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The brute necessity of believing something so long as life lasts does not justify any belief in particular.

George Santayana

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George Santayana
Age: 88 †
Born: 1863
Born: October 2
Died: 1952
Died: September 16
Essayist
Novelist
Philosopher
Poet
University Teacher
Writer
Madrid
Spain
Jorge Santayana
Jorge Augustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana
Jorge Augustin Nicolas Ruiz de Santayana
George Santayana
Believe
Believing
Life
Necessity
Particular
Belief
Lasts
Doe
Brute
Long
Brutes
Something
Justify

More quotes by George Santayana

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Skepticism is the chastity of the intellect, and it is shameful to surrender it too soon or to the first comer there is nobility in preserving it coolly and proudly through long youth, until at last, in the ripeness of instinct and discretion, it can be safely exchanged for fidelity and happiness.
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Trust the man who hesitates in his speech and is quick and steady in action, but beware of long arguments and long beards.
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Wealth, religion, military victory have more rhetorical than efficacious worth.
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In each person I catch the fleeting suggestion of something beautiful and swear eternal friendship with that.
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Self-assurance is contemptible and fatal unless it is self-knowledge.
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Nietzsche said that the earth has been a madhouse long enough. Without contradicting him we might perhaps soften the expression, and say that philosophy has been long enough an asylum for enthusiasts.
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Repetition is the only form of permanence that Nature can achieve.
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A child educated only at school is an uneducated child.
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Gnomic wisdom, however, is notoriously polychrome, and proverbs depend for their truth entirely on the occasion they are applied to. Almost every wise saying has an opposite one, no less wise, to balance it.
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A friend's only gift is himself.
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Docility is the observable half of reason.
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Existence is a miracle, and, morally considered, a free gift from moment to moment.
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Nothing is inherently and invincibly young except spirit. And spirit can enter a human being perhaps better in the quiet of old age and dwell there more undisturbed than in the turmoil of adventure.
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Even under the most favorable circumstances no mortal can be asked to seize the truth in its wholeness or at its center.
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Tomes of aesthetic criticism hang on a few moments of real delight and intuition.
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The mediocrity of everything in the great world of today is simply appalling. We live in intellectual slums.
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To attempt to be religious without practicing a specific religion is as possible as attempting to speak without a specific language.
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It is right to prefer our own country to all others, because we are children and citizens before we can be travellers or philosophers.
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It is always pleasant to be urged to do something on the ground that one can do it well.
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The lover knows much more about absolute good and universal beauty than any logician or theologian, unless the latter, too, be lovers in disguise.
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