Quotes about mind
page 79

Rachel Weisz photo

“I was kind of a tomboy climbing trees so it never crossed my mind, no.”

Rachel Weisz (1970) English actress

Rachel said when asked if the role had been a childhood fantasy of hers.
Source: hellomagazine.com http://www.hellomagazine.com/celebrities/2013030911512/rachel-weisz-us-interview/

“He who enlists a man's mind wields a power even greater than the sword or the scepter.”

Source: The Worldly Philosophers (1953), Chapter I, Introduction, p. 3

Pierre Corneille photo

“The Christians have one God alone, the lord
Of all, whose will unaided does what he
Resolves. But, if I dare to speak my mind,
Our gods are often ill-assorted, and
Ev'n were their wrath to strike me down at once,
There are too many to be real gods.”

Les chrétiens n'ont qu'un Dieu, maître absolu de tout,
De qui le seul vouloir fait tout ce qu'il résout;
Mais, si j'ose entre nous dire ce que me semble,
Les nôtres bien souvent s'accordent mal ensemble,
Et, me dût leur colère écraser à tes yeux,
Nous en avons beaucoup pour être de vrais dieux.
Sévère, act IV, scene vi. Trans. John Cairncross (1980)
Variant of last lines: As for our gods, we have a few too many to be true.
Polyeucte (1642)

“Teaching is a personal matter of the nursery of the mind and should not be on public display.”

Saul Gorn (1912–1992) computer scientist

Attributed to Saul Gorn in: National Association of Educational Broadcasters (1968) Educational Broadcasting Review Vol 2. p. 32; Article "Teaching As A Private Process"

Henryk Sienkiewicz photo
P.G. Wodehouse photo
Archibald Hill photo
George Holmes Howison photo
Samuel Johnson photo
Jean-François Lyotard photo
Annie Besant photo
Edwin Abbott Abbott photo
Paul Bourget photo
Aron Ra photo

“Science is a search for truth –whatever the truth may turn out to be, even if it’s evidently not what we wanted to believe it was. In science, it doesn’t matter what you believe; all that matters is why you believe it. This is why real science disallows faith, promising instead to remain objective, to follow wherever the evidence leads, and either correct or reject any and all errors along the way even if it challenges whatever we think we know now. But creationist organizations post written declarations of their unwavering obligation to uphold and defend their preconceived notions, declaring in advance their refusal to ever to let their minds be changed by any amount of evidence that is ever revealed. Anti-science evangelists display their statement of faith proudly on their own forums, as if admitting to a closed and dishonest mind wasn’t something to ashamed of or beg forgiveness for. They don’t want to do science. They want to un-do science! They try to segregate experimental science from historical science, ignoring the fact that both are based on empirical observations and both can be checked with testable hypotheses. Worse, they want to redefine science in general so that astrology, subjective convictions of faith, and excuses of magic can supplant the scientific method whenever necessary in defense of their beliefs. They’re only open to critical inquiry so long as that is not permitted to challenge the sacred scriptures nor vindicate any of the fields of study to which they’re already opposed. In short, everything science stands for, -or hopes to achieve- is threatened by the political agenda of these superstitious subversives.”

Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast

"12th Foundational Falsehood of Creationism" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TkY7HrJOhc Youtube (April 19, 2008)
Youtube, Foundational Falsehoods of Creationism

Huldrych Zwingli photo
Henry Fielding photo
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey photo
Mortimer J. Adler photo
Robert G. Ingersoll photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Sam Harris photo
Kenneth Grahame photo
Czeslaw Milosz photo
Horatio Nelson photo
Northrop Frye photo

“A person who knows nothing about literature may be an ignoramus, but many people don't mind being that.”

Northrop Frye (1912–1991) Canadian literary critic and literary theorist

"Quotes", The Educated Imagination (1963), Talk 1: The Motive For Metaphor http://northropfrye-theeducatedimagination.blogspot.ca/2009/08/1-motive-for-metaphor.html

John Keats photo
T. E. Lawrence photo
Umberto Veronesi photo

“The empowered mind allows problems to seed personal growth.”

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 159

Adi Da Samraj photo
Werner Herzog photo
José Martí photo
Jane Goodall photo
Jean Henri Fabre photo
Ed Harcourt photo

“God, you make me sing. Funny things about you You infect my mind. All the time, you do.”

Ed Harcourt (1977) British musician

She Fell Into My Arms

Martin Buber photo
James Fenimore Cooper photo
Eric R. Kandel photo
Andrew Marvell photo

“Therefore the love which us doth bind,
But Fate so enviously debars,
Is the conjunction of the mind,
And opposition of the stars.”

