Mere Quotes - Page 7

• I really see no harm which can come of giving our children a little knowledge of physiology. ... The instruction must be real, based upon observation, eked out by good explanatory diagrams and models, and conveyed by a teacher whose own knowledge has been acquired by a study of the facts; and not the mere catechismal parrot-work which too often usurps the place of elementary teaching.

  Thomas Huxley

  Education, Teacher, Children

  Thomas Henry Huxley (1882). “Science and Culture: And Other Essays”

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• Intelligence makes clear to us the interrelationship of means and ends. But mere thinking cannot give us a sense of the ultimate and fundamental ends. To make clear these fundamental ends and valuations and to set them fast in the emotional life of the individual, seems to me precisely the most important function which religion has to form in the social life of man.

  Albert Einstein

  Mean, Thinking, Men

  Albert Einstein (1995). “Ideas and Opinions”, Three Rivers Press

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• A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for a second; that second for a third; and so on, till the bulk of the society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery, to have no sensibilities left but for sin and suffering.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Adversity, Suffering, Principles

  Thomas Jefferson, Andrew M. Allison (1983). “The Real Thomas Jefferson”, Natl Center for Constitutional

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• The one resolution, which was in my mind long before it took the form of a resolution, is the key-note of my life. It is this, always to regard as mere impertinences of fate the handicaps which were placed upon my life almost at the beginning. I resolved that they should not crush or dwarf my soul, but rather be made to blossom, like Aaron's rod, with flowers.

  Helen Keller

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

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• The mere fact that you have obstacles to overcome is in your favor.

  Robert Collier

  Inspirational, Struggle, Overcoming

  Robert Collier (2009). “Riches Within Your Reach!”, p.207, Penguin

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• Surely no mere mortal who has at all gone down into himself will ever pretend that his slightest thought or act solely originates in his own defined identity.

  Herman Melville

  Identity, Gone, Free Will

  Herman Melville (1852). “Pierre; Or, The Ambiguities”, p.239

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• The inward persuasion that we are free to do, or not to do a thing, is but a mere illusion. If we trace the true principle of our actions, we shall find, that they are always necessary consequences of our volitions and desires, which are never in our power. You think yourself free, because you do what you will; but are you free to will, or not to will; to desire, or not to desire? Are not your volitions and desires necessarily excited by objects or qualities totally independent of you?

  Baron d'Holbach

  Independent, Thinking, Desire

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• My belief is firm in a law of compensation. The true rewards are ever in proportion to the labor and sacrifices made. This is one of the reasons why I feel certain that of all my inventions, the Magnifying Transmitter will prove most important and valuable to future generations. I am prompted to this prediction not so much by thoughts of the commercial and industrial revolution which it will surely bring about, but of the humanitarian consequences of the many achievements it makes possible. Considerations of mere utility weigh little in the balance against the higher benefits of civilization.

  Nikola Tesla

  Hard Work, Sacrifice, Law

  Nikola Tesla (2016). “My Inventions: [Illustrated & Biography Added]”, p.79, eKitap Projesi

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• When people talk as if the Crusades were nothing more than an aggressive raid against Islam, they seem to forget in the strangest way that Islam itself was only an aggressive raid against the old and ordered civilization in these parts. I do not say it in mere hostility to the religion of Mahomet; I am fully conscious of many values and virtues in it; but certainly it was Islam that was the invasion and Christendom that was the thing invaded.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Civilization, People, Islam

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• It is quite an old-fashioned fallacy to suppose that our objection to scepticism is that it removes the discipline from life. Our objection to scepticism is that it removes the motive power. Materialism is not a thing which destroys mere restraint. Materialism itself is the great restraint.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Discipline, Materialism, Old Fashioned

  Gilbert K. Chesterton (2013). “The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton”, p.213, Simon and Schuster

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• I had no ambition to make a fortune. Mere money-making has never been my goal, I had an ambition to build.

  John D. Rockefeller

  Money, Attitude, Ambition

  John D. Rockefeller (2015). “John D. Rockefeller on Making Money: Advice and Words of Wisdom on Building and Sharing Wealth”, p.16, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

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• Do not judge men by mere appearances; for the light laughter that bubbles on the lip often mantles over the depths of sadness, and the serious look may be the sober veil that covers a divine peace and joy.

