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The God of many men is little more than their court of appeal against the damnatory judgment passed on their failures by the opinion of the world.

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
Appeal
Littles
Appeals
Little
Passed
Many
Court
Men
Judgment
World
Philosophy
Opinion
History
Failures

More quotes by William James

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Philosophy is at once the most sublime and the most trivial of human pursuits.
William James
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But petitional prayer is only one department of prayer and if we take the word in the wider sense as meaning every kind of inward communion or conversation with the power recognized as divine, we can easily see that scientific criticism leaves it untouched. Prayer in this wide sense is the very soul and essence of religion.
William James
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Serious development of the personality begins at the closet door.
William James
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The deepest hunger in human beings is the desire to be appreciated.
William James
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A purely disembodied human emotion is a nonentity.
William James
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The war-function has grasped us so far but the constructive interests may some day seem no less imperative, and impose on the individual a hardly lighter burden.
William James
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Lay plans as if we were to be immortal.
William James
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To know an object is to lead to it through a context which the world provides
William James
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... A rule of thinking which would absolutely prevent me from acknowledging certain kinds of truth if those ... truths were really there, would be an irrational rule.
William James
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Smitten as we are with the vision of social righteousness, a God indifferent to everything but adulation, and full of partiality for his individual favorites, lacks an essential element of largeness.
William James
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There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision, and for whom the lighting of every cigar, the drinking of every cup, the time of rising and going to bed every day, and the beginning of every bit of work, are subjects of express volitional deliberation.
William James
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Lives based on having are less free than lives based either on doing or being.
William James
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The history of philosophy is to a great extent that of a certain clash of human temperaments.
William James
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Could the young but realize how soon they will become mere walking bundles of habits, they would give more heed to their conduct while in the plastic state.
William James
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We have grown literally afraid to be poor. We despise anyone who elects to be poor in order to simplify and save his inner life. If he does not join the general scramble and pant with the money-making street, we deem him spiritless and lacking in ambition
William James
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There is but one unconditional commandment ... to bring about the very largest total universe of good which we can see.
William James
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We don't laugh because we're happy - we're happy because we laugh.
William James
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The instant field of the present is at all times what I call the 'pure' experience. It is only virtually or potentially either object or subject as yet.
William James
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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
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An unlearned carpenter of my acquaintance once said in my hearing: There is very little difference between one man and another but what little there is, is very important. This distinction seems to me to go to the root of the matter.
William James