Quotes about philosophy
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“We can assert, with entire plausibility, that there is not one of all these sects — Kabalism, Judaism, and our present Christianity included — but sprung from the two main branches of that one mother-trunk, the once universal religion, which antedated the Vedaic ages — we speak of that prehistoric Buddhism which merged later into Brahmanism.The religion which the primitive teaching of the early few apostles most resembled — a religion preached by Jesus himself — is the elder of these two, Buddhism. The latter as taught in its primitive purity, and carried to perfection by the last of the Buddhas, Gautama, based its moral ethics on three fundamental principles. It alleged that 1, every thing existing, exists from natural causes; 2, that virtue brings its own reward, and vice and sin their own punishment; and, 3, that the state of man in this world is probationary... However puzzling the subsequent theological tenets; however seemingly incomprehensible the metaphysical abstractions which have convulsed the theology of every one of the great religions of mankind as soon as it was placed on a sure footing, the above is found to be the essence of every religious philosophy, with the exception of later Christianity. It was that of Zoroaster, of Pythagoras, of Plato, of Jesus, and even of Moses, albeit the teachings of the Jewish law-giver have been so piously tampered with.”

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky book Isis Unveiled

Source: Isis Unveiled (1877), Volume II, Chapter III

Age, World, Religion, Law

“Yet the majestic philosophy-science-religion of the ages teaches us that there are beings so much greater and higher than man is, and beings so much smaller and less than he, that in reality he himself in turn stands in his world and cosmos as the one or the other of these extremes to such greater or smaller entities.”

Gottfried de Purucker (1874–1942) Author, Theosophist

Ch 2
Man in Evolution (1941)

Age, World, Religion, Reality

“I'm afraid I'm a practical man,' said the doctor with gruff humour, 'and I don't bother much about religion and philosophy.”

G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English mystery novelist and Christian apologist

'You'll never be a practical man till you do,' said Father Brown. 'Look here, doctor; you know me pretty well; I think you know I'm not a bigot. You know I know there are all sorts in all religions; good men in bad ones and bad men in good ones.
The Dagger with Wings (1926)

Religion

“Just as Hegel is said to have understood his philosophy for the first time when he read its French translation, Vilfredo Pareto could have learned what it was he meant exactly to say when he read Bergson's 1938 classic.”

Paul A. Samuelson (1915–2009) American economist

Introduction to the Enlarged Edition
1940s, Foundations of Economic Analysis (1947; 1983)

Learning, Time, Reading

“The philosophy of science is as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.”

Richard Feynman (1918–1988) American theoretical physicist

Attributed to Feynman, many times, by the British historian of science Brian Cox.
Disputed and/or attributed

Bird, Science

“Indeed I reply in a single word to the sentiments of the saints on these questions about nature; in theology, to be sure, the force of authorities is to be weighed, in philosophy, however, that of causes. Therefore, a saint is Lactantius, who denied the rotundity of the earth; a saint is Augustine, who, admitting the rotundity, yet denied the antipodes; worthy of sainthood is the dutiful performance of moderns who, admitting the meagreness of the earth, yet deny its motion. But truth is more saintly for me, who demonstrate by philosophy, without violating my due respect for the doctors of the church, that the earth is both round and inhabited at the antipodes, and of the most despicable size, and finally is moved among the stars.”

Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer

Translation by Burtt, ibid., Vol. III. p. 156
Secondary works, Joannis Kepleri Astronomi Opera Omnia (1858)

Truth, Star, Question, Nature

“We must ally ourselves with the oppressed communities of the world. We cannot make our stand as nationalists, we cannot even make our stand as internationalists. We must place our future hopes upon the philosophy of intercommunalism, a philosophy which holds that the rise of imperialism in America transforms all other nations into oppressed communities. In revolutionary love we must make common cause with these oppressed communities.”

Huey P. Newton (1942–1989) Co-founder of the Black Panther Party

Resolutions and Declarations (1970)
To Die For The People

Love, World, Making love, Hope

“Synthesizing as it does the philosophical accomplishments of fifteen centuries, this book appears as the final achievement of ancient philosophy.”

John Scotus Eriugena (810–877) Irish theologian

George Bosworth Burch Early Medieval Philosophy (New York: King’s Crown Press, 1951) p. 5.

Of De Divisione Naturae.
Criticism

Books, Appearance

“No one enters heaven except through philosophy.”

John Scotus Eriugena (810–877) Irish theologian

Annotationes in Marciam, no. 64; translation from John Joseph O’Meara Eriugena (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988) p. 30.
Original: (la) Nemo intrat in caelum nisi per philosophiam.

“Certainly, Marx was atheist, "materialist", etc. But for a philosopher also, it's advisable to distinguish between what he is and what he thinks to be. The most important, this is not what Marx thought and that we ignore, but what think the texts he has written. What appears in them, in a way as obvious as exceptional in the history of philosophy, this is a metaphysics of the individual. Marx is one of the first Christian thinkers of Occident.”

Michel Henry (1922–2002) French writer

Michel Henry, Marx II. Une philosophie de l’économie, éd. Gallimard, coll. « Nrf », 1976, p. 445
Books on Economy and Politics, Marx. A Philosophy of Human Being (1976)
Original: (fr) Marx certes était athée, « matérialiste », etc. Mais chez un philosophe aussi, il convient de distinguer ce qu’il est de ce qu’il croit être. Ce qui compte, ce n’est d’ailleurs pas ce que Marx pensait et que nous ignorons, c’est ce que pensent les textes qu’il a écrits. Ce qui paraît en eux, de façon aussi évidente qu’exceptionnelle dans l’histoire de la philosophie, c’est une métaphysique de l’individu. Marx est l’un des premiers penseurs chrétiens de l’Occident.

