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
The passions grafted on wounded pride are the most inveterate; they are green and vigorous in old age.
We must welcome the future, remembering that soon it will be the past; and we must respect the past, remembering that it was once all that was humanly possible.
History is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren't there.
A man's feet should be planted in his country, but his eyes should survey the world.
It takes patience to appreciate domestic bliss; volatile spirits prefer unhappiness.
The muffled syllables that Nature speaks Fill us with deeper longing for her word; She hides a meaning that the spirit seeks, She makes a sweeter music than is heard.
Experience seems to most of us to lead to conclusions, but empiricism has sworn never to draw them.
Perhaps the only true dignity of man is his capacity to despise himself.
One's friends are that part of the human race with which one can be human.
The Soul is the voice of the body's interests.
Each religion, so dear to those whose life it sanctifies, and fulfilling so necessary a function in the society that has adopted it, necessarily contradicts every other religion, and probably contradicts itself.
What religion a man shall have is a historical accident, quite as much as what language he shall speak.
Do not have evil-doers for friends, do not have low people for friends: have virtuous people for friends, have for friends the best of men.
For an idea ever to be fashionable is ominous, since it must afterwards be always old fashioned