Quote

It seems the natural thing for us to listen whilst the Europeans talk.

William James

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

William James
Age: 68 †
Born: 1842
Born: January 11
Died: 1910
Died: August 26
Philosopher
Physician
Psychologist
University Teacher
W. James
Talk
Natural
Political
Seems
Thing
Europeans
Whilst
Listen
Politics

More quotes by William James

Image
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
Image
The states of consciousness are all that psychology needs to do her work with. Metaphysics or theology may prove the Soul to exist but for psychology the hypothesis of such a substantial principle of unity is superfluous.
William James
Image
True ideas are those that we can assimilate, validate, corroborate, and verify. False ideas are those that we cannot. That is the practical difference it makes to us to have true ideas that therefore is the meaning of truth, for it is all that truth is known as.
William James
Image
Our volitional habits depend, then, first, on what the stock of ideas is which we have and, second, on the habitual coupling of the several ideas with action or inaction respectively.
William James
Image
Selection is the very keel on which our mental ship is built. And in this case of memory its utility is obvious. If we remembered everything, we should on most occasions be as ill off as if we remembered nothing.
William James
Image
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
William James
Image
My first act of free will shall be to believe in free will.
William James
Image
Compared to what we ought to be, we are half awake.
William James
Image
As there is no worse lie than a truth misunderstood by those who hear it, so reasonable arguments, challenges to magnanimity, and appeals to sympathy or justice, are folly when we are dealing with human crocodiles and boa-constrictors.
William James
Image
To change one's life: a. Start immediately b. B. Do it flamboyantly c. No exceptions Never suffer an exception to occur till the new habit is securely rooted.
William James
Image
The minute a man ceases to grow, no matter what his years, that minute he begins to be old.
William James
Image
We don't laugh because we're happy - we're happy because we laugh.
William James
Image
All the qualities of a man acquire dignity when he knows that the service of the collectivity that owns him needs them. If proud of the collectivity, his own pride rises in proportion. No collectivity is like an army for nourishing such pride.
William James
Image
An educated memory depends on an organized system of associations and its goodness depends on two of their peculiarities: first, on the persistency of the associations and, second, on their number.
William James
Image
The amount of psychology which is necessary to all teachers need not be very great.
William James
Image
As Charles Lamb says, there is nothing so nice as doing good by stealth and being found out by accident, so I now say it is even nicer to make heroic decisions and to be prevented by 'circumstances beyond your control' from ever trying to execute them.
William James
Image
An idea will infect another with its own emotional interest when they have become both associated together into any sort of a mental total.
William James
Image
Ninety-nine hundredths or, possibly, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousandths of our activity is purely automatic and habitual, from our rising in the morning to our lying down each night.
William James
Image
Most people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being. They make very small use of their possible consciousness, and of their soul's resources in general, much like a man who, out of his whole bodily organism, should get into a habit of using and moving only his little finger.
William James
Image
We are not only gregarious animals, liking to be in sight of our fellows, but we have an innate propensity to get ourselves noticed, and noticed favorably, by our kind.
William James