Way, History, Thinking, Appearance

“What, then, is it to treat of philosophy, unless to lay down the rules of the true religion by which we seek rationally and adore humbly God, who is the first and sovereign cause of all things? Hence it follows that the true philosophy is the true religion, and reciprocally that the true religion is the true philosophy.”

John Scotus Eriugena (810–877) Irish theologian

Original: (la) Quid est aliud de philosophia tractare, nisi verae religionis, qua summa et principalis omnium rerum causa, Deus, et humiliter colitur, et rationabiliter investigatur, regulas exponere? Conficitur inde, veram esse philosophiam veram religionem, conversimque veram religionem esse veram philosophiam.

De Divina Praedestinatione, ch. 1; translation from Kenelm Henry Digby Mores Catholici, vol. 8 (London: Booker & Dolman, 1837) p. 198.

God, Religion

“He is here to show the worlds of The Cosmos the philosophy of the stars”

Cometan

Book: Cometan, the Omnidoxy

World, Star

“But Confucianism was not merely the official philosophy of the Chinese administration. Confucius ideals were accepted by the majority of the Chinese people, and for over two thousand years deeply influenced their life and thought.”

Michael H. Hart book The 100

about Confucius, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History p. 29/30
Muhammad, Confucius

Life, People

“American life is builded, and can alone survive, upon . . . [the] fundamental philosophy announced by the Savior nineteen centuries ago.”

Herbert Hoover (1874–1964) 31st President of the United States of America

“Radio Address to the Nation on Unemployment Relief,” American Presidency Project, October 18, 1931

Life

“[India is the] lost paradise of all religions and philosophies," "the cradle of humanity," and also its "eternal home," and the great Orient "waiting to be discovered within ourselves."... "mankind's origins can be traced to India, where the human mind got the first shapes of wisdom and virtue with simplicity, strength and sublimity which has - frankly spoken - nothing, nothing at all equivalent in our philosophical, cold European world."... "O holy land (India), I salute thee, thou source of all music, thou voice of the heart' ... "Behold the East - cradle of the human race, of human emotion, of all religion."”

Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803) German philosopher, theologian, poet, and literary critic

Quotes by Herder about India. Quoted from Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture. New Delhi: Pragun Publication. (quoting Ghosh, Pranebendranath Johann Gottfried Herder's Image of India (1900)p334, Singhal, Damodar P India and world Civilization Rupa and Co Calcutta 1993 p. 231)

Wisdom, World, Religion, Music

“The Kaizen Philosophy assumes that our way of life - be it our working life, our social life, or our home life - deserves to be constantly improved.”

Masaaki Imai (1930) Japanese business theorist and consultant

Gemba Kaizen: A Commonsense, Low-Cost Approach to Management (ed. McGraw Hill Professional, 1997), ISBN 9780071368162

Life, Way, Home

“The crisis of production today is the crisis of the antagonism between manual and intellectual labor. The problem of modern philosophy from Descartes in the sixteenth century to Stalinism in 1950 is the problem of the division of labor between the intellectuals and the workers.”

C. L. R. James (1901–1989) Trinidadian writer

State Capitalism and World Revolution (1950)

Problem

“You can gather however that I know I am not a real artist, and at the same time am fearfully serious over my work and willing to sweat at atmosphere if it helps me do what I want. What I want, I think, is the sentimental, but the sentimental reached by no easy beaten track—I cannot explain myself properly, for you must remember (I forget it myself) that though 'clever' I have a small and cloudy brain, and cannot clear it by talking or reading philosophy.”

E.M. Forster (1879–1970) English novelist

Letter 60, to Robert Trevelyan, 28 October 1905
Selected Letters (1983-1985)

Thinking, Time, Reading, Help

“Coming into San Diego we saw a beautiful golden ship in the sunset, but brighter than the sunset. I had ten-power binoculars with me, and was able to study it for half a minute from the halted car. It slowly faded out, the way they do... We have been given their simple philosophy. It runs parallel with the original teachings of Jesus.”

Desmond Leslie (1921–2001) British pilot, film maker, writer, and musician

Quoted by Agnes Bernelle in All the Planets are Inhabited! https://web.archive.org/web/20120616003031/http://www.egyouth.fsnet.co.uk/atpai/agnes.htm Weekend Mail, (26 August 1954)

Beauty, Cars, Way, Study

“The lesson of modern history—that Religions enjoy (are endowed with) the prerogative of perpetual youth while philosophies seldom outlast a generation.”

John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton (1834–1902) British politician and historian

Private notes, quoted in Herbert Butterfield, ‘Acton: His Training, Methods and Intellectual System’, in A. O. Sarkissian (ed.), Studies in Diplomatic History and Historiography in honour of G. P. Gooch, C.H. (1961), p. 195
Undated

Youth, Religion, History

“Islam is now Wrestling with Western thought as it once wrestled with Greek philosophy, and is as much in need as it was then of a 'revival of the religious sciences.'”

