There are in fact four very different stumbling blocks in the way of grasping the truth, which hinder every man however learned, and scarcely allow anyone to win a clear title to wisdom, namely, the example of weak and unworthy authority, longstanding custom, the feeling of the ignorant crowd, and the hiding of our own ignorance while making a display of our apparent knowledge.
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Since the social victim has been oppressed by society, he comes to feel that his individual life will be improved read more
Since the social victim has been oppressed by society, he comes to feel that his individual life will be improved more by changes in society than by his own initiative. Without realizing it, he makes society rather than himself the agent of change. The power he finds in his victimization may lead him to collective action against society, but it also encourages passivity within the sphere of his personal life.
An inventor is simply a fellow who doesn't take his education too seriously.
An inventor is simply a fellow who doesn't take his education too seriously.
Persons of high self-esteem are not driven to make themselves superior to others; they do not seek to prove their read more
Persons of high self-esteem are not driven to make themselves superior to others; they do not seek to prove their value by measuring themselves against a comparative standard. Their joy is being who they are, not in being better than someone else.
A nail is driven out by another nail. Habit is overcome by habit.
A nail is driven out by another nail. Habit is overcome by habit.
...we are entitled to make almost any reasonable assumption, but should resist making conclusions until evidence requires that we do read more
...we are entitled to make almost any reasonable assumption, but should resist making conclusions until evidence requires that we do so.
Because we do not understand the brain very well we are constantly tempted to use the latest technology as a read more
Because we do not understand the brain very well we are constantly tempted to use the latest technology as a model for trying to understand it. In my childhood we were always assured that the brain was a telephone switchboard. ('What else could it be?') I was amused to see that Sherrington, the great British neuroscientist, thought that the brain worked like a telegraph system. Freud often compared the brain to hydraulic and electro-magnetic systems. Leibniz compared it to a mill, and I am told some of the ancient Greeks thought the brain functions like a catapult. At present, obviously, the metaphor is the digital computer.
If you cannot be the master of your language, you must be its slave. If you cannot examine your thoughts, read more
If you cannot be the master of your language, you must be its slave. If you cannot examine your thoughts, you have no choice but to think them, however silly they may be.
A healthy appetite for righteousness, kept in due control by good manners, is an excellent thing; but to "hunger and read more
A healthy appetite for righteousness, kept in due control by good manners, is an excellent thing; but to "hunger and thirst" after it is often merely a symptom of spiritual diabetes.
The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim read more
The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim all excellence for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause.
