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The belief in free-will is not in the least incompatible with the belief in Providence, provided you do not restrict the Providence to fulminating nothing but fatal decrees.

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
Fatal
Providence
Provided
Least
Belief
Decrees
Free
Restrict
Nothing
Incompatible
Decree

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We hear the words we have spoken, feel our own blow as we give it, or read in the bystander's eyes the success or failure of our conduct.
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Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second.
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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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Psychology ought certainly to give the teacher radical help.
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True is the name for whatever idea starts the verification process, useful is the name for its completed function in experience
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I know that you, ladies and gentlemen, have a philosophy, each and all of you, and that the most interesting and important thing about you is the way in which it determines the perspective in your several worlds.
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General scepticism is the live mental attitude of refusing to conclude. It is a permanent torpor of the will, renewing itself in detail towards each successive thesis that offers, and you can no more kill it off by logic than you can kill off obstinacy or practical joking.
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No living person is sunk so low as not to be imitated by somebody.
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Act in earnest and you will become earnest in all you do.
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As a rule we disbelieve all the facts and theories for which we have no use.
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There can be no difference anywhere that does not make a difference somewhere.
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Good-humor is a philosophic state of mind it seems to say to Nature that we take her no more seriously than she takes us. I maintain that one should always talk of philosophy with a smile.
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Man, biologically considered ... is simply the most formidable of all beasts of prey, and, indeed, the only one that preys systematically on its own kind.
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There's nothing so absurd that if you repeat it often enough, people will believe it.
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It would probably astound each of them beyond measure to be let into his neighbor's mind and to find how different the scenery there was from that in his own.
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Our errors are surely not such awfully solemn things. In a world where we are so certain to incur them in spite of all our caution, a certain lightness of heart seems healthier than this excessive nervousness on their behalf.
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Wisdom is learning what to overlook.
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I am well aware how odd it must seem to some of you to hear me say that an idea is true so long as to believe it is profitable to our lives
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Need and struggle are what excite and inspire us our hour of triumph is what brings the void.
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Everything which is demanded is by that fact a good.
William James