George Santayana
George Santayana
Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás, known in English as George Santayana, was a philosopher, essayist, poet, and novelist. Originally from Spain, Santayana was raised and educated in the United States from the age of eight and identified himself as an American, although he always kept a valid Spanish passport. He wrote in English and is generally considered an American man of letters. At the age of forty-eight, Santayana left his position at Harvard and returned to Europe...
NationalitySpanish
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth16 December 1863
CityMadrid, Spain
CountrySpain
Almost every wise saying has an opposite one, no less wise, to balance it.
Graphic design is the paradise of individuality, eccentricity, heresy, abnormality, hobbies and humors.
Our character ... is an omen of our destiny, and the more integrity we have and keep, the simpler and nobler that destiny is likely to be.
Fanaticism consists of redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim.
To know what people really think, pay regard to what they do, rather than what they say.
For a man who has done his natural duty, death is as natural as sleep.
Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
To delight in war is a merit in the soldier, a dangerous quality in the captain, and a positive crime in the statesman.
The highest form of vanity is love of fame.
Beauty as we feel it is something indescribable; what it is or what it means can never be said.
It is possible to be a master in false philosophy, easier, in fact, than to be a master in the truth, because a false philosophy can be made as simple and consistent as one pleases.
Fashion is something barbarous, for it produces innovation without reason and imitation without benefit.
It is veneer, rouge, aestheticism, art museums, new theaters, etc. that make America impotent. The good things are football, kindness, and jazz bands.
We need sometimes to escape into open solitudes, into aimlessness, into the moral holiday of running some pure hazard in order to sharpen the edge of life, to taste hardship, and to be compelled to work desperately for a moment at no matter what.