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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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William James
Age: 68 †
Born: 1842
Born: January 11
Died: 1910
Died: August 26
Philosopher
Physician
Psychologist
University Teacher
W. James
Even
Lover
Consequences
Impulse
Useless
Lovers
Consequence
Harmful
Loves
Obey
Must
Thinker

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Most men have a good memory for facts connected with their own pursuits.
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As long as there are postmen, life will have zest.
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You do not sing because you're happy, you're happy because you sing.
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The difference between objective and subjective extension is one of relation to a context solely.
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There are two lives, the natural and the spiritual, and we must lose the one before we can participate in the other.
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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.
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Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake. Our fires are damped, our drafts are checked. We are making use of only a small part of our possible mental and physical resources.
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A new opinion counts as true just in proportion as it gratifies the individual's desire to assimilate the novel in his experience to his beliefs in stock
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With mere good intentions hell is proverbially paved.
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Earnestness means willingness to live with energy, though energy bring pain.
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Language is the most imperfect and expensive means yet discovered for communicating thought.
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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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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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All natural happiness thus seems infected with a contradiction. The breath of the sepulchre surrounds it.
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How pleasant is the day when we give up striving to be young-or slender.
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