Famous Quotes & Sayings

Henry David Thoreau

The poet uses the results of science and philosophy, and generalizes their widest deductions.

Henry David Thoreau

What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which would be in harmony with the scenery,--for if men read aright, methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor philosophy can supply their place.

Henry David Thoreau

We are apt to imagine that this hubbub of Philosophy, Literature, and Religion, which is heard in pulpits, lyceums, and parlors, vibrates through the universe, and is as catholic a sound as the creaking of the earth's axle. But if a man sleeps soundly, he will forget it all between sunset and dawn.

Henry David Thoreau

To be a philosopher... is to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically.

Henry David Thoreau

There are nowadays professors of philosophy, but not philosophers

Henry David Thoreau

No method nor discipline can supersede the necessity of being forever on the alert. What is a course of history, or philosophy, or poetry, or the most admirable routine of life, compared with the discipline of looking always at what is to be seen? Will you be a reader, a student merely, or a seer?

Henry David Thoreau

I have just been through the process of killing a cistudo for the sake of science; but I cannot excuse myself for this murder, and see that such actions are inconsistent with the poetic perception, however they may serve science, and will affect the quality of my observations. I pray that I may walk more innocently and serenely through nature. No reasoning whatever reconciles me to this act. It affects my day injuriously. I have lost some self-respect. I have a murderer's experience to a degree.

Henry David Thoreau

I saw a muskrat come out of a hole in the ice ... While I am looking at him, I am thinking what he is thinking of me. He is a different sort of man, that's all.

Henry David Thoreau

Say, Not so, and you will out circle the philosophers.

Henry David Thoreau

My desire for knowledge is intermittent; but my desire to bathe my head in atmospheres unknown to my feet is perennial and constant. The highest that we can attain to is not Knowledge, but Sympathy with Intelligence. I do not know that this higher knowledge amounts to anything more definite than a novel and grand surprise on a sudden revelation of the insufficiency of all that we called Knowledge before,—a discovery that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Remorse sleeps during prosperity but awakes bitter consciousness during adversity.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

I have always said and felt that true enjoyment can not be described.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

How many famous and high-spirited heroes have lived a day too long?

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

I also realized that the philosophers, far from ridding me of my vain doubts, only multiplied the doubts that tormented me and failed to remove any one of them. So I chose another guide and said, Let me follow the Inner Light; it will not lead me so far astray as others have done, or if it does it will be my own fault, and I shall not go so far wrong if I follow my own illusions as if I trusted to their deceits.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Force does not constitute right... obedience is due only to legitimate powers.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Take from the philosopher the pleasure of being heard and his desire for knowledge ceases.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

An intelligent being, is the active principle of all things. One must have renounced all common sense to doubt it, and it is a waste of time to try to prove such self evident truth.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Fame is but the breath of people, and that often unwholesome.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Take the course opposite to custom and you will almost always do well.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

All of my misfortunes come from having thought too well of my fellows.

Jill Scott

Nothing has gotten me out of Philadelphia. I moved 20 minutes away from Philly. That's about it.

Jerry Falwell

Most of these feminists are radical, frustrated lesbians, many of them, and man-haters, and failures in their relationships with men, and who have declared war on the male gender. The biblical condemnation of feminism has to do with its radical philosophy and goals. That's the bottom line.

Eugene Ionesco

When silence confronts us, the question to which there is no answer rings out in the silence. That ultimate "why," that great "why" is like a light that blots out everything, but a blinding light; nothing more can be made out...

Eugene Ionesco

It's when I am fully conscious that I ask questions.

Eugene Ionesco

There is no religion in which everyday life is not considered a prison; there is no philosophy or ideology that does not think that we live in alienation.

Eugene Ionesco

It's only when I say that everything is incomprehensible that I come as close as possible to understanding the only thing it is given to us to understand.

Esther Hicks

Nothing, in all of the Universe is more delicious than to be in this physical body allowing the fullness that is you to be present in the moment.

Esther Hicks

Your body is an absolute mirror of your mind. As you worry, your body shows it. As you love, your body shows it. As you are overwhelmed, your body shows it. As you are angry your body shows it. Every cell of your body is being allowed or resisted by the way you feel. 'My physical state is a direct reflection of how I feel', instead of 'How I feel is a direct reflection of my physical state'.

Erykah Badu

It's almost like a lot of black people in America, a lot of young black men, are born with this cloud over their heads. It's their penitentiary cloud, this philosophy we all have, that it's harder for us.

Erykah Badu

We lock ourselves into our own philosophies, our own religions, our own walks of life, and if we fail, we condemn ourselves and then we get sick.

Ernest Holmes

If the philosophy of Christianity were lived, wars would cease, unhappiness would cease, economic problems would be solved, poverty would be wiped from the face of the earth, and man's inhumanity to man would be transmuted into a spirit of mutual helpfulness.

Erma Bombeck

I learned the importance of a man's chair early in life. I learned that he may love several wives, embrace several cars, be true to more than one political philosophy, and be equally committed to several careers, but he will have only one comfortable chair in his life. I learned it will be an ugly chair. It will match nothing in the entire house. It will never wear out.