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Knowledge about life is one thing effective occupation of a place in life, with its dynamic currents passing through your being, is another.

William James

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William James
Age: 68 †
Born: 1842
Born: January 11
Died: 1910
Died: August 26
Philosopher
Physician
Psychologist
University Teacher
W. James
Place
Dynamic
Thing
Passings
Life
Occupation
Currents
Effective
Passing
Knowledge
Another

More quotes by William James

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Habit is the enormous flywheel of society, its most precious conservative agent. There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision. Full half the time of such a man goes to the deciding, or regretting, of matters which ought to be so ingrained in him as practically not to exist for his consciousness at all.
William James
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Religion . . . shall mean for us the feelings, acts and experiences of individual men in their solitude.
William James
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The thinker philosophizes as the lover loves. Even were the consequences not only useless but harmful, he must obey his impulse.
William James
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Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task.
William James
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We are stereotyped creatures, imitators and copiers of our past selves.
William James
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The perfect stillness of the night was thrilled by a more solemn silence. The darkness held a presence that was all the more felt because it was not seen. I could not any more have doubted that HE was there than that I was. Indeed, I felt myself to be, if possible, the less real of the two.
William James
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Invention, using the term most broadly, and imitation, are the two legs, so to call them, on which the human race historically has walked.
William James
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Experience, as we know, has a way of boiling over, and making us correct our present formulas.
William James
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Religion is a monumental chapter in the history of human egotism.
William James
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The good or bad is not in the circumstance, but only in the mind...that encounters it.
William James
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What a teacher needs to know about psychology might almost be written on the palm of one's hand.
William James
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To give up pretensions is as blessed a relief as to get them ratified.
William James
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a man does not cry because he is sad, he is sad because he cries
William James
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The greatest enemy of any one of our truths may be the rest of our truths.
William James
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I don't sing because I'm happy I'm happy because I sing.
William James
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...as I apprehend the Buddhist doctrine of karma, I agree in principle with that.
William James
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To be conscious means not simply to be, but to be reported, known, to have awareness of one's being added to that being.
William James
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Science herself consults her heart when she lays it down that the infinite ascertainment of fact and correction of false belief are the supreme goods for man.
William James
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Pessimism leads to weakness. Optimism leads to power.
William James
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Your hopes, dreams and aspirations are legitimate. They are trying to take you airborne, above the clouds, above the storms, if you only let them.
William James