William Montgomery Watt (1909–2006) Scottish historian

Deep study of al-Ghazali may suggest to Muslims steps to be taken if they are to deal successfully with the contemporary situation. Christians, too, now that the world is in a cultural melting-pot, must be prepared to learn from Islam, and are unlikely to find a more sympathetic guide than al-Ghazali. The Deliverance from Error https://www.amazon.com/Al-Ghazalis-Path-Sufism-Deliverance-al-Munqidh/dp/1887752307, Introduction

Science

“The trouble I have with astrophysics or quantum mechanics is the same problem I have with philosophy; which is: initially it is mind blowing, then it is fascinating, then it is disturbing, then it is almost uncomprehensible, then it's fascinating again, then you disappear up your own ass.”

Craig Ferguson (1962) Scottish-born American television host, stand-up comedian, writer, actor, director, author, producer and voice a…

Couple Thinkers (2017)

Problem

“[O]ur [small] knowledge of the relation of finite to infinite... is... continually increasing—science and philosophy are continally presenting... broader views of the relation of man to nature and of individual thought to abstract thought.”

Karl Pearson (1857–1936) English mathematician and biometrician

The Ethic of Freethought (Mar 6, 1883)

Nature, Knowledge, Relation ships, Science

“Philosophy is much more important than politics, but we have to deal with politics because politics is the measuring rod of the philosophy... It's important that we... try to get the truth out...”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

Reflecting On The Past & Anticipating The Future, Ron Paul Liberty Report], YouTube (31 December 2019)
2019

Truth

“Because I was lazy, I'd adopted the philosophy that things just happen.”

David Sedaris Naked

Essay: "C.O.G." (p.222)
Naked (1997)

“It is Hindu philosophy that the more you give, the more you get. When I was a child, we used to visit the blind, the handicapped and schools where kids were without parents. It is about taking care of other individuals and to cherish what you have, you must take care of them.”

Bhanu Choudhrie (1978)

"Millionaire Interview: Bhanu Choudhrie" https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/article-1690283/Millionaire-Interview-Bhanu-Choudhrie.html, This is Money (2010)

School, Parent

“Plato was synthesis of Europe and Asia, and a decidedly Oriental element pervades his philosophy, giving it a sunrise color.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

Source: Abhedananda, Swami India and her people, a study in the social. political, educational and religious conditians of India. [6th ed.] Calcutta, Ramakrishna Vedanta Math [1945]

Color

“Problems or successes, they all are the results of our own actions. Karma. The philosophy of action is that no one else is the giver of peace or happiness. One's own karma, one's own actions are responsible to come to bring either happiness or success or whatever... As you sow, so shall you reap. It's a very old proverb of mankind. As you sow, so shall you reap. Sometime you may have killed that man, and then sometime now he comes to kill you... What we have done, the result of that comes to us whenever it comes, either today, tomorrow, hundred years later, hundred lives later, whatever, whatever. And so, it's our own karma.
That is why that philosophy in every religion: Killing is sin. Killing is sin in every religion. Whosoever sins, whoever is killed, it doesn't matter. It's a sin. And sin.. is a punishable offense. Because when you sin, when you've killed some man, what you are killing? You are killing the cosmic potential within the individual. Individual is cosmic. Individual potential of life is cosmic potential. Individual is divine deep inside. Transcendental experience awakens that divinity in man...When you kill a man like that you deprive him from getting to his human right.”

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

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, in CNN Larry King Weekend:Interview With Maharishi Mahesh Yogi http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0205/12/lklw.00.html, (2002)

Life, Happiness, Peace, Religion

“Bitterness is not a philosophy, friend. Outrage is not an ethic. Stop counting corpses and reach a truce with the universe, or you’ll be stuck on the dung heap forever.”

James K. Morrow (1947) (1947-) science fiction author

Source: Blameless in Abaddon (1996), Chapter 15 (p. 392)

Universe

“By his theory of relativity Albert Einstein has provoked a revolution of thought in physical science. ...Physical space and time are found to be closely bound... with... motion of the observer; and only an amorphous combination of the two is left... It is my aim to give an account of this work without introducing anything very technical in... mathematics, physics, or philosophy. ...[T]he task is one of interpreting a clear-cut theory... although perhaps not everyone would accept the author's views of its meaning.”

Arthur Stanley Eddington (1882–1944) British astrophysicist

Space, Time and Gravitation (1920)

Mathematics, Science, Time

“I am enraptured by Hindu philosophy, whose essential endeavor is to surmount the self; and everything I do, everything I think is only myself and the selfs humiliations.”

Emil M. Cioran book The Trouble With Being Born

The Trouble With Being Born (1973)

Thinking, Self-confidence

“The most important subject, and the first problem of philosophy, is the restoration in man of the lost image of God; so far as this relates to science.
Should this restoration in the internal consciousness be fully understood, and really brought about, the object of pure philosophy is attained.”

Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel (1772–1829) German poet, critic and scholar

The Philosophy of History (1852), Author's Preface

God, Problem, Relation ships, Science

“In our secret depths, wherever we do our unspoken wishing, either we want life to be tidy, clear, fully understood, contained within definite limits, or we long for it to seem larger, wilder, stranger. Faced with some odd incident, either we wish to cut it down or to build it up.
On this level, below that of philosophies and rational opinions, either we reject or ignore the unknown, the apparently inexplicable, the marvellous and miraculous, or we welcome every sign of them. At one extreme is a narrow intolerant bigotry, snarling at anything outside the accepted world-picture, and at the other is an idiotic credulity, the prey of any glib charlatan. At one end the world becomes a prison, at the other a madhouse.”

