A joke is an epigram on the death of a feeling.”

“Forgetting our intentions is the most frequent of all acts of stupidity.”

“Many people are obstinate about the path once it is taken, few people about the destination.”

“People are always angry at anyone who chooses very individual standards for his life; because of the extraordinary treatment which that man grants to himself, they feel degraded, like ordinary beings.”

“If a man has a great deal to put in them, a day will have a hundred pockets.”

“Here the ways of men divide. If you wish to strive for peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you wish to be a disciple of truth, then inquire.”

“The demand to be loved is the greatest of all arrogant presumptions.”

“Whatever is done for love always occurs beyond good and evil.”

“Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed.”

“Ascetic ideals reveal so many bridges to independence that a philosopher is bound to rejoice and clap his hands when he hears the story of all those resolute men who one day said No to all servitude and went into some desert.”

“Whoever does not have two-thirds of his day for himself, is a slave, whatever he may be: a statesman, a businessman, an official, or a scholar.”

“We often contradict an opinion for no other reason than that we do not like the tone in which it is expressed.”

“They muddy the water, to make it seem deep.”

“There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.”

“Most people are far too much occupied with themselves to be malicious

“If we possess our why of life, we can put up with almost any how.”

“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.”

“A good writer possesses not only his own spirit but also the spirit of his friends.”

“That every will must consider every other will its equal — would be a principal hostile to life, an agent of the dissolution and destruction of man, an attempt to assassinate the future of man, a sign of weariness, a secret path to nothingness.”

“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.”

Best Philosophers Quotes by Jin Jacques Rausseau

“Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.”

“What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?”

“People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little.”

“Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong.”

“The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.”

“Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.”

“What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?”

“Happiness: a good bank account, a good cook, and a good digestion.”

“The person who has lived the most is not the one with the most years but the one with the richest experiences.”

“Man was born free, and he is everywhere in chains.”

“Innocence is ashamed of nothing.”

“Truth is an homage that the good man pays to his own dignity.”

“Civilization is a hopeless race to discover remedies for the evils it produces.”

“I have never believed that man’s freedom consisted in doing what he wants, but rather in never doing what he does not want to do.”

“By doing good we become good.”

“The bigger a state becomes the more liberty diminishes.”

“The greatest braggarts are usually the biggest cowards.”

“No man has any natural authority over his fellow men.”

“Plant and your spouse plants with you; weed and you weed alone.”

“I may be no better, but at least I am different.”

“People in their natural state are basically good. But this natural innocence, however, is corrupted by the evils of society.”

“There are always four sides to a story: your side, their side, the truth and what really happened.”

“Freedom is the power to choose our own chains.”

“I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.”

“The freedom of Mankind does not lie in the fact that can do what we want, but that we do not have to do that which we do not want.”

“Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong.”

“Those people who treat politics and morality separately will never understand either of them.”

“Why should we build our happiness on the opinons of others, when we can find it in our own hearts?”
“People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little.”

“The money you have gives you freedom; the money you pursue enslaves you.”

“I hate books; they only teach us to talk about things we know nothing about.”

“The falsification of history has done more to impede human development than any one thing known to mankind.”

“Plants are shaped by cultivation and men by education. We are born weak, we need strength; we are born totally unprovided, we need aid; we are born stupid, we need judgment. Everything we do not have at our birth and which we need when we are grown is given us by education.”

“What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?”

“Once you teach people to say what they do not understand, it is easy enough to get them to say anything you like.”

“Those that are most slow in making a promise are the most faithful in the performance of it.”

“I have suffered too much in this world not to hope for another.”

“Finance is a slave’s word.”

“People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little.”

“I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.”

“Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”

“The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.”

“It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living.”

“You forget that the fruits belong to all and that the land belongs to no one.”

“It is unnatural for a majority to rule, for a majority can seldom be organized and united for specific action, and a minority can.”

“Every man has the right to risk his own life in order to preserve it. Has it ever been said that a man who throws himself out the window to escape from a fire is guilty of suicide?”

“Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect.”

“A feeble body weakens the mind.”

“Whoever blushes is already guilty; true innocence is ashamed of nothing.”

Best Philosophers Quotes by Jean Paul Sartre

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“Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself.”

“Nothing happens while you live. The scenery changes, people come in and go out, that’s all. There are no beginnings. Days are tacked on to days without rhyme or reason, an interminable, monotonous addition.”

“I’ve dropped out of their hearts like a little sparrow fallen from its nest.”

