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Asceticism may be a mere expression of organic hardihood, disgusted with too much ease.

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
Asceticism
Disgusted
Organic
Ease
Mere
Expression
May
Much
Hardihood

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If you only care enough for a result, you will almost certainly attain it. Only you must, then, really wish these things, and wish them exclusively, and not wish at the same time a hundred other incompatible things just as strongly.
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Materialism means simply the denial that the moral order is eternal, and the cutting off of ultimate hopes spiritualism means theaffirmation of an eternal moral order and the letting loose of hope.
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I don't sing because I'm happy I'm happy because I sing.
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Our life is always deeper than we know, is always more divine than it seems, and hence we are able to survive degradations and despairs which otherwise must engulf us.
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So it is with children who learn to read fluently and well: They begin to take flight into whole new worlds as effortlessly as young birds take to the sky.
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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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You may not get everything you dream about, but you will never get anything you don't dream about.
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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.
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The instinct of ownership is fundamental in man's nature.
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The one who thinks over his experiences most, and weaves them into systematic relations with each other, will be the one with the best memory.
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Truth is what will be steadily borne out by subsequent experience
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Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling.
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Wisdom is learning what to overlook.
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The ideas gained by men before they are twenty-five are practically the only ideas they shall have in their lives.
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A man may not achieve everything he has dreamed, but he will never achieve anything great without having dreamed it first.
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The more rational statement is that we feel sorry because we strike, afraid because we tremble, and not that we cry, strike, or tremble because we are sorry, angry, or fearful as the case may be.
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The greatest enemy of any one of our truths may be the rest of our truths.
William James
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Our minds thus grow in spots and like grease-spots, the spots spread. But we let them spread as little as possible: we keep unaltered as much of our old knowledge, as many of our old prejudices and beliefs, as we can. We patch and tinker more than we renew. The novelty soaks in it stains the ancient mass but it is also tinged by what absorbs it.
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To study the abnormal is the best way of understanding the normal.
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It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
William James