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John Stuart Mill cytaty
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John Stuart Mill – angielski filozof, politolog i ekonomista. W filozofii był pierwotnie kontynuatorem tradycji utylitaryzmu. W politologii i ekonomii był teoretykiem i piewcą liberalizmu. Uważany jest za twórcę liberalizmu demokratycznego. Żonaty z Harriet Taylor Mill, z którą wspólnie napisali Poddaństwo kobiet – jedną z najważniejszych krytyk nierówności płci.



✵ 20. Maj 1806 – 8. Maj 1873   •   Natępne imiona J.S Mill, John S. Mill
John Stuart Mill Fotografia
John Stuart Mill: 198   Cytatów 4   Polubienia

John Stuart Mill słynne cytaty

„Oryginalność jest jedyną rzeczą, której użyteczności nie mogą pojąć nieoryginalne umysły.”

John Stuart Mill

Utylitaryzm. O wolności

„Ludzkość zyskuje więcej, pozwalając żyć każdemu wedle jego upodobania, niż zmuszając każdego, by żył wedle upodobania pozostałych.”

John Stuart Mill

Utylitaryzm. O wolności

„Jedyną wolnością zasługującą na to miano, jest swoboda dążenia do własnego dobra na swój własny sposób, o ile nie próbujemy pozbawiać innych wolności ani powstrzymywać ich starań o jej osiągnięcie.”

John Stuart Mill

Utylitaryzm. O wolności

„Wojna jest zła, lecz nie najgorsza. Jeszcze gorszy jest stan rozkładu i degradacji uczuć moralnych i patriotycznych, nakazujący myśleć, że nie ma rzeczy wartej wojny. Osoba, która nie ma niczego, o co mogłaby walczyć, niczego ważniejszego niż osobiste bezpieczeństwo jest pożałowania godnym stworzeniem i nie ma szans na bycie wolnym, chyba że dzięki wysiłkom ludzi lepszych niż ona sama.”

John Stuart Mill

„[Są] najpełniejszym systemem duchowego i świeckiego despotyzmu, jaki kiedykolwiek zrodził się w ludzkim umyśle, z wyjątkiem może Ignacego Loyoli.”

John Stuart Mill

o ideach Comte'a.
Źródło: Autobiografia, przeł.M. Szerer, Warszawa 1931.

„(…) samorząd, o którym mowa, nie oznacza, że każdy rządzi sobą, lecz że każdym rządzą wszyscy pozostali.”

John Stuart Mill

Utylitaryzm. O wolności

John Stuart Mill cytaty

„Czyny są dobre, jeśli przyczyniają się do szczęścia, złe, jeśli przyczyniają się do czegoś przeciwnego. Przez szczęście rozumie się przyjemność i brak cierpienia, przez nieszczęście – cierpienie i brak przyjemności.”

John Stuart Mill
O nieszczęściu , O szczęściu , O przyjemności , O cierpieniu

„Lepiej być niezadowolonym Sokratesem niż zadowolonym głupcem.”

John Stuart Mill

Źródło: Utylitaryzm (1861)

„Żaden rząd utworzony przez demokrację lub liczną arystokrację nie wzniósł się nigdy, i nawet wznieść nie mógł ponad mierność.”

John Stuart Mill

Utylitaryzm. O wolności

O demokracji

„Rząd sądzić należy (…) wedle tego, co robi z obywateli i co robi z nimi (…) i wedle dobroci lub sprawiedliwości dzieł, których dokonywa dla nich bądź z nimi.”

John Stuart Mill
O sprawiedliwości

„Istnieje olbrzymia różnica między uznawaniem opinii za prawdziwą, ponieważ nie została odparta mimo wielu sposobności do jej zwalczenia, a zakładaniem jej prawdy w celu niedopuszczenia do jej odparcia. Całkowita swoboda przeczenia i oponowania naszej opinii jest jedynym warunkiem usprawiedliwiającym przyjmowanie jej prawdziwości w celu działania; i tylko na tych warunkach istota obdarzona ludzkimi zdolnościami może być rozumowo pewna, że ma słuszność.”