Andrew Marvell (1621–1678) English metaphysical poet and politician

The Definition of Love (1650-1652)

William Ewart Gladstone photo
John Hoole photo
Abraham Joshua Heschel photo

“The opposite of freedom is not determinism, but hardness of heart. Freedom presupposes openness of heart, of mind, of eye and ear.”

Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972) Polish-American Conservative Judaism Rabbi

Volume 1, p. 191
The Prophets (1962)

James Fenimore Cooper photo

“I do not pretend to understand why such a sacrifice should be necessary, but I believe it, feel it; and believing and feeling it, I cannot but adore and worship the Son, who quitted heaven to come on earth, and suffered, that we might possess eternal life. It is all mystery to me, as is the creation itself, our existence, God himself, and all else that my mind is too limited to comprehend. But, Roswell, if I believe a part of the teachings of the Christian church, I must believe all. The apostles, who were called by Christ in person, who lived in his very presence, who knew nothing except as the Holy Spirit prompted, worshiped him as the Son of God, as one 'who thought it not robbery to be equal with God;' and shall I, ignorant and uninspired, pretend to set up my feeble means of reasoning, in opposition to their written instructions!"… I do not deny that we are to exercise our reason, but it is within the bounds set for its exercise. We may examine the evidence of Christianity, and determine for ourselves how far it is supported by reasonable and sufficient proofs; beyond this we cannot be expected to go, else might we be required to comprehend the mystery of our own existence, which just as much exceeds our understanding as any other. We are told that man was created in the image of his Creator, which means that there is an immortal and spiritual part of him that is entirely different from the material creature One perishes, temporarily at least--a limb can be severed from the body and perish, even while the body survives; but it is not so with that which has been created in the image of the deity. That is imperishable, immortal, spiritual, though doomed to dwell awhile in a tenement of clay. Now, why is it more difficult to believe that pure divinity may have entered into the person of one man, than to believe, nay to feel, that the image of God has entered into the persons of so many myriads of men?”

James Fenimore Cooper (1789–1851) American author

Source: The Sea Lions or The Lost Sealers (1849), Ch. XII

Calvin Coolidge photo
Nick Bostrom photo
Maria Edgeworth photo

“I have made up my mind to like no novels really, but Miss Edgeworth's, yours and my own.”

Maria Edgeworth (1768–1849) Irish writer

Jane Austen, letter to her niece, Anna Lefroy, 1814; cited from Valerie Grosvenor Myer Jane Austen, Obstinate Heart (New York: Arcade, 1997) p. 196.
Criticism

Kent Hovind photo
Max Eastman photo

“A liberal mind is a mind that is able to imagine itself believing anything.”

Max Eastman (1883–1969) American activist

The Masses (September 1917)

Nisargadatta Maharaj photo
David Brewster photo
Nisargadatta Maharaj photo
Margaret Fuller photo
William Wood, 1st Baron Hatherley photo
Francisco De Goya photo
Albert Einstein photo
Bob Dylan photo
Tryon Edwards photo

“Anxiety is the poison of human life; the parent of many sins and of more miseries. – In a world where everything is doubtful, and where we may be disappointed, and be blessed in disappointment, why this restless stir and commotion of mind? – Can it alter the cause, or unravel the mystery of human events?”

Tryon Edwards (1809–1894) American theologian

Misattributed to Tryon Edwards by a number of websites, thinkexist.com and quoteland.com among others. This quote does appear on p. 23 of Edwards' compilation, A Dictionary of Thoughts; however, it is clearly identified there as a quote by Hugh Blair, the Scottish author and preacher.
A genuine Tryon Edwards quote on the subject of anxiety appears above in the Sourced section ( from p. 22 of A Dictionary of Thoughts. )
Misattributed

Guillaume Apollinaire photo

“You see before you a man in his right mind
Worldly-wise and with access to death
Having tested the sorrow of love and its ecstasies
Having sometimes even astonished the professors
Good with languages
Having travelled a great deal
Having seen battle in the Artillery and the Infantry
Wounded in the head trepanned under chloroform
Having lost my best friends in the butchery
As much of antiquity and modernity as can be known I know”

Me voici devant tous un homme plein de sens
Connaissant la vie et de la mort ce qu'un vivant peut connaître
Ayant éprouvé les douleurs et les joies de l'amour
Ayant su quelquefois imposer ses idées
Connaissant plusieurs langages
Ayant pas mal voyagé
Ayant vu la guerre dans l'Artillerie et l'lnfanterie
Blessé à la tête trépané sous le chloroforme
Ayant perdu ses meilleurs amis dans l'effroyable lutte
Je sais d'ancien et de nouveau autant qu'un homme seul pourrait des deux savoir
"La jolie rousse" (The Pretty Redhead), line 1; p. 133.
Calligrammes (1918)

Pearl S.  Buck photo
Bradley Joseph photo

“My songs bring images to the listener's mind. The object is to transport my listeners to another place, some place sacred and spiritual that will make them glad they took the ride.”