J.B. Priestley (1894–1984) English writer

Source: Man and Time (1964), Ch. 8, p. 183

Life, Secret, World

“Present excitement will at all times magnify present dangers, but true philosophy must teach us that none more threatening than the past can remain to be overcome; and we ought (for we have just reason) to entertain an abiding confidence in the stability of our institutions and an entire conviction that if administered in the true form, character, and spirit in which they were established they are abundantly adequate to preserve to us and our children the rich blessings already derived from them, to make our beloved land for a thousand generations that chosen spot where happiness springs from a perfect equality of political rights.”

Martin Van Buren (1782–1862) American politician, 8th President of the United States (in office from 1837 to 1841)

Inaugural address (1837)

Happiness, Children, Making love, Confidence

“When I was in college, I wanted to know more about my Native American past because I come from one of the 64 Native groups that are very much alive [in Mexico]. But there was nothing like that. So I ended up designing my own major that included women’s studies, philosophy, and anthropology.”

Lila Downs (1968) Mexican American singer-songwriter

On shaping her higher education in order to learn more about her heritage in “Lila Downs Reminds Us of the Strength Women Bring to Latin America and its History” https://sheshredsmag.com/lila-downs-14/ in She Shreds (2018 May 3) Heritage and indigenous peoples

Women, Study, Past

“To radicalize the question of phenomenology is not only to aim for a pure phenomenality but to seek out the mode according to which it originally becomes a phenomenon -- the substance, the stuff, the phenomenological matter of which it is made, its phenomenologically pure materiality. That is the task of material phenomenology. Prior to this being-toward-the-outside in which everything is properly speaking placed outside of itself and in which every reality is a priori emptied and dispossessed of itself and thus becomes its contrary, an irreality, and prior to the abandonment and undoing that is called death and that would be unable to exist on its own, material phenomenology is devoted to the discovery of the reign of a phenomenality that is constructed in such a surprising way that the thought that always thinks about the world never thinks about it. To the internal structure of this originary manifestation, there belongs no Outside, no Separation, no Ek-stasis. Its phenomenological substance is not visibility. None of the categories that have been used by philosophy since the Greeks at any rate, are appropriate for it.”

Michel Henry (1922–2002) French writer

Source: Michel Henry, Material Phenomenology, Fordham University Press, 2008, p. 2
Source: Books on Phenomenology and Life, Material Phenomenology (1990)

Death, World, Way, Question

“The task of material phenomenology is immense. It is not simply to be attached to another order of phenomena that remained neglected up to now but to rethink everything, if one can think reality. Every sphere of reality must become the object of a new analysis that goes back to its invisible dimension. And this concerns material nature as well, which is a living cosmos. Since material phenomenology implies the revival of philosophical questioning in its entirety, it offers a future to phenomenology and to philosophy itself. At the same time, it discovers a new past.”

Michel Henry (1922–2002) French writer

Source: Michel Henry, Material Phenomenology, Fordham University Press, 2008, p. 6
Source: Books on Phenomenology and Life, Material Phenomenology (1990)

Question, Nature, Thinking, Reality

“The question of phenomenology, which alone confers a proper object to philosophy, is what makes it into an autonomous discipline -- the fundamental discipline of knowledge -- and not just a mere reflexion after the fact on what the other sciences have found. This question is no longer concerned with the phenomena but the mode of their givenness, their phenomenality, not with what appears but with appearing. The invaluable contribution of historical phenomenology is to become aware of this appearing and to analyze it in and of itself. This is its theme. Again, this must not simply be the repetition of the traditional philosophical problem of consciousness or the greek aletheia. For the illusion of common sense, science and past philosophies is to understand the being of the phenomenon always as a first putting at a distance, the arrival of an Outside in which everything becomes visible, a "phenomenon", in the light of this Outside.”

Michel Henry (1922–2002) French writer

Source: Michel Henry, Material Phenomenology, Fordham University Press, 2008, p. 2
Source: Books on Phenomenology and Life, Material Phenomenology (1990)

Making love, Understanding, Question, Knowledge

“The Liberal is distinguished from the Conservative and the Radical, not only by his basic philosophy but by his methods. Never does he believe that a good end justifies and evil means. He seeks to find everything that binds men together, rather than what divides them, for he loves persuasion and detests coercion.”

Dorothy Thompson (1893–1961) American journalist and radio broadcaster

Dorothy Thompson’s Political Guide: A Study of American Liberalism and its Relationship to Modern Totalitarian States (1938)
Source: A Study of American Liberalism and its Relationship to Modern Totalitarian States (1938)
p. 90

Love, Men, Making love, Evil

“What confuses the mind of the average American is that the American collectivist calls himself a Liberal, and has pre-empted a word which has a totally different philosophy behind it. The Fascists and Communists know that Liberalism is the enemy. But the American collectivist, who calls himself a Liberal, believes that he can have the better of two worlds.”

Dorothy Thompson (1893–1961) American journalist and radio broadcaster

World

“I shall put the case somewhat from the standpoint of the militant suffragettes themselves, trying to give some idea of the philosophy and ethical principles underlying the militant propaganda and, above all, with the hope of making clear to American readers some of the radical differences between English and American conditions.”

