Lin Yutang
Lin Yutang
Lin Yutangwas a Chinese writer, translator, linguist and inventor. His informal but polished style in both Chinese and English made him one of the most influential writers of his generation, and his compilations and translations of classic Chinese texts into English were bestsellers in the West...
NationalityChinese
ProfessionAuthor
Date of Birth10 October 1895
CountryChina
philosophy society body
Any good practical philosophy must start out with the recognition of our having a body.
philosophy eye average
To me personally the only function of philosophy is to teach us to take life more lightly and gayly than the average businessman does, for no businessman who does not retire at fifty, if he can, is in my eyes a philosopher.
wise philosophy believe
The world I believe is far too serious, and being far too serious ... it has need of a wise and merry philosophy.
philosophy rose heathers
There is more hope in a heather rose than in all the tons of Teutonic philosophy.
teacher philosophy night
India was China's teacher in religion and imaginative literature, and the world's teacher in trignometry, quandratic equations, grammar, phonetics, Arabian Nights, animal fables, chess, as well as in philosophy, and that she inspired Boccaccio, Goethe, Herder, Schopenhauer, Emerson, and probably also old Aesop.
philosophy views objectivity
I rather despise claims to objectivity in philosophy; the point of view is the thing.
philosophy reality healthy
Let us face ourselves bravely as we are. For only a philosophy that recognizes reality can lead us into true happiness, and only that kind of philosophy is sound and healthy.
appreciation philosophy done
I have done my best. That is about all the philosophy of living one needs.
philosophy loss medicine
There is a great probability that our loss of capacity for enjoying the positive joys of life is largely due to the decreased sensibility of our senses and our lack of full use of them. All human happiness is sensuous happiness.
weekend men order
The question that faces every man born into this world is not what should be his purpose, which he should set about to achieve, but just what to do with life? The answer, that he should order his life so that he can find the greatest happiness in it, is more a practical question, similar to that of how a man should spend his weekend, then a metaphysical proposition as to what is the mystic purpose of his life in the scheme of the universe.
christian wise teaching
The only part of Christian teachings which will be truly accepted by the Chinese people is Christ's injunction to be "harmless as doves" but "wise as serpents.
art thinking play
Art is both creation and recreation. Of the two ideas, I think art as recreation or as sheer play of the human spirit is more important.
people society impossible
We should not expect people to be good, but should make it impossible for them to be bad.
simplicity depth signs-and-symbols
Simplicity is the outward sign and symbol of depth of thought.