  Edwin Hubbel Chapin

  Sad, Laughter, Ex Boyfriend

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• Lastly, the great uncertainty of all data in War is a peculiar difficulty, because all action must, to a certain extent, be planned in a mere twilight, which in addition not unfrequently — like the effect of a fog or moonshine — gives to things exaggerated dimensions and an unnatural appearance.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  War, Twilight, Data

  "On War".

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• Society is not a mere sum of individuals. Rather, the system formed by their association represents a specific reality which has its own characteristics... The group thinks, feels, and acts quite differently from the way in which its members would were they isolated. If, then, we begin with the individual, we shall be able to understand nothing of what takes place in the group.

  Emile Durkheim

  Reality, Thinking, Groups

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• Nothing will ever equal that moment of joyous excitement which filled my whole being when I felt myself flying away from the earth. It was not mere pleasure; it was perfect bliss. Escaped from the frightful torments of persecution and of calumny, I felt that I was answering all in rising above all.

  Jacques Charles

  Airplane, Calumny Is, Perfect

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• Evolution in the biosphere is therefore a necessarily irreversible process defining a direction in time; a direction which is the same as that enjoined by the law of increasing entropy, that is to say, the second law of thermodynamics. This is far more than a mere comparison: the second law is founded upon considerations identical to those which establish the irreversibility of evolution. Indeed, it is legitimate to view the irreversibility of evolution as an expression of the second law in the biosphere.

  Jacques Monod

  Science, Views, Expression

  Jacques Monod (1971). “Chance and necessity: an essay on the natural philosophy of modern biology”

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• Every one is fond of comparing himself to something great and grandiose, as Louis XIV likened himself to the sun, and others have had like similes. I am more humble. I am a mere street scavenger (chiffonier) of science. With my hook in my hand and my basket on my back, I go about the streets of science, collecting what I find.

  Francois Magendie

  Humble, Humility, Science

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• Those who would most scornfully repudiate Christianity as a mere "opiate of the people" have a contempt for the rich, that is, for all mankind except the poor.

  C. S. Lewis

  Atheist, People, Opiates

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• Self is the opaque veil that hides the Face of God from us. It can be removed only in spiritual experience, never by mere instruction.

  Aiden Wilson Tozer

  Spiritual, Atheist, Self

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• In many cultures it is customary to answer that God created the universe out of nothing. But this is mere temporizing. If we wish courageously to pursue the question, we must, of course ask next where God comes from? And if we decide this to be unanswerable, why not save a step and conclude that the universe has always existed?

  Carl Sagan

  Atheist, Religion, Wish

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• If some good evidence for life after death were announced, I'd be eager to examine it; but it would have to be real scientific data, not mere anecdote. As with the face on Mars and alien abductions, better the hard truth, I say, than the comforting fantasy.

  Carl Sagan

  Atheist, Real, Data

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.263, Ballantine Books

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• The Bible is no mere book, but a Living Creature, with a power that conquers all that oppose it.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Bible, Book, Biblical

  The Watchtower magazine, May 15, 1992.

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• All cravings are the mind seeking salvation or fulfillment in external things and in the future as a substitute for the joy of Being. As long as I am my mind, I am those cravings, those needs, wants, attachments, and aversions, and apart from them there is no "I" except as a mere possibility, an unfulfilled potential, a seed that has not yet sprouted.

  Eckhart Tolle

  Happiness, Spiritual, Thinking

  Eckhart Tolle (2010). “The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment”, p.31, New World Library

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• For I have shown from the Scriptures, that no one of the sons of Adam is as to everything, and absolutely, called God, or named Lord. But that He is Himself in His own right, beyond all men who ever lived, God, and Lord, and King Eternal, and the Incarnate Word, proclaimed by all the prophets, the apostles, and by the Spirit Himself, may be seen by all who have attained to even a small portion of the truth. Now the Scriptures would not have testified these things of Him, if, like others, He had been a mere man.

  Irenaeus of Lyons

  Jesus, Kings, Son

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• As poverty has been reduced in terms of mere survival, it has become more profound in terms of our way of life.

  Raoul Vaneigem

  Life, Profound, Survival

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