Mary Winsor (1869–1956) American suffragist

Source: The Militant suffrage movement (1914)

Making love, Hope, Idea

“Since a great part of those Learned Men, especially Physicians who have discerned the defects of the vulgar Philosophy, but are not yet come to understand and relish the Corpuscularian, have slid into the Doctrine of the Chymists; and since the Spagyrists are wont to pretend to make out all the Qualities of bodies from the Predominancy of some one of their three Hypostatical Principles, I suppose it may both keep my opinion from appearing too presumptuous, and (which is far more considerable) may make way for the fairer Reception of the Mechanical Hypothesis about Qualities, if I here intimate (though but briefly and in general) some of those defects, that I have observed in Chymists Explications of Qualities.”

Robert Boyle (1627–1691) English natural philosopher, chemist, physicist, and inventor

Source: Of the Imperfection of The Chymist's Doctrine of Qualities (1675)

Men, Making love, Way, Understanding

“Look at the solar system, and look at the Earth. On Earth, there are many intelligent species, but only one has achieved technology. Right here in the journey of our own solar system, there is a very, very powerful message that says here's how we should look for alien life, small and big. So yeah, microbes are talking and we are listening, and they are taking us, one planet at a time and one moon at a time, towards their big brothers out there. And they are telling us about diversity, they are telling us about abundance of life, and they are telling us how this life has survived thus far to reach civilization, intelligence, technology and, indeed, philosophy.”

Nathalie Cabrol (1963) French American astrobiologist

Source: How Mars might hold the secret to the origin of life https://www.ted.com/talks/nathalie_cabrol_how_mars_might_hold_the_secret_to_the_origin_of_life (March 2015)

Life, Intelligence, Time

“There is absolutely not a shadow of a doubt that the Greeks knew all about Indian philosophy.”

Roger-Pol Droit (1949) French philosopher

The Forgetfulness of India. Quoted in Gautier, Francois Arise again, 6 India! Har-Anand Publication 2000 p.22 Quoted from Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture https://books.google.com/books/about/A_Tribute_to_Hinduism.html?id=G3AMAQAAMAAJ

“the teaching of my philosophy... that our whole existence is something which had better not have been, and that to disown and disclaim it is the highest wisdom.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Ch 1 Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims Source: Counsels and Maxims http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/counsels/chapter1.html 2017-12-01 https://web.archive.org/web/20171201131253/http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/counsels/chapter1.html,

Wisdom

“You know, I have a philosophy there’s good that happens in everything.
It may not reveal itself immediately, and even in the most dire circumstances, if you just wait, if you just remain open to things, the good in it will reveal itself. And that has happened to me as well in countless, countless ways.”

Rush Limbaugh (1951) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, author, and television personality

2020s, I’ve Had a Year to Think About What’s Important (2020)

Way, Waiting

“And now I salute thee with awe, with veneration, and wonder, ancient India, of whom I am the adept, the India of the highest splendor of art and philosophy. May thy awakening astonish the Occident, decadent, mean, daily dwindling, slayer of nations, slayer of Gods, slayer of souls, which yet bows down still, ancient India, before the prodigies of thy primordial conceptions!”

Pierre Loti (1850–1923) French writer

Source: attributed and quoted in Josyer, G R. Sanskrit Civilization, International Academy of Sanskrit Research. Mysore 1966 p. 1

https://books.google.com/books/about/A_Tribute_to_Hinduism.html?id=G3AMAQAAMAAJ A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture

God, Art, Soul

“There was no need to worry about religion or philosophy; the truth was determined by whoever was in power.”

John Twelve Hawks book The Traveler

Fourth Realm Trilogy (2005-2009), The Traveler (2005)

Truth, Religion

“Mum said school mighta been different for me if I only give a damn. Maybe it was wasted on me like the teachers said. I didn't have any philosophy in me then, so I didn't know what to listen for. Most of it was pointless crap. Don't reckon I met a single wise person all the years I stayed but like I say, I wasn't paying close attention. And the thing is I miss it a bit. That's something I never thought I'd hear myself say. I didn't know what I was, what I could do. Except the lame things I did do.”

Tim Winton (1960) Australian writer

Part I, Ch.6 - p.43
The Shepherd's Hut (2018)

School, Teachers, Personality

“Revenge is the philosophy of dictators and mob bosses... used to keep others in line with threats of economic ruin, violence, or worse.”

David Cay Johnston (1948) Investigative journalist and author

It's Even Worse Than You Think (2018)

Revenge

“Philosophy of science can bring a strong array of analytical and synthetic tools to questions of ultimate causation, ultimate reality and “the whole of reality” because these questions are both physical and metaphysical—entailing methodological procedures from both science and philosophy.”

Robert Spitzer (priest) (1952) American Jesuit priest, scholar and educator

Can scientific methods prove the existence of God? https://www.americamagazine.org/content/all-things/god-and-science-qa-robert-spitzer-sj (December 29, 2015)

Question, Reality, Strong, Science

“There is no need for temples, no need for complicated philosophies. My brain and my heart are my temples; my philosophy is kindness.”

Tenzin Gyatso (1935) spiritual leader of Tibet

Heart

“I have done my best: that is about all the philosophy of living one needs.”

Lin Yutang (1895–1976) Chinese writer

“Science gives us knowledge, but only philosophy can give us wisdom.”

