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[Religion is] the attempt to be in harmony with an unseen order of things.

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
Things
Unseen
Attempt
Harmony
Grace
Religion
Order

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Events are influenced by our very great desires.
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I don't see how an epigram, being a bolt from the blue, with no introduction or cue, ever gets itself writ.
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The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.
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A great idea goes through three stages on its way to acceptance: 1) it is dismissed as nonsense, 2) it is acknowledged as true, but insignificant, 3) finally, it is seen to be important, but not really anything new.
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The aim of science is always to reduce complexity to simplicity.
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This life is worth living, we can say, since it is what we make it.
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Mankind's common instinct for reality has always held the world to be essentially a theatre for heroism.
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Pretend what we may, the whole man within us is at work when we form our philosophical opinions.
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...These healers...my intellect has been unable to assimilate their theories....But their facts are patent and startling and anything that interferes with the multiplication of such facts, and with our freest opportunity of observing and studying them, will, I believe, be a public calamity.
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In any project the important factor is your belief. Without belief, there can be no successful outcome.
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Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.
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Philosophy, beginning in wonder, as Plato and Aristotle said, is able to fancy everything different from what it is. It sees the familiar as if it were strange, and the strange as if it were familiar. It can take things up and lay them down again. It rouses us from our native dogmatic slumber and breaks up our caked prejudices.
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In the last analysis, then, we believe that we all know and think about and talk about the same world because we believe our PERCEPTS are possessed by us in common
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All natural goods perish. Riches take wings fame is a breath love is a cheat youth and health and pleasure vanish.
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The deepest hunger in human beings is the desire to be appreciated.
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[T]here is very little difference between one person and another, but what little difference ther eis, is very important.
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Why should we think upon things that are lovely? Because thinking determines life. It is a common habit to blame life upon the environment. Environment modifies life but does not govern life. The soul is stronger than its surroundings.
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Faith branches off the highroad before reason begins
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You must bring out of each word its practical cash-value, set it at work within the stream of your experience.
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In all primary school work the principle of multiple impressions is well recognized.
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