John Stuart Mill

Źródło: Richard H. Popkin, Avrum Stroll, Filozofia, Poznań 1994, tłum. Jan Karłowski, Norbert Leśniewski, Andrzej Przyłębski, s. 126.

„Istnieje domniemanie prawdy poglądu podtrzymywanego przez wielu ludzi, a odrzucając go, winniśmy wskazać jakąś realną lub możliwą przyczynę jego panowania.”

John Stuart Mill
O ludziach

„Nieprzyjaciel wolności słowa mógłby powiedzieć w celu zmniejszenia siły tych uwag, że nie ma żadnej konieczności, by ludzkość znała i wiedziała wszystko, co mogą powiedzieć za lub przeciw jej opiniom filozofowie i teologowie. Że zwykłym ludziom nie jest potrzebna zdolność do wykazania nieścisłości lub błędów przemyskiego oponenta. Że wystarczy, jeśli jest ktoś zdolny do udzielenia odpowiedzi obalającej wszystko, co mogłoby wprowadzić w błąd osoby niewykształcone. Że proste umysły, które nauczyły się oczywistych zasad wpajanych w nie prawd, mogą zaufać autorytetowi co do rzeczy, a zdając sobie sprawę z tego, że nie mają dostatecznej wiedzy ani talentu do rozwiązywania każdej trudności, którą można by wysunąć, mogą zadowolić się przeświadczeniem, że wszystkie wysunięte trudności zostały już lub mogą być pokonane przez osoby szczególnie do tego uzdolnione.”

John Stuart Mill

Źródło: Richard H. Popkin, Avrum Stroll, Filozofia, Poznań 1994, tłum. Jan Karłowski, Norbert Leśniewski, Andrzej Przyłębski, s. 127.

O błędach , O zaufaniu , O wiedzę , O wolności

John Stuart Mill: Cytaty po angielsku

“Although this last is prodigiously important as a means of improvement in the hands of those who are themselves impelled by nobler principles of action, I do not believe that any one of the survivors of the Benthamites or Utilitarians of that day, now relies mainly upon it for the general amendment of human conduct.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Autobiography (1873)

“There is nothing very extraordinary in this fact: no youth of the age I then was, can be expected to be more than one thing, and this was the thing I happened to be. Ambition and desire of distinction, I had in abundance; and zeal for what I thought the good of mankind was my strongest sentiment, mixing with and colouring all others. But my zeal was as yet little else, at that period of my life, than zeal for speculative opinions. It had not its root in genuine benevolence, or sympathy with mankind; though these qualities held their due place in my ethical standard. Nor was it connected with any high enthusiasm for ideal nobleness.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Autobiography (1873)

“The influence of Charles Austin over me differed from that of the persons I have hitherto mentioned, in being not the influence of a man over a boy, but that of an elder contemporary. It was through him that I first felt myself, not a pupil under teachers, but a man among men. He was the first person of intellect whom I met on a ground of equality, though as yet much his inferior on that common ground. He was a man who never failed to impress greatly those with whom he came in contact, even when their opinions were the very reverse of his. The impression he gave was that of boundless strength, together with talents which, combined with such apparent force of will and character, seemed capable of dominating the world. Those who knew him, whether friendly to him or not, always anticipated that he would play a conspicuous part in public life. It is seldom that men produce so great an immediate effect by speech, unless they, in some degree, lay themselves out for it; and he did this in no ordinary degree. He loved to strike, and even to startle. He knew that decision is the greatest element of effect, and he uttered his opinions with all the decision he could throw into them, never so well pleased as when he astonished any one by their audacity.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)
Źródło: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/77/mode/1up pp. 77-78

