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In the contemplation of beauty we are raised above ourselves, the passions are silenced and we are happy in the recognition of a good that we do not seek to possess.

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
Good
Passions
Possess
Recognition
Seek
Raised
Passion
Beauty
Silenced
Happy
Contemplation

More quotes by George Santayana

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There is nothing to which men, while they have food and drink, cannot reconcile themselves.
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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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Beautiful things, when taste is formed, are obviously and unaccountably beautiful.
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Chaos is a name for any order that produces confusion in our minds.
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A child educated only at school is an uneducated child.
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Wisdom lies in taking everything with good humor and a grain of salt.
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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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Catastrophes come when some dominant institution, swollen like a soap-bubble and still standing without foundations, suddenly crumbles at the touch of what may seem a word or idea, but is really some stronger material source.
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Advertising is the modern substitute for argument its function is to make the worse appear the better.
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There is wisdom in turning as often as possible from the familiar to the unfamiliar: it keeps the mind nimble, it kills prejudice, and it fosters humor.
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The traveller must be somebody and come from somewhere, so that his definite character and moral traditions may supply an organ and a point of comparison for his observations.
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The God to whom depth in philosophy bring back men's minds is far from being the same from whom a little philosophy estranges them
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Man's most serious activity is play.
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Fun is a good thing but only when it spoils nothing better.
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The Bible is a wonderful source of inspiration for those who don't understand it.
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O world, thou choosest not the better part! It is not wisdom to be only wise, And on the inward vision close the eyes, But it is wisdom to believe the heart. Columbus found a world, and had no chart, Save one that faith deciphered in the skies To trust the soul's invincible surmise Was all his science and his only art.
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Christianity persecuted, tortured, and burned. Like a hound it tracked the very scent of heresy. It kindled wars, and nursed furious hatreds and ambitions... Man, far from being freed from his natural passions, was plunged into artificial ones quite as violent and much more disappointing.
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The philosophy of the common man is an old wife that gives him no pleasure, yet he cannot live without her, and resents any aspersions that strangers may cast on her character.
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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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The works of nature first acquire a meaning in the commentaries they provoke.
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