Source: On Aggression (1963), Ch. XII : On the Virtue of Scientific Humility
Context: We are the highest achievement reached so far by the great constructors of evolution. We are their "latest" but certainly not their last word. The scientist must not regard anything as absolute, not even the laws of pure reason. He must remain aware of the great fact, discovered by Heraclitus, that nothing whatever really remains the same even for one moment, but that everything is perpetually changing. To regard man, the most ephemeral and rapidly evolving of all species, as the final and unsurpassable achievement of creation, especially at his present-day particularly dangerous and disagreeable stage of development, is certainly the most arrogant and dangerous of all untenable doctrines. If I thought of man as the final image of God, I should not know what to think of God. But when I consider that our ancestors, at a time fairly recent in relation to the earth's history, were perfectly ordinary apes, closely related to chimpanzees, I see a glimmer of hope. It does not require very great optimism to assume that from us human beings something better and higher may evolve. Far from seeing in man the irrevocable and unsurpassable image of God, I assert – more modestly and, I believe, in greater awe of the Creation and its infinite possibilities – that the long-sought missing link between animals and the really humane being is ourselves!
Source: Seraphita (1835), Ch. 2: Seraphita.
Context: If we study Nature attentively in its great evolutions as in its minutest works, we cannot fail to recognize the possibility of enchantment — giving to that word its exact significance. Man does not create forces; he employs the only force that exists and which includes all others, namely Motion, the breath incomprehensible of the sovereign Maker of the universe.
1910s, The Progressives, Past and Present (1910)
Context: We must set the end in view as the goal; and then, instead of making a fetish of some particular kind of means, we should adopt whatever honorable means will best accomplish the end. In so far as unrestricted individual liberty brings the best results, we should encourage it. But when a point is reached where this complete lack of restriction on individual liberty fails to achieve the best results, then, on behalf of the whole people, we should exercise the collective power of the people, through the State Legislatures in matters of purely local concern, and through the National Legislature when the purpose is so big that only National action can achieve it.
Source: Science and Sanity: An Introduction to Non-Aristotelian Systems and General Semantics
I say “we,” but if you’re a Bible-thumping fundamentalist I expect you at this point to take the book by one corner at arm’s length and ceremonially consign it to the place where you put most sensible ideas, along with everything else you decline to acknowledge the existence of, such as mainly shit.
context (5) “The Grand Manor”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)
As quoted inThe A-V Magazine Vol. 89, No. 1 (January 1981), p. 18, and The Extended Circle : A Dictionary of Humane Thought (1985) by Jon Wynne-Tyson, p. 75; this has been cited to "Harper's Magazine (1890)" but no occurence prior to the 1981 appearance has been located.
Disputed
[The Temple Dedication Souvenir]
Transhumanism (1957)
Context: The personality may grievously fail in attaining any real wholeness. One thing is certain, that the well-developed, well-integrated personality is the highest product of evolution, the fullest realization we know of in the universe.
(Che) nessuna scienza
Senz’ ammaestratura
Non saglie in grande altura
Per proprio sentimento.
Canzone. (Poeti del Primo Secolo, Firenze, 1816, Vol. I, p. 83).
Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 369.
Science and the Unseen World (1929)
Context: Our story of evolution ended with a stirring in the brain-organ of the latest of Nature's experiments; but that stirring of consciousness transmutes the whole story and gives meaning to its symbolism. Symbolically it is the end, but looking behind the symbolism it is the beginning.<!--III, p.38
