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The evolution of our spirit is blazed on the dark background of eternity by our individual wakes. Every person can, if he/she wishes, leave a more or less brilliant wake behind them.

Bertrand Russell

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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
Every
Leave
Background
Dark
Backgrounds
Less
Wake
Wish
Brilliant
Individual
Eternity
Spirit
Evolution
Blazed
Persons
Behinds
Wakes
Person
Behind
Wishes

More quotes by Bertrand Russell

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We may often do as we please - but we cannot please as we please.
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The human animal, like others, is adapted to a certain amount of struggle for life [and] the mere absence of effort from his life removes an essential ingredient of happiness. [. . .] He forgets that to be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.
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What will be the good of the conquest of leisure and health, if no one remembers how to use them?
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My own view on religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source of untold misery to the human race.
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Stupidity and unconscious bias often work more damage than venality.
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Awareness of universals is called conceiving, and a universal of which we are aware is called a concept.
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There's a Bible on that shelf there. But I keep it next to Voltaire - poison and antidote.
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There are three ways of securing a society that shall be stable as regards population. The first is that of birth control, the second that of infanticide or really destructive wars, and the third that of general misery except for a powerful minority.
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To discover a system for the avoidance of war is a vital need of our civilisation.
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It is entirely clear that there is only one way in which great wars can be permanently prevented, and that is the establishment of an international government with a monopoly of serious armed force.
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I have throughout been curious about how much we can be said to know and with what degree of certainty or doubtfulness.
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Nine-tenths of the appeal of pornography is due to the indecent feelings concerning sex which moralists inculcate in the young the other tenth is physiological, and will occur in one way or another whatever the state of the law may be.
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It is likely that America will be more important during the next century or two, but after that it may well be the turn of China.
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The place of the father in the modern suburban family is a very small one, particularly if he plays golf.
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In science the successors stand upon the shoulders of their predecessors where one man of supreme genius has invented a method, a thousand lesser men can apply it. ... In art nothing worth doing can be done without genius in science even a very moderate capacity can contribute to a supreme achievement.
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To acquire immunity to eloquence is of the utmost importance to the citizens of a democracy.
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I believe four ingredients are necessary for happiness: health, warm personal relations, sufficient means to keep you from want, and successful work.
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In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors, for, from the time of Jefferson onward, the doctrine that all men are equal applies only upwards, not downwards.
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The psychology of adultery has been falsified by conventional morals, which assume, in monogamous countries, that attraction to one person cannot coexist with affection for another. Everybody knows that this is untrue.
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In the revolt against idealism, the ambiguities of the word experience have been perceived, with the result that realists have more and more avoided the word.
Bertrand Russell