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A new position of responsibility will usually show a man to be a far stronger creature than was supposed.

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
Usually
Position
Responsibility
Show
Creature
Shows
Ethics
Men
Supposed
Stronger
Creatures

More quotes by William James

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Men habitually use only a small part of the power which they actually possess.
William James
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Where quality is the thing sought after, the thing of supreme quality is cheap, whatever the price one has to pay for it.
William James
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Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity.
William James
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We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and never to be undone. Every smallest stroke of virtue or of vice leaves its never so little scar. ...Nothing we ever do is, in strict scientific literalness, wiped out.
William James
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I take it that no man is educated who has never dallied with the thought of suicide.
William James
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Lives based on having are less free than lives based either on doing or being.
William James
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In modern eyes, precious though wars may be they must not be waged solely for the sake of the ideal harvest. Only when forced upon one, is a war now thought permissible.
William James
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My experience is what I agree to attend to.
William James
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Tension is a habit. Relaxing is a habit. Bad habits can be broken, good habits formed.
William James
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Lets take full advantage of this discovery
William James
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Our lives are like islands in the sea, or like trees in the forest. The maple and the pine may whisper to each other with their leaves ... But the trees also commingle their roots in the darkness underground, and the islands also hang together through the ocean's bottom.
William James
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Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second.
William James
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Intelligence is a fixed goal with variable means of achieving it.
William James
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There is an organic affinity between joyousness and tenderness.
William James
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In this real world of sweat and dirt, it seems to me that when a view of things is 'noble,' that ought to count as presumption against its truth, and as a philosophic disqualification. The prince of darkness may be a gentleman, as we are told he is, but whatever the God of earth and heaven is, he can surely be no gentleman.
William James
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Our minds thus grow in spots and like grease-spots, the spots spread. But we let them spread as little as possible: we keep unaltered as much of our old knowledge, as many of our old prejudices and beliefs, as we can. We patch and tinker more than we renew. The novelty soaks in it stains the ancient mass but it is also tinged by what absorbs it.
William James
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It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
William James
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The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes.
William James
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We can act as if there were a God feel as if we were free consider Nature as if she were full of special designs lay plans as if we were to be immortal and we find then that these words do make a genuine difference in our moral life.
William James
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... the intellect, everywhere invasive, shows everywhere its shallowing effect.
William James