“All this is merely saying that he, in a degree once common, but now very unusual, threw his feelings into his opinions; which truly it is difficult to understand how any one who possesses much of both, can fail to do. None but those who do not care about opinions, will confound it with intolerance. Those, who having opinions which they hold to be immensely important, and their contraries to be prodigiously hurtful, have any deep regard for the general good, will necessarily dislike, as a class and in the abstract, those who think wrong what they think right, and right what they think wrong: though they need not therefore be, nor was my father, insensible to good qualities in an opponent, nor governed in their estimation of individuals by one general presumption, instead of by the whole of their character.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/50/mode/1up pp. 50-51

“He blamed as severely what he thought a bad action, when the motive was a feeling of duty, as if the agents had been consciously evil doers. He would not have accepted as a plea in mitigation for inquisitors, that they sincerely believed burning heretics to be an obligation of conscience. But though he did not allow honesty of purpose to soften his disapprobation of actions, it had its full effect on his estimation of characters. No one prized conscientiousness and rectitude of intention more highly, or was more incapable of valuing any person in whom he did not feel assurance of it.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/49/mode/1up pp. 49-50

“He thought human life a poor thing at best, after the freshness of youth and of unsatisfied curiosity had gone by. This was a topic on which he did not often speak, especially, it may be supposed, in the presence of young persons: but when he did, it was with an air of settled and profound conviction. He would sometimes say, that if life were made what it might be, by good government and good education, it would be worth having: but he never spoke with anything like enthusiasm even of that possibility.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)
Źródło: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/48/mode/1up p. 48

“Though they may think the proof incomplete that the universe is a work of design, and though they assuredly disbelieve that it can have an Author and Governor who is absolute in power as well as perfect in goodness, they have that which constitutes the principal worth of all religions whatever, an ideal conception of a Perfect Being, to which they habitually refer as the guide of their conscience; and this ideal of Good is usually far nearer to perfection than the objective Deity of those, who think themselves obliged to find absolute goodness in the author of a world so crowded with suffering and so deformed by injustice as ours.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)
Źródło: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/46/mode/1up p. 46

“My father was as well aware as anyone that Christians do not, in general, undergo the demoralizing consequences which seem inherent in such a creed, in the manner or to the extent which might have been expected from it. The same slovenliness of thought, and subjection of the reason to fears, wishes, and affections, which enable them to accept a theory involving a contradiction in terms, prevents them from perceiving the logical consequences of the theory. Such is the facility with which mankind believe at one and the same time things inconsistent with one another, and so few are those who draw from what they receive as truths, any consequences but those recommended to them by their feelings, that multitudes have held the undoubting belief in an Omnipotent Author of Hell, and have nevertheless identified that being with the best conception they were able to form of perfect goodness.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/41/mode/1up pp. 41–42

“I consequently remained long, and in a less degree have always remained, inexpert in anything requiring manual dexterity; my mind as well as my hands, did its work very lamely when it was applied, or ought to have been applied, to the practical details which, as they are the chief interest of life to the majority of men, are also the things in which whatever mental capacity they have, chiefly shows itself: I was constantly meriting reproof by inattention, inobservance, and general slackness of mind in matters of daily life. My father was the extreme opposite in these particulars: his senses and mental faculties were always on the alert; he carried decision and energy of character in his whole manner and into every action of life: and this, as much as his talents, contributed to the strong impression which he always made upon those with whom he came into personal contact. But the children of energetic parents, frequently grow up unenergetic, because they lean on their parents, and the parents are energetic for them.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/36/mode/1up pp. 36–37

“My state of mind was not humility, but neither was it arrogance. I never thought of saying to myself, I am, or I can do, so and so. I neither estimated myself highly nor lowly. I did not estimate myself at all. If I thought anything about myself, it was that I was rather backward in my studies, since I always found myself so, in comparison with what my father expected from me. I assert this with confidence, though it was not the impression of various persons who saw me in my childhood. They, as I have since found, thought me greatly and disagreeably self-conceited; probably because I was disputatious, and did not scruple to give direct contradictions to things which I heard said. I suppose I acquired this bad habit from having been encouraged in an unusual degree to talk on matters beyond my age, and with grown persons, while I never had inculcated in me the usual respect for them. My father did not correct this ill-breeding and impertinence, probably from not being aware of it, for I was always too much in awe of him to be otherwise than extremely subdued and quiet in his presence.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/33/mode/1up pp. 33–34