“If you are lonely when you’re alone, you are in bad company.”

“Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you.”

“Every existing thing is born without reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance.”

“Commitment is an act, not a word. Jean-Paul Sartre When the rich wage war, it’s the poor who die.”

“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.”

“Only the guy who isn’t rowing has time to rock the boat.”

“I am no longer sure of anything. If I satiate my desires, I sin but I deliver myself from them; if I refuse to satisfy them, they infect the whole soul.”

“The best work is not what is most difficult for you; it is what you do best.”

“We must act out passion before we can feel it.”

“Man is not the sum of what he has already, but rather the sum of what he does not yet have, of what he could have.”

“Life has no meaning the moment you lose the illusion of being eternal.”

“When rich people fight wars with one another, poor people are the ones to die. Jean-Paul Sartre If I became a philosopher, if I have so keenly sought this fame for which I’m still waiting, it’s all been to seduce women basically.”

“We do not know what we want and yet we are responsible for what we are – that is the fact.”

“I hate victims who respect their executioners.”

“For an occurrence to become an adventure, it is necessary and sufficient for one to recount it.”

“That God does not exist, I cannot deny, that my whole being cries out for God I cannot forget.”

“I do not believe in God; his existence has been disproved by science. But in the concentration camp, I learned to believe in men.”

“Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.”

“We do not know what we want and yet we are responsible for what we are – that is the fact.”

“Life begins on the other side of despair.”

“Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.”

“Everything has been figured out, except how to live.”

“Every existing thing is born without reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance.”

“There is only one day left, always starting over: it is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk.”

“Man is fully responsible for his nature and his choices.”

“If I became a philosopher, if I have so keenly sought this fame for which I’m still waiting, it’s all been to seduce women basically.”

“Three o’clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do. Jean-Paul Sartre We do not judge the people we love. Jean-Paul Sartre No finite point has meaning without an infinite reference point.”

“I am no longer sure of anything. If I satiate my desires, I sin but I deliver myself from them; if I refuse to satisfy them, they infect the whole soul.”

“The best work is not what is most difficult for you; it is what you do best.”

“The words I speak are too big for my mouth, they tear it; the load of destiny I bear is too heavy for my youth and has shattered it.”

“…here we are, all of us, eating and drinking to preserve our precious existence, and that there’s nothing, nothing, absolutely no reason for existing.”

“In a world, man must create his own essence. It is in throwing himself into the world, suffering there, struggling there, that he gradually defines himself.”

“…an existent can never justify the existence of another existent.”

“Better to die on one’s feet than to live on one’s knees.”

“Freedom is what we do with what is done to us.”

“He could do what he liked, no one had the right to advise him, there would be for him no Good or Evil unless he thought them into being.”

“There is no human nature, since there is no god to conceive it.”

“Things are entirely what they appear to be and BEHIND THEM… there is nothing.”

“I can always choose, but I ought to know that if I do not choose, I am still choosing.”

“It isn’t freedom from. It’s freedom to.”

“Whenever the wife wants to do drugs, she thinks about Sartre. One bad trip and then a giant lobster followed him around for the rest of his days.”

“So, I was a poodle of the future; I made prophecies.”

“Smooth and smiling faces everywhere, but ruin in their eyes.”

“For those who want ‘to change life’ or ‘to reinvent love’ God is nothing but a hindrance.”

“To believe is to know you believe, and to know you believe is not to believe.”

“We only become what we are by the radical and deep-seated refusal of that which others have made of us.”

“Every existing thing is born without a reason, prolongs itself out of weakness, and dies by chance.”

Best English Quotes by Rene Descartes

“There is nothing more ancient than the truth.”.

“When it is not in our power to follow what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable.”

“An optimist may see a light where there is none, but why must the pessimist always run to blow it out?”

“Traveling is almost like talking with those of other centuries.”

“I could not possibly be of such a nature as I am, and yet have in my mind the idea of a God, if God did not in reality exist.”

“The reading of all good books is like conversation with the finest men of past centuries.”

“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”

“I paid special attention to Arithmetic and Geometry.”

“Among all those who up to this time made discoveries in the sciences, it was the mathematicians alone who had been able to arrive at demonstrations.”

“For me, everything in nature is mathematics.”

“If we possessed a thorough knowledge of all the parts of the seed of any animal, we could from that alone deduce the whole conformation and figure of each of its members

“But in my opinion, all things in nature occur mathematically.”

“The two operations of our understanding, intuition and deduction, on which alone we have said we must rely in the acquisition of knowledge.”