Will Durant (1885–1981) American historian, philosopher and writer

Wisdom, Knowledge, Science

“It ought to be possible to restore to the word "philosophy" its original meaning: philosophy − the "love of wisdom" − is the science of all the fundamental principles; this science operates with intuition, which "perceives," and not with reason alone, which "concludes."”

Frithjof Schuon book The Transfiguration of Man

Subjectively speaking, the essence of philosophy is certitude; for the moderns, on the contrary, the essence of philosophy is doubt: the philosopher is supposed to reason without any premise (voraussetzungsloses Denken), as if this condition were not itself a preconceived idea; this is the classical contradiction of all relativism. Everything is doubted except for doubt. The solution to the problem of knowledge − if there is a problem − could not possibly be this intellectual suicide that is the promotion of doubt; on the contrary, it lies in having recourse to a source of certitude that transcends the mental mechanism, and this source − the only one there is − is the pure Intellect, or Intelligence as such.
[2005, The Transfiguration of Man, World Wisdom, 3, 978-0-94153219-8]
Miscellaneous, Philosophy

Love, Wisdom, Science

“Let us specify that the possible gaps in the human mind are due, not to fortuitous causes, but to the very conditions of the "dark age", the kali-yuga, which has as an effect − among other modes of decadence − a progressive weakening of pure intellection and of the ascending tendencies of soul; whence the necessity of the religious revelations, and whence also the problematical phenomenon of gratuitous and divergent philosophies.”

Frithjof Schuon (1907–1998) Swiss philosopher

[1995, Norms and Paradoxes in Spiritual Alchemy, Sophia: The Journal of Traditional Studies, 1, 1, 8]
Miscellaneous, Revelation

Age, Soul

“My ultimate intuitive clue in philosophy is that "God is love" and that the idea of God is definable as that of the being worthy to be loved with all one’s heart, mind, soul, and entire being.”

Charles Hartshorne (1897–2000) Philosopher

The Philosophy of Charles Hartshorne (1991), edited by Lewis Edwin Hahn, p. 700

Love, God, Soul, Idea

“My philosophy was very much to embrace yourself and love what you are, instead of making you something you're not. Refine what you already have - don't change it at its core. That's always been my whole ethos.”

Jonathan Van Ness (1987) American hairstylist and television personality

page 232
Over the Top: A Raw Journey to Self-Love (2019)

Love, Change

“We reject a political philosophy asserting that economic reforms can be launched over and against society, above people's heads - one that pushes democratic change aside.”

Tadeusz Mazowiecki (1927–2013) Polish politician and prime minister

"Inaugural address of Premier Tadeusz Mazowiecki" https://polishfreedom.pl/en/document/statement-inaugural-address-of-the-prime-minister-tadeusz-mazowiecki-delivered-at-the-seym-session-on-12th-september-1989 (12 September 1989)

People, Change

“The one thing you know after completing a degree in Philosophy is that you don’t know anything. That disqualifies you from almost every profession….. except perhaps being an actor!”

Nick Brimble (1944) British actor

“Philosophy will fail forever its primary aim because it searches for something that does not exist.”

Menotti Lerro (1980) Italian poet

La filosofia fallirà per sempre il suo primario obiettivo, poiché ricerca qualcosa che non esiste.

“If you get too emotional, you are ready to be defeated. No manifestation of emotions in the face of logic whenever it comes to the domain of philosophy.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“Since every religion is based upon a philosophical idea, it would make sense that we are all following the philosophies of our religious founders.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Religion, Idea, Sense

“As a general rule philosophy is like stirring mud or not letting a sleeping dog lie. It is an attempt to deny, circumvent or otherwise escape from the consequences of the interlacing of the roots of things with one another.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

Philosophy
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912), Part XX - First Principles

Lie, Dogs, Sleep

“Utilitarianism is a very egalitarian philosophy, asking the haves to do a lot for the have-nots. Were you to wake up tomorrow as a born-again utilitarian, the biggest change in your life would be your newfound devotion to helping unfortunate others.”

Joshua Greene (1974) American psychologist

Joshua Greene, Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them (2013), p. 275

Life, Change, Help

“Utilitarianism is a great idea with an awful name. It is, in my opinion, the most underrated and misunderstood idea in all of moral and political philosophy.”

Joshua Greene (1974) American psychologist

Joshua Greene, Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them (2013), p. 106

Idea

“The marvel of the Bhagavad-Gita is its truly beautiful revelation of life's wisdom which enables philosophy to blossom into religion.”

Hermann Hesse (1877–1962) German writer

as quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture https://books.google.com/books/about/A_Tribute_to_Hinduism.html?id=G3AMAQAAMAAJ

Life, Wisdom, Religion, Beauty

“Philosophy — in every field of inquiry — is what you have to do until you figure out what questions you should have been asking in the first place.”

Daniel Dennett (1942) American philosopher

Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking (2013)

Question

“Nature has no automatically transferable wisdom to serve as the basis of human morality. Passive observation and unquestioned reverence for nature are no substitute for ethical philosophy.”

Stephen Jay Gould book An Urchin in the Storm

Source: An Urchin in the Storm (1987) "Utopia, Limited", p. 225

Wisdom, Nature

“My philosophy has been to take things day by day. When I talk about this philosophy it makes people perhaps a little surprised.”