Bradley Joseph (1965) Composer, pianist, keyboardist, arranger, producer, recording artist

Official Bio http://www.bradleyjoseph.com/About_Bradley.asp and Reflections Bio http://www.serve.com/gregl7/bradley.htm

Aron Ra photo
Mary Wollstonecraft photo
Semyon Timoshenko photo
Norman Angell photo
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi photo

“In this meditation we do not concentrate or control the mind. We let the mind follow its natural instinct toward greater happiness, and it goes within and it gains bliss consciousness in the being.”

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (1917–2008) Inventor of Transcendental Meditation, musician

Quoted from: Maharishi Mahesh Yogi - Lake Louise, Canada (1968) - MaharishiUniversity http://www.bienfaits-meditation.com/en/maharishi/videos/mechanics-of-the-technique

Jane Roberts photo
Leo Tolstoy photo
David Frawley photo
Ingmar Bergman photo
John Stuart Mill photo

“How can great minds be produced in a country where the test of a great mind is agreeing in the opinions of small minds?”

John Stuart Mill (1806–1873) British philosopher and political economist

As quoted in Egoists: A Book of Supermen (1909) by James Huneker, p. 367

“Let me remind you that science is not necessarily wisdom. To know, is not the sole nor even the highest office of the intellect; and it loses all its glory unless it act in furtherance of the great end of man's life. That end is, as both reason and revelation unite in telling us, to acquire the feelings and habits that will lead us to love and seek what is good in all its forms, and guide us by following its traces to the first Great Cause of all, where only we find it pure and unclouded.
If science be cultivated in congruity with this, it is the most precious possession we can have— the most divine endowment. But if it be perverted to minister to any wicked or ignoble purpose — if it even be permitted to take too absolute a hold of the mind, or overshadow that which should be paramount over all, the perception of right, the sense of Duty — if it does not increase in us the consciousness of an Almighty and All-beneficent presence, — it lowers instead of raising us in the great scale of existence.
This, however, it can never do but by our fault. All its tendencies are heavenward; every new fact which it reveals is a ray from the origin of light, which leads us to its source. If any think otherwise, their knowledge is imperfect, or their understanding warped, or darkened by their passions. The book of nature is, like that of revelation, written by God, and therefore cannot contradict it; both we are unable to read through all their extent, and therefore should neither wonder nor be alarmed if at times we miss the pages which reconcile any seeming inconsistence. In both, too, we may fail to interpret rightly that which is recorded; but be assured, if we search them in quest of truth alone, each will bear witness to the other, — and physical knowledge, instead of being hostile to religion, will be found its most powerful ally, its most useful servant. Many, I know, think otherwise; and because attempts have occasionally been made to draw from astronomy, from geology, from the modes of the growth and formation of animals and plants, arguments against the divine origin of the sacred Scripture, or even to substitute for the creative will of an intelligent first cause the blind and casual evolution of some agency of a material system, they would reject their study as fraught with danger. In this I must express my deep conviction that they do injury to that very cause which they think they are serving.
Time will not let me touch further on the cavils and errors in question; and besides they have been often fully answered. I will only say, that I am here surrounded by many, matchless in the sciences which are supposed so dangerous, and not less conspicuous for truth and piety. If they find no discord between faith and knowledge, why should you or any suppose it to exist? On the contrary, they cannot be well separated. We must know that God is, before we can confess Him; we must know that He is wise and powerful before we can trust in Him, — that He is good before we can love Him. All these attributes, the study of His works had made known before He gave that more perfect knowledge of himself with which we are blessed. Among the Semitic tribes his names betoken exalted nature and resistless power; among the Hellenic races they denote his wisdom; but that which we inherit from our northern ancestors denotes his goodness. All these the more perfect researches of modern science bring out in ever-increasing splendour, and I cannot conceive anything that more effectually brings home to the mind the absolute omnipresence of the Deity than high physical knowledge. I fear I have too long trespassed on your patience, yet let me point out to you a few examples.
What can fill us with an overwhelming sense of His infinite wisdom like the telescope? As you sound with it the fathomless abyss of stars, till all measure of distances seems to fail and imagination alone gauges the distance; yet even there as here is the same divine harmony of forces, the same perfect conservation of systems, which the being able to trace in the pages of Newton or Laplace makes us feel as if we were more than men. If it is such a triumph of intellect to trace this law of the universe, how transcendent must that Greatest over all be, in which it and many like it, have their existence! That instrument tells us that the globe which we inhabit is but a speck, the existence of which cannot be perceived beyond our system. Can we then hope that in this immensity of worlds we shall not be overlooked? The microscope will answer. If the telescope lead to one verge of infinity, it brings us to the other; and shows us that down in the very twilight of visibility the living points which it discloses are fashioned with the most finished perfection, — that the most marvellous contrivances minister to their preservation and their enjoyment, — that as nothing is too vast for the Creator's control, so nothing is too minute or trifling for His care. At every turn the philosopher meets facts which show that man's Creator is also his Father, — things which seem to contain a special provision for his use and his happiness : but I will take only two, from their special relation to this very district. Is it possible to consider the properties which distinguish iron from other metals without a conviction that those qualities were given to it that it might be useful to man, whatever other purposes might be answered by them. That it should. be ductile and plastic while influenced by heat, capable of being welded, and yet by a slight chemical change capable of adamantine hardness, — and that the metal which alone possesses properties so precious should be the most abundant of all, — must seem, as it is, a miracle of bounty. And not less marvellous is the prescient kindness which stored up in your coalfields the exuberant vegetation of the ancient world, under circumstances which preserved this precious magazine of wealth and power, not merely till He had placed on earth beings who would use it, but even to a late period of their existence, lest the element that was to develope to the utmost their civilization and energy migbt be wasted or abused.
But I must conclude with this summary of all which I would wish to impress on your minds—* that the more we know His works the nearer we are to Him. Such knowledge pleases Him; it is bright and holy, it is our purest happiness here, and will assuredly follow us into another life if rightly sought in this. May He guide us in its pursuit; and in particular, may this meeting which I have attempted to open in His name, be successful and prosperous, so that in future years they who follow me in this high office may refer to it as one to be remembered with unmixed satisfaction.”

