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It is art that makes life, and I know of no substitute whatsoever for the force and beauty of its process.

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
Art
Life
Whatsoever
Substitute
Substitutes
Beauty
Force
Process
Makes

More quotes by William James

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My first act of free will shall be to believe in free will.
William James
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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.
William James
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The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community.
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Faith is one of the forces by which men live, and the total absence of it means collapse
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Give your dreams all you've got, and you'll be amazed at the energy that comes out of you.
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A winner's attitude: it may be difficult, but it's possible. A loser's attitude: It may be possible, but it's too difficult.
William James
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If an unusual necessity forces us onward, a surprising thing occurs. The fatigue gets worse up to a certain point, when, gradually or suddenly, it passes away and we are fresher than before!
William James
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Philosophy is an unusually stubborn attempt to think clearly.
William James
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No living person is sunk so low as not to be imitated by somebody.
William James
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The difference between the first and second-best things in art absolutely seems to escape verbal definition -- it is a matter of a hair, a shade, an inward quiver of some kind -- yet what miles away in the point of preciousness!
William James
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The essence of genius is to know what to overlook.
William James
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Philosophy lives in words, but truth and fact well up into our lives in ways that exceed verbal formulation. There is in the living act of perception always something that glimmers and twinkles and will not be caught, and for which reflection comes too late.
William James
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As we take, in fact, a general view of the wonderful stream of our consciousness, what strikes us first is this different pace of its parts. Like a bird 's life, it seems to be made of an alternation of flights and perchings.
William James
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Faith is synonymous with working hypothesis.
William James
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From a pragmatic point of view, the difference between living against a background of foreigness (an indifferent Universe) and one of intimacy (a benevolent Universe) means the difference between a general habit of wariness and one of trust.
William James
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The same is true of Love, and the instinctive desire to please those whom we love. The teacher who succeeds in getting herself loved by the pupils will obtain results which one of a more forbidding temperament finds it impossible to secure.
William James
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Footnotes -- little dogs yapping at the heels of the text
William James
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The great thing, then, in all education, is to make our nervous system our ally instead of our enemy.
William James
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Belief creates the actual fact.
William James
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There can be no final truth in ethics any more than in physics, until the last man has had his experience and said his say.
William James