Bhumibol Adulyadej (1927–2016) King of Thailand

Source: "King Bhumibol's Reign" in The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/1989/05/21/magazine/king-bhumibol-s-reign.html (21 May 1989)

People

“Philosophy is more often the systematization of the prejudices of philosophers than the systematization of nature. Distrust all generalizations: stick to the concrete.”

Epifanio de los Santos (1871–1928) Filipino politician

Remarkable Quotes
Source: As quoted in “Don Pañong – Genius" by A.V.H. Hartendorp in Philippine Magazine (September 1929), p. 211.

Nature

“If I live for one purpose it is for this, that I will preach the union of Eastern and Western philosophy, the reconciliation of Europe and Asia. The idea may seem absurd to many in the present age. It may provoke ridicule and angry reviling. But posterity will prove a better judge.”

Max Müller (1823–1900) German-born philologist and orientalist

Source: quoted in Ibn, W. (2009). Defending the West: A critique of Edward Said's Orientalism. Amherst, N.Y: Prometheus Books.

Age, Idea

“The point being that the influence of dharmic philosophy on Western culture runs deep and yet consistently goes unacknowledged.”

Rajiv Malhotra book Being Different

Source: Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism (2011)

“Philosophy can never reconcile itself with science. Science aims at self-evident truths and finds in them that "natural necessity" which, after having proclaimed itself for ever eternal, claims to serve as the foundation of all knowledge and strives to rule over all wanton "suddenly."”

Lev Shestov (1866–1938) Russian theologian

But philosophy has always been, and will always be, a fight with and a conquest of self-evident truths; philosophy is not looking for any "natural necessity", it sees in naturalness and in necessity alike an evil magic, which, if one cannot quite shake it off (for in this no mortal has ever yet succeeded), yet one must at least call by its right name; and even this is an important step! p. 342
Source: In Job's Balances: on the sources of the eternal truths, Words That Are Swallowed Up - Plotinus's Ecstasies

Truth, Nature, Knowledge, Science

“The first commandment of modern philosophy runs: Thou shalt emancipate thyself from all postulates. The postulate has been declared a deadly sin, and he who makes one is the enemy of truth.”

Lev Shestov (1866–1938) Russian theologian

Source: In Job's Balances: on the sources of the eternal truths, On The Philosophy of History p. 247

Truth

“Philosophy is not exactly science, [analytic philosophers] think, but it must resemble science in its style and mood of detachment: its appearance of being without any particular person’s or any particular group’s biases.”

Bruce Wilshire (1932–2015) American philosopher

Source: Fashionable Nihilism (2002), p. xii

Mood, Thinking, Appearance, Science

“On Philosophy Tube, I call all the shots, I do all the writing, I do all the research. I plan it all out, and it's my show. I miss the feeling of being at the bottom and having to climb up again.”

Abigail Thorn (1993) British actress and YouTuber

Source: Meet Abigail Thorn, the trans philosopher who wants to kill James Bond https://www.insider.com/abigail-thorn-interview-philosophy-tube-kill-james-bond-podcast-2021-8, 21 August 202

Feeling

“Philosophy asks for a reason, not just a scientific fact.”

Catherine Rowett (1956) Professor of Philosophy at the University of East Anglia (born 1956)

Source: Presocratic Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction (2004), Ch. 1 : Lost words, forgotten worlds

“Ancient India gave to to the world its religions and philosophies: Egypt and Greece owe India their wisdom and it is known that Pythagoras went to India to study under Brahmins, who were the most enlightened of human beings.”

Pierre Sonnerat (1748–1814) French botanist (1748-1814)

Source: quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture https://books.google.com/books/about/A_Tribute_to_Hinduism.html?id=G3AMAQAAMAAJ

Wisdom, World, Religion, Study

“[National-Socialism is] not only narrow and selfish but arrogant [with a] very weak scientific foundation for its racial philosophy.”

Subhas Chandra Bose (1897–1945) Indian nationalist leader and politician

Source: quoted in Leonard Gordon, Bengal The Nationalist Movement, p 260, and in Elst, K. (2010). The saffron swastika: The notion of "Hindu fascism". p 959

Selfishness

“This is... a book about morality. By offering several perspectives... some rooted in philosophy, some... in science and technology, we may come to see new ways to understand...”

Laurence Tribe (1941) American lawyer and law school professor

Abortion: The Clash of Absolutes (1990), Approaching Abortion Anew

Books, Way, Understanding, Science

“In Occultism one who has reached the stage of Initiation, and become a Master in the science of Esoteric philosophy.”

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1831–1891) occult writer

Adept (Lat.). Adeptus, “He who has obtained.”
The Theosophical Glossary (1892)

Science

“No one ever landed on English soil with more hatred in his heart for a race than I did for the English, and, on this platform, are present English friends who can bear witness to the fact, but the more I lived among them, saw how the machine is working, the English national life, mixed with them, found where the heart-beat of the nation was, the more I loved them. There is none among you here present, my brothers, who loves the English people more than I do. You have to see what is going on there, and you have to mix with them. As the philosophy, our national philosophy of the Vedanta, has summarised all misfortune, all misery from that one cause, ignorance, herein also we must understand that the difficulties that arise between us and the English people are mostly due to that ignorance; we do not know them, they do not know us.”

Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902) Indian Hindu monk and phylosopher

Source: Spoken on his return to India from England, as recorded in From Colombo to Almora (1904), p. 221

Love, Life, People, Understanding

“Men preach Philosophy, women practise it.”

