Quote

The twin conceptions of sin and vindictive punishment seem to be at the root of much that is most vigorous, both in religion and politics.

Bertrand Russell

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Bertrand Russell
Age: 97 †
Born: 1872
Born: May 18
Died: 1970
Died: February 2
Analytic Philosopher
Autobiographer
Epistemologist
Essayist
Journalist
Logician
Mathematician
Metaphysician
Peace Activist
Philosopher
Tryleg
Bertrand Arthur William Russell
Russell
Bertrand Russell
3rd Earl Russell
Bertrand Russell
Earl Russell
Bertrand Arthur William Russell
3rd Earl Russell
Seems
Conception
Much
Punishment
Vindictive
Roots
Conceptions
Sin
Twin
Seem
Vigorous
Politics
Wickedness
Religion
Twins
Evil
Root

More quotes by Bertrand Russell

Image
Half the useful work in the world consists of combating the harmful work.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, Thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought is great and swift and free.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Public opinion is always more tyrannical towards those who obviously fear it than towards those who feel indifferent to it.
Bertrand Russell
Image
A man's acts are partly determined by spontaneous impulse, partly by the conscious and unconscious effects of the various groups to which he belongs.
Bertrand Russell
Image
The time has come, or is about to come, when only large-scale civil disobedience, which should be nonviolent, can save the populations from the universal death which their governments are preparing for them.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Ants and savages put strangers to death.
Bertrand Russell
Image
The conception of the necessary unit of all that is resolves itself into the poverty of the imagination, and a freer logic emancipates us from the straitwaistcoated benevolent institution, which idealism palms off as the totality of being.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Philosophy seems to me on the whole a rather hopeless business.
Bertrand Russell
Image
When the journey from means to end is not too long, the means themselves are enjoyed if the end is ardently desired.
Bertrand Russell
Image
I do not believe that science per se is an adequate source of happiness, nor do I think that my own scientific outlook has contributed very greatly to my own happiness, which I attribute to defecating twice a day with unfailing regularity.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Belief in a Divine mission is one of the many forms of certainty that have afflicted the human race.
Bertrand Russell
Image
If I were granted omnipotence, and millions of years to experiment in, I should not think Man much to boast of as the final result of all my efforts.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Americans need rest, but do not know it.
Bertrand Russell
Image
A million million years gives us some time to prepare for the end . . . let us make the best of it.
Bertrand Russell
Image
To write tragedy, a man must feel tragedy. To feel tragedy, a man must be aware of the world in which he lives. Not only with his mind, but with his blood and sinews.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Common sense, however it tries, cannot avoid being surprised from time to time.
Bertrand Russell
Image
That Plato's Republic should have been admired, on its political side, by decent people, is perhaps the most astonishing example of literary snobbery in all history.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.
Bertrand Russell
Image
Those who forget good and evil and seek only to know the facts are more likely to achieve good than those who view the world through the distorting medium of their own desires.
Bertrand Russell
Image
If two hitherto rival football teams, under the influence of brotherly love, decided to co-operate in placing the football first beyond one goal and then beyond the other, no one's happiness would be increased
Bertrand Russell