Robinson in his 1849 adress, as quoted in the Report of the Nineteenth Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science https://archive.org/stream/report36sciegoog#page/n50/mode/2up, London, 1850.

Joseph Joubert photo
Elizabeth Bisland Whetmore photo
Baruch Spinoza photo

“Fierce boils in every vein
Indignant shame and passion blind,
The tempest of the lover's mind,
The soldier's high disdain.”

John Conington (1825–1869) British classical scholar

Source: Translations, The Aeneid of Virgil (1866), Book XII, p. 465

Samuel Taylor Coleridge photo

“I have heard of reasons manifold
Why Love must needs be blind,
But this the best of all I hold,—
His eyes are in his mind.”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English poet, literary critic and philosopher

To a Lady, Offended by a Sportive Observation
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

David Mitchell photo

“The body is the outermost layer of the mind.”

David Mitchell (1969) English novelist

Part 6
number9dream (2001)

Ronald Dworkin photo
Hugh Macmillan, Baron Macmillan photo
James Macpherson photo
Seneca the Younger photo
El Lissitsky photo
John Dear photo
Britney Spears photo

“My loneliness is killing me (and I)
I must confess, I still Believe (still believe)
When I'm not with you I lose my mind
Give me a sign!
Hit me Baby One More Time!”

Britney Spears (1981) American singer, dancer and actress

"...Baby One More Time"
Lyrics, "...Baby One More Time"(1999)

Bob Harper (personal trainer) photo

“I’m a big meditator… I do it every day, twice a day. You turn off your phone, you can put an eye mask on, shut down and you will do much benefit to your body and your mind.”

Bob Harper (personal trainer) (1965) American personal trainer

"'Biggest Loser' host Bob Harper's 5 steps to a healthier new year" https://www.today.com/health/biggest-loser-host-bob-harper-s-health-tips-new-year-t106445, interview with Today (December 27, 2016).

Jacob Bronowski photo

“Almost everything that we do that is worth doing is done in the first place in the mind's eye.”

Jacob Bronowski (1908–1974) Polish-born British mathematician

"The Reach of Imagination" (1967)

John Banville photo