Alfred Austin (1835–1913) British writer and poet

Source: Lamia's Winter-Quarters (1898), Lamia on p. 66.

Women, Men

“If you are not something of a philosopher,—and by philosophy I understand a serene temper, and the maintaining of an equable mind under the sharpest disappointments,—I do not advise you to cultivate, or at any rate to grow enamoured of, a garden.”

Alfred Austin (1835–1913) British writer and poet

Source: In Veronica's Garden (1895), p. 92.

Disappointment, Understanding

“Philosophy is the attempt to formulate principles or categories which the philosopher already possesses, in common with everyone else, but in an unformulated state.”

Otis Hamilton Lee (1902–1948) American philosopher

Source: [10.1086/286600, Philosophy and Science, Philosophy of Science, 7, 7–17, 1940, Lee, Otis]

“Behavior is imitated, then abstracted into play, formalized into drama and story, crystallized into myth and codified into religion—and only then criticized in philosophy, and provided, post-hoc, with rational underpinnings.”

Jordan Peterson book Maps of Meaning

Source: Books, Maps of Meaning (1999), p. 78

Religion, Behavior

“It is by the progress of philosophy and by the spectacle of the happiness of France, that you will extend the empire of our revolution, and not by the force of arms and by the calamities of war.”

Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) French revolutionary lawyer and politician

Speech to the National Convention, 10th April 1793
Misc Quotes

War, Happiness

“[A] profit and loss statement is not simply a collection of figures, but rather—for the perceptive banker—a window into the nuts and bolts of the business, from its method of operation to its management philosophy.”

Henry Kaufman (1927) American economist

On Money and Markets (2000)

Business, Loss

“Veganism. It’s not a diet, it’s a philosophy, which aims to cause as less cruelty around you as practically possible.”

Dave Leduc (1991) Canadian Lethwei fighter (born 1991)

On veganism Source: As quoted in Plant Based News https://plantbasednews.org/culture/sport/world-champion-lethwei-fighter-dave-leduc-says-being-vegan-is-a-philosophy-not-a-diet/ (2nd February, 2021)

“Philosophy is to the mind of the architect as eyesight is to his steps. The term "genius" when applied to him simply means a man who understands what others only know about.”

Frank Lloyd Wright (1867–1959) American architect (1867-1959)

A Testament (1957)

Understanding

“The basic question of philosophy can be formulated as follows: "What are the criteria for a right life?"”

Zafar Mirzo (1972)

Life, Question

“I know that our efforts all come to nothing. Analyze life, tear its trappings off, lay it bare with thought, with logic, with philosophy, and its emptiness is revealed as a bottomless pit; its nothingness frankly confesses to nothingness, and Despair comes to perch in the soulI know the end of us all is nothing, I know that at the end of Time, the reward of our toil will be nothing — and again nothing. I know that all our handiwork and all our ideas will be destroyed. I know that not even ash will be left from the fires that consume us. I know that our ideals, even those we achieve, will vanish in the eternal darkness of oblivion and final non-being. There is no hope, none, in my heart. I know, No promise, none, can I make to myself and to others. No recompense can I expect for my labors. No fruit will be born of my thoughts. I know the time — eternal seducer of all men, eternal cause of all effects — offers me nothing but the blank prospect of annihilation. So, my dignity is broken and weak, in recognition of my impending defeat.

The man who is alone, who stands on his own feet, who is stripped bare, who asks for nothing and wants nothing, who has reached the apex of disinterestedness not through blind renunciation but through excess of clear vision, turns to the world which stretches out before him as a burned prairie, as a devastated city — a world in which no churches, asylums, refuges, ideals, are left — and says: «Though you promise me nothing I am still with you, I am still an atom of your energies, my work is part of your work; I am your companion and your mirror as you march on your merciless way. But I owe nothing to any one. I would be responsible to freedom alone.”

Alexis Karpouzos (1967)

Source: https://alexiskarpouzos.medium.com/at-the-end-of-time-alexis-karpouzos-0b5a34cfbbe9

Life, Men, World, Hope

This quote waiting for review.

“The immediate approach to success in life is not about the plight to seek strategic means to escape poverty, but about changing your life philosophy and direction.”

Dr. Manuel

This quote challenges the "hacks" and "grindset" culture. It argues that success isn't about scrambling for a quick financial exit; it’s about a total internal reset.

---

### The Breakdown

* **The Tactical Trap:** Searching for "strategic means to escape poverty" is purely defensive. If you only focus on survival tactics (like a side hustle or a better resume) without changing your mindset, you are just running faster on a treadmill. You are still letting poverty dictate your life.
* **The Philosophical Pivot:** Success requires upgrading your internal operating system. You must shift from a *scarcity mindset* ("How do I survive today?") to a *leverage mindset* ("What can I build for tomorrow?").
* **Direction Over Velocity:** Speed means nothing if you are facing the wrong way. When you stop running *away* from poverty and start walking *toward* a specific vision, your daily decisions naturally shift from desperate reactions to calculated actions.

> **The Bottom Line:** You cannot build a wealthy life using a poverty blueprint. Tactics change what you *do*, but philosophy changes who you *are*—and that is the only permanent escape hatch.

Life, Change, Success

Quotes about philosophy page 21

Quotes about philosophy
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