“Truths will be discovered by an individual rather than a whole people.”

“The first precept was never to accept a thing as true until I knew it as such without a single doubt.”

“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”

“We never understand a thing so well, and make it our own, as when we have discovered it for ourselves.”

“But possibly I am something more than I suppose myself to be.”

“To know what people really think, pay attention to what they do, rather than what they say.”

“When writing about transcendental issues, be transcendentally clear.”

“Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power.”

“Everything is self-evident.”

“Conquer yourself rather than the world.”

“I am accustomed to sleep and, in my dreams, to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake.”

“Illusory joy is often worth more than genuine sorrow.”

“If I found any new truths in the sciences, I can say that they follow from, or depend on, five or six principal problems which I succeeded in solving and which I regard as so many battles where the fortunes of war were on my side.”

“One cannot conceive anything so strange and so implausible that it has not already been said by one philosopher or another.”

“To live without philosophizing is in truth the same as keeping the eyes closed without attempting to open them.”

“It is in the nature of our mind to construct general propositions on the basis of our knowledge of particular ones.”

“Our convictions result from custom and example very much more than from any knowledge that is certain.”

“We do not describe the world we see; we see the world we can describe.”

“Because reason is the only thing that makes us men, and distinguishes us from the beasts, I would prefer to believe that it exists, in its entirety, in each of us.”

“I suppose therefore that all things I see are illusions; I believe that nothing has ever existed of everything my lying memory tells me. I think I have no senses. I believe that body, shape, extension, motion, location are functions. What is there then that can be taken as true? Perhaps only this one thing, that nothing at all is certain.”

“Conquer yourself rather than the world.”

“To live without philosophizing is in truth the same as keeping the eyes closed without attempting to open them.”

“There is nothing so strange and so unbelievable that it has not been said by one philosopher or another.”

“In order to seek truth, it is necessary once in the course of our life to doubt, as far as possible, of all things.”

“Common sense is the most widely shared commodity in the world, for every man is convinced that he is well supplied with it.”

“Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power.”

“It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well.”

“To know what people really think, pay attention to what they do, rather than what they say.”

“And thus, the actions of life often not allowing any delay, it is a truth very certain that, when it is not in our power to determine the most true opinions, we ought to follow the most probable.”

“With me, everything turns into mathematics.”

“It is true that medicine as it is currently practiced contains little of much use.”

“Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it.”

“Give me extension and motion and I will construct the universe.”

“By ‘God’, I understand, a substance which is infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, supremely powerful.”

“The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest men of past centuries.”

“When I was examining what I was, I realized that I could pretend that I had no body… but I could not pretend in the same way that I did not exist.”

“The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.”

“I desire to live in peace and to continue the life I have begun under the motto ‘to live well you must live unseen.”

FAQ

1. What are Rene Descartes’s best quotes?

Ans: Rene Descartes best quotes are –

“There is nothing more ancient than the truth.”.
“When it is not in our power to follow what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable.”
“Traveling is almost like talking with those of other centuries.”

2. What are Jean Paul Sarte best quotes?

Ans: Jean Paul Sarte best quotes are –

“Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself.”

“Nothing happens while you live. The scenery changes, people come in and go out, that’s all. There are no beginnings. Days are tacked on to days without rhyme or reason, an interminable, monotonous addition.”
“I’ve dropped out of their hearts like a little sparrow fallen from its nest.”

3. What are Jin Jacques Rausseau’s best quotes?

Ans: Jin Jacques Rausseau best quotes are –

“Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.”
“What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?”
“People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little.”

4. What are Friedrich Nietzsche best quotes?

Ans: Friedrich Nietzsche best quotes are –

“The true man wants two things: danger and play.”
“Be careful, lest in casting out your demon you exorcise the best thing in you.”
“The secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is: to live dangerously!”

5. What are John Stuart Mill best quotes?

Ans: John Stuart Mill best quotes are –

“Liberty lies in the rights of that person whose views you find most odious.”
“I have learned to seek my happiness by limiting my desires, rather than attempting to satisfy them.”
“After the primary necessities of food and raiment, freedom is the first and strongest want of human nature.”

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Dev Kirtonia

Hi, I’m Dev Kirtonia, Founder & CEO of Dev Library. A website that provides all SCERT, NCERT 3 to 12, and BA, B.com, B.Sc, and Computer Science with Post Graduate Notes & Suggestions, Novel, eBooks, Biography, Quotes, Study Materials, and more.