“If I had been by nature extremely quick of apprehension, or had possessed a very accurate and retentive memory or were of a remarkably active and energetic character, the trial would not be conclusive; but in all these natural gifts I am rather below than above par; what I could do, could assuredly be done by any boy or girl of average capacity and healthy physical constitution: and if I have accomplished anything, I owe it, among other fortunate circumstances, to the fact that through the early training bestowed on me by my father, I started, I may fairly say, with an advantage of a quarter of a century over my contemporaries.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/30/mode/1up pp. 30–31

“The principle itself of dogmatic religion, dogmatic morality, dogmatic philosophy, is what requires to be rooted out; not any particular manifestation of that principle. ¶ The very corner-stone of an education intended to form great minds, must be the recognition of the principle, that the object is to call forth the greatest possible quantity of intellectual power, and to inspire the intensest love of truth: and this without a particle of regard to the results to which the exercise of that power may lead, even though it should conduct the pupil to opinions diametrically opposite to those of his teachers. We say this, not because we think opinions unimportant, but because of the immense importance which we attach to them; for in proportion to the degree of intellectual power and love of truth which we succeed in creating, is the certainty that (whatever may happen in any one particular instance) in the aggregate of instances true opinions will be the result; and intellectual power and practical love of truth are alike impossible where the reasoner is shown his conclusions, and informed beforehand that he is expected to arrive at them.”

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John Stuart Mill

"Civilization," London and Westminster Review (April 1836)

“he regarded it with the feelings due not to a mere mental delusion, but to a great moral evil. He looked upon it as the greatest enemy of morality: first, by setting up factitious excellencies, -- belief in creeds, devotional feelings, and ceremonies, not connected with the good of human kind, -- and causing these to be accepted as substitutes for genuine virtues: but above all, by radically vitiating the standard of morals; making it consist in doing the will of a being, on whom it lavishes indeed all the phrases of adulation, but whom in sober truth it depicts as eminently hateful.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/40/mode/1up p. 40

“I remember the very place in Hyde Park where, in my fourteenth year, on the eve of leaving my father's house for a long absence, he told me that I should find, as I got acquainted with new people, that I had been taught many things which youths of my age did not commonly know; and that many persons would be disposed to talk to me of this, and to compliment me upon it. What other things he said on this topic I remember very imperfectly; but he wound up by saying, that whatever I knew more than others, could not be ascribed to any merit in me, but to the very unusual advantage which had fallen to my lot.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/34/mode/1up p. 34

“the course of instruction which I have partially retraced, the point most superficially apparent is the great effort to give, during the years of childhood an amount of knowledge in what are considered the higher branches of education, which is seldom acquired (if acquired at all) until the age of manhood.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)

https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/30/mode/1up p. 30

“[My father] impressed upon me from the first, that the manner in which the world came into existence was a subject on which nothing was known: that the question, “Who made me?””

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

cannot be answered, because we have no experience or authentic information from which to answer it; and that any answer only throws the difficulty a step further back, since the question immediately presents itself, “Who made God?”
Źródło: Autobiography (1873), Ch. 2: Moral Influences in Early Youth. My Father's Character and Opinions.

“it was partly by their writings that my eyes were opened to the very limited and temporary value of the old political economy, which assumes private property and inheritance as indefeasible facts, and freedom of production and exchange as the dernier mot of social improvement. The scheme gradually unfolded by the St. Simonians, under which the labour and capital of society would be managed for the general account of the community every individual being required to take a share of labour either as thinker, teacher, artist, or producer, all being classed according to their capacity, and remunerated according to their works, appeared to me a far superior description of Socialism to Owen's.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Autobiography (1873)

“the correct statement would be, not that I disliked poetry, but that I was theoretically indifferent to it. I disliked any sentiments in poetry which I should have disliked in prose; and that included a great deal. And I was wholly blind to its place in human culture, as a means of educating the feelings. But I was always personally very susceptible to some kinds of it.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

