“Nature gets credit which should in truth be reserved for ourselves: the rose for its scent, the nightingale for its song, and the sun for its radiance. The poets are entirely mistaken. They should address their lyrics to themselves and should turn them into odes of self-congratulation on the excellence of the human mind.”

as cited in History, Humanity and Evolution (1989), p. 383.
1920s, Science and the Modern World (1925)

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Alfred North Whitehead112

English mathematician and philosopher 1861–1947

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