Will Durant: Trending quotes

“The only real revolution is in the enlightenment of the mind and the improvement of character, the only real emancipation is individual, and the only real revolutionists are philosophers and saints.”

Source: The Story of Civilization (1935–1975), VI - The Reformation (1957), p.g. 14

“It is true that even across the Himalayan barrier India has sent to the west, such gifts as grammar and logic, philosophy and fables, hypnotism and chess, and above all numerals and the decimal system.”

The Lessons of History (1968)‎, p. 72 (co-authored with Ariel Durant)

“Love one another. My final lesson of history is the same as that of Jesus.
You may think that's a lot of lollipop but just try it. Love is the most practical thing in the world. If you take an attitude of love toward everybody you meet, you'll eventually get along.”

The Case for India (1931)

“Philosophy is a hypothetical interpretation of the unknown (as in metaphysics), or of the inexactly known (as in ethics or political philosophy); it is the front trench in the siege of truth.”

When asked, at the age of 92, if he could summarize the lessons of history into a single sentence. As quoted in "Durants on History from the Ages, with Love," by Pam Proctor, Parade (6 August 1978) p. 12. Durant is quoting Jesus (from John 13:34) here, and might also be quoting Jiddu Krishnamurti: "Love is the most practical thing in the world. To love, to be kind, not to be greedy, not to be ambitious, not to be influenced by people but to think for yourself — these are all very practical things, and they will bring about a practical, happy society."

“Nothing should more deeply shame the modern student than the recency and inadequacy of his acquaintance with India.”

The Story of Philosophy (1926)

“There is no greater drama in human record than the sight of a few Christians, scorned or oppressed by a succession of emperors, bearing all trials with a fierce tenacity, multiplying quietly, building order while their enemies generated chaos, fighting the sword with the word, brutality with hope, and at last defeating the strongest state that history has known. Caesar and Christ had met in the arena, and Christ had won.”

The Story of Civilization (1935–1975), I - Our Oriental Heritage (1935)

“Rooted in freedom, bonded in the fellowship of danger, sharing everywhere a common human blood, we declare again that all men are brothers, and that mutual tolerance is the price of liberty.”

Source: The Story of Civilization (1935–1975), III - Caesar and Christ (1944), Chapter 30, part 1, p. 652.

“When liberty becomes license, dictatorship is near.”

Declaration of INTERdependence (1945)

“On young love* "Here is a fulfillment of long centuries of civilization and culture; here, in romantic love, more than the triumph of thought or the victories of power is the topmost reach of human beings."”

The Story of Philosophy (1926)

“Power dements even more than it corrupts, lowering the guard of foresight and raising the haste of action.”

Source: The Story of Civilization (1935–1975), VI - The Reformation (1957), p.g. 8

“No man who is in a hurry is quite civilized.”

As quoted in Midnight by Dean Koontz
The Story of Civilization (1935–1975), XI - The Age of Napoleon (1975)

“Philosophy accepts the hard and hazardous task of dealing with problems not yet open to the methods of science - problems like good and evil, beauty and ugliness, order and freedom, life and death; so soon as a field of inquiry yields knowledge susceptible of exact formulation it is called science.”

Source: The Story of Civilization (1935–1975), II - Life of Greece (1939), Ch. XII : Work and Wealth in Athens, p. 277 http://books.google.com/books?id=l2wgAAAAMAAJ&q=%22no+man+who+is+in+a+hurry+is+quite+civilized%22&pg=PA277#v=onepage

“Civilization begins with order, grows with liberty, and dies with chaos.”

The Story of Philosophy (1926)

“India was the motherland of our race, and Sanskrit the mother of Europe's languages: she was the mother of our philosophy; mother, through the Arabs, of much of our mathematics; mother, through the Buddha, of the ideals embodied in Christianity; mother, through the village community, of self-government and democracy. Mother India is in many ways the mother of us all.”

The Story of Philosophy (1926)

“India will teach us the tolerance and gentleness of mature mind, understanding spirit and a unifying, pacifying love for all human beings.”

The Case for India (1931)