'Long before I had enlarged in any considerable degree, the basis of my intellectual creed, I had obtained in the natural course of my mental progress, poetic culture of the most valuable kind, by means of reverential admiration for the lives and characters of heroic persons; especially the heroes of philosophy.'
Autobiography (1873)

“Conformity to nature has no connection whatever with right and wrong. The idea can never be fitly introduced into ethical discussions at all, except, occasionally and partially, into the question of degrees of culpability. To illustrate this point, let us consider the phrase by which the greatest intensity of condemnatory feeling is conveyed in connection with the idea of nature - the word "unnatural."”

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John Stuart Mill

That a thing is unnatural, in any precise meaning which can be attached to the word, is no argument for its being blamable; since the most criminal actions are to a being like man not more unnatural than most of the virtues.
Źródło: On Nature (1874), p. 102

“It’s not too much to say that every indication of design in the universe is evidence against the omnipotence of the designer. For what do we mean by ‘design?”

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John Stuart Mill

Theism

“These considerations did not make us overlook the folly of premature attempts to dispense with the inducements of private interest in social affairs, while no substitute for them has been or can be provided: but we regarded all existing institutions and social arrangements as being (in a phrase I once heard from Austin) "merely provisional," and we welcomed with the greatest pleasure and interest all socialistic experiments by select individuals (such as the Co-operative Societies), which, whether they succeeded or failed, could not but operate as a most useful education of those who took part in them, by cultivating their capacity of acting upon motives pointing directly to the general good, or making them aware of the defects which render them and others incapable of doing so.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Źródło: Autobiography (1873)
Źródło: https://archive.org/details/autobiography01mill/page/233/mode/1up pp. 233-234

“Wisdom and contrivance are shown in overcoming difficulties, so there is no place for them in a Being for whom no difficulties exist”

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John Stuart Mill

pages 176-177; Early Modern Texts page 16
Three Essays on Religion (posthumous publication), Theism, Part II: Attributes

“landlords... grow richer, as it were in their sleep, without working, risking, or economizing."”

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John Stuart Mill książka Principles of Political Economy

Book 5, Chapter 2, Section 5
Principles of Political Economy (1848-1871)

“I generally answered to myself, that I did not think I could possibly bear it beyond a year.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Autobiography (1873)

“The utilitarian doctrine is, that happiness is desirable, and the only thing desirable, as an end; all other things being only desirable as means to that end.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Utilitarianism

Źródło: Utilitarianism (1861), Ch. 4

“The reasons for legal intervention in favour of children, apply not less strongly to the case of those unfortunate slaves and victims of the most brutal part of mankind, the lower animals.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Principles of Political Economy

Book V, Chapter 11, Section 9
Principles of Political Economy (1848-1871)

“I regard utility as the ultimate appeal on all ethical questions; but it must be utility in the largest sense, grounded on the permanent interests of man as a progressive being.”

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John Stuart Mill książka On Liberty

Źródło: On Liberty (1859), Ch. 1: Introductory

“While fully recognizing the superior excellence of unselfish benevolence and love of justice, we did not expect the regeneration of mankind from any direct action on those sentiments, but from the effect of educated intellect, enlightening the selfish feelings.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Autobiography (1873)
Kontekst: What we principally thought of, was to alter people's opinions; to make them believe according to evidence, and know what was their real interest, which when they once knew, they would, we thought, by the instrument of opinion, enforce a regard to it upon one another. While fully recognizing the superior excellence of unselfish benevolence and love of justice, we did not expect the regeneration of mankind from any direct action on those sentiments, but from the effect of educated intellect, enlightening the selfish feelings.

“Condorcet's Life of Turgot; a book well calculated to rouse the best sort of enthusiasm, since it contains one of the wisest and noblest of lives, delineated by one of the wisest and noblest of men.”

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John Stuart Mill książka Autobiography

Autobiography (1873)

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