Quote

To fight is a radical instinct if men have nothing else to fight over they will fight over words, fancies, or women, or they will fight because they dislike each other's looks, or because they have met walking in opposite directions.

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
Fight
Dislike
Fighting
Fancy
Words
Opposite
Else
Radical
Women
Opposites
Nothing
Instinct
Looks
Mets
Fancies
Men
Walking
Directions

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The tide of evolution carries everything before it, thoughts no less than bodies, and persons no less than nations.
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Truth is a jewel which should not be painted over but it may be set to advantage and shown in a good light.
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Never have I enjoyed youth so thoroughly as I have in my old age
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We crave support in vanity, as we do in religion, and never forgive contradictions in that sphere.
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Our character ... is an omen of our destiny, and the more integrity we have and keep, the simpler and nobler that destiny is likely to be.
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Perhaps the only true dignity of man is his capacity to despise himself.
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We are not compelled in naturalism, or even in materialism, to ignore immaterial things the point is that any immaterial things which are recognized shall be regarded as names, aspects, functions, or concomitant products of those physical things among which action goes on.
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What better comfort have we, or what other Profit in living Than to feed, sobered by the truth of Nature, Awhile upon her beauty, And hand her torch of gladness to the ages Following after?
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To delight in war is a merit in the soldier, a dangerous quality in the captain, and a positive crime in the statesman.
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I feel so much the continual death of everything and everybody, and have so learned to reconcile myself to it, that the final and official end loses most of its impressiveness.
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Uselessness is a fatal accusation to bring against any act which is done for its presumed utility, but those which are done for their own sake are their own justification.
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Wisdom lies in taking everything with good humor and a grain of salt.
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Society itself is an accident to the spirit, and if society in any of its forms is to be justified morally it must be justified at the bar of the individual conscience.
George Santayana
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The Universe, so far as we can observe it, is a wonderful and immense engine its extent, its order, its beauty, its cruelty, makes it alike impressive.
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The same battle in the clouds will be known to the deaf only as lightning and to the blind only as thunder.
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Everything in nature is lyrical in its ideal essence, tragic in its fate, and comic in its existence.
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Facts are all accidents. They all might have been different. They all may become different. They all may collapse altogether.
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If you prefer illusions to realities, it is only because all decent realities have eluded you and left you in the lurch or else your contempt for the world is mere hypocrisy and funk.
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Habit is stronger than reason.
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The brute necessity of believing something so long as life lasts does not justify any belief in particular.
George Santayana