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A smattering of everything is worth little. It is a fallacy to suppose that an encyclopaedic knowledge is desirable. The mind is made strong, not through much learning, but by the thorough possession of something.

Louis Agassiz

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Louis Agassiz
Age: 66 †
Born: 1807
Born: May 28
Died: 1873
Died: December 14
Biologist
Botanist
Climatologist
Geologist
Glaciologist
Ichthyologist
Naturalist
Paleontologist
Pathologist
Philosopher
Physician
Motiers
Agassiz
Jean Louis Rudolph Agassiz
Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz
Much
Worth
Made
Learning
Mind
Knowledge
Smattering
Something
Strong
Fallacy
Science
Thorough
Littles
Desirable
Little
Suppose
Everything
Possession

More quotes by Louis Agassiz

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I now never make the preparations for penetrating into some small province of nature hitherto undiscovered without breathing a prayer to the Being who hides His secrets from me only to allure me graciously on to the unfolding of them.
Louis Agassiz
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The surface of the earth is not simply a stage on which the thousands of present and past inhabitants played their parts in turn. There are much more intimate relations between the earth and the living organisms which populated it, and it may even be demonstrated that the earth was developed because of them.
Louis Agassiz
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One naturally asks, what was the use of this great engine set at work ages ago to grind, furrow, and knead over, as it were, the surface of the earth? We have our answer in the fertile soil which spreads over the temperate regions of the globe. The glacier was God's great plough.
Louis Agassiz
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A man cannot be professor of zoölogy on one day and of chemistry on the next, and do good work in both. As in a concert all are musicians,-one plays one instrument, and one another, but none all in perfection.
Louis Agassiz
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Lay aside all conceit Learn to read the book of Nature for yourself. Those who have succeeded best have followed for years some slim thread which once in a while has broadened out and disclosed some treasure worth a life-long search.
Louis Agassiz
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The world has arisen in some way or another. How it originated is the great question, and Darwin's theory, like all other attempts, to explain the origin of life, is thus far merely conjectural. I believe he has not even made the best conjecture possible in the present state of our knowledge.
Louis Agassiz
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The possibilities of existence run so deeply into the extravagant that there is scarcely any conception too extraordinary for Nature to realise.
Louis Agassiz
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It is better to have a few forms well known than to teach a little about many hundred species. Better a dozen specimens thoroughly studied as the result of the first year's work, than to have two thousand dollars' worth of shells and corals bought from a curiosity-shop. The dozen animals would be your own.
Louis Agassiz
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Facts are the words of God, and we may heap them together endlessly, but they will teach us little or nothing till we place them in their true relations, and recognize the thought that binds them together.
Louis Agassiz
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Philosophers and theologians have yet to learn that a physical fact is as sacred as a moral principle. Our own nature demands from us this double allegiance.
Louis Agassiz
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The time has come when scientific truth must cease to be the property of the few, when it must be woven into the common life of the world.
Louis Agassiz
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The office of science is not to record possibilities but to ascertain what nature does ... As far as Darwinism deals with mere arguments of possibilities or even probabilities, without a basis of fact, it departs from the true scientific method and injures science, as most of the devotees of the new ism have already done.
Louis Agassiz
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I will frankly tell you that my experience in prolonged scientific investigations convinces me that a belief in God-a God who is behind and within the chaos of vanishing points of human knowledge-adds a wonderful stimulus to the man who attempts to penetrate into the regions of the unknown.
Louis Agassiz
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I may say that here, as in most cases where the operations of nature interfere with the designs of man, it is not by a direct intervention on our part that we may remedy the difficulties, but rather by a precise knowledge of their causes, which may enable us, if not to check, at least to avoid the evil consequences.
Louis Agassiz
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The study of Nature is intercourse with the Highest Mind.
Louis Agassiz
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The world is the geologist's great puzzle-box he stands before it like the child to whom the separate pieces of his puzzle remain a mystery till he detects their relation and sees where they fit, and then his fragments grow at once into a connected picture beneath his hand.
Louis Agassiz
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But unless some great revolution in nature modifies the present relative level between land and sea, it may safely be maintained that the present outer reef is the final southern boundary of the North American continent.
Louis Agassiz
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In Europe I have been accused of taking my scientific ideas from the Church. In America I have been called a heretic, because I will not let my church-going friends pat me on the head.
Louis Agassiz
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You cannot do without one specialty. You must have some base-line to measure the work and attainments of others. For a general view of the subject, study the history of the sciences. Broad knowledge of all Nature has been the possession of no naturalist except Humboldt, and general relations constituted his specialty.
Louis Agassiz
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The resources of the Deity cannot be so meagre, that, in order to create a human being endowed with reason, he must change a monkey into a man.
Louis Agassiz