Bertrand Russell Quotes - Page 25

• As a philosopher, if I were speaking to a purely philosophic audience I should say that I ought to describe myself as an Agnostic, because I do not think that there is a conclusive argument by which one can prove that there is not a God. On the other hand, if I am to convey the right impression to the ordinary man in the street I think that I ought to say that I am an Atheist, because, when I say that I cannot prove that there is not a God, I ought to add equally that I cannot prove that there are not the Homeric gods.

  Bertrand Russell

  Atheist, Men, Thinking

  Bertrand Russell, John G. Slater, Peter Köllner (1997). “Last Philosophical Testament: 1943-68”, p.91, Psychology Press

  12 Copy quote

• Man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; no fire, no heroism, no intensity of though and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave.

  Bertrand Russell

  Men, Fire, Feelings

  Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.107, Simon and Schuster

  7 Copy quote

• You could take up the line that some of the gnostics took up - a line which I often thought was a very plausible one - that as a matter of fact this world that we know was made by the devil at a moment when God was not looking. There is a good deal to be said for that, and I am not concerned to refute it.

  Bertrand Russell

  Devil, Matter, Facts

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Bertrand Russell's Best”, p.119, Routledge

  9 Copy quote

• It seems to us unwise to have insisted on teaching geometry to the younger Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, in order to make him a good king, but from Plato's point of view it was essential. He was sufficiently Pythagorean to think that without mathematics no true wisdom is possible.

  Bertrand Russell

  Kings, Plato, Teaching

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “History of Western Philosophy: Collectors Edition”, p.95, Routledge

  7 Copy quote

• Language serves not only to express thought but to make possible thoughts which could not exist without it.

  Bertrand Russell

  Learning, Language, Programming

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.106, Routledge

  7 Copy quote

• I must, before I die, find some way to say the essential thing that is in me, that I have never said yet -- a thing that is not love or hate or pity or scorn, but the very breath of life, fierce and coming from far away, bringing into human life the vastness and the fearful passionless force of non-human things.

  Bertrand Russell

  Hate, Essentials, Vastness

  Bertrand Russell (1995). “My Philosophical Development”, p.193, Psychology Press

  15 Copy quote

• (on A History of Western Philosophy) I was sometimes accused by reviewers of writing not a true history but a biased account of the events that I arbitrarily chose to write of. But to my mind, a man without a bias cannot write interesting history - if, indeed, such man exists.

  Bertrand Russell

  Philosophy, Writing, Men

  Bertrand Russell (2014). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell”, p.465, Routledge

  9 Copy quote

• The human heart as modern civilization has made it is more prone to hatred than to friendship. And it is prone to hatred because it is dissatisfied.

  Bertrand Russell

  Heart, Civilization, Hatred

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.53, Lulu Press, Inc

  11 Copy quote

• Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand-in-hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those two things. In this world we can now begin a little to understand things, and a little to master them by the help of science, which has forced its way step by step against the Christian religion, against the churches, and against the opposition of all the old precepts.

  Bertrand Russell

  Christian, Hands, Two

  Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.22, Simon and Schuster

  8 Copy quote

• Physics is mathematical not because we know so much about the physical world, but because we know so little; it is only its mathematical properties that we can discover.

  Bertrand Russell

  Humility, Math, Science

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “An Outline of Philosophy”, p.171, Routledge

  16 Copy quote

• ...I am afraid that education is conceived more in terms of indoctrination by most school officials than in terms of enlightenment. My own belief is that education must be subversive if it is to be meaningful. By this I mean that it must challenge all the things we take for granted, examine all accepted assumptions, tamper with every sacred cow, and instill a desire to question and doubt. Without this the mere instruction to memorise data is empty. The attempt to enforce conventional mediocrity on the young is criminal.

  Bertrand Russell

  Meaningful, School, Data

  16 Copy quote

• Many people when they fall in love look for a little haven of refuge from the world, where they can be sure of being admired when they are not admirable, and praised when they are not praiseworthy.

  Bertrand Russell

  Love, Fall, People

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.66, W. W. Norton & Company

  62 Copy quote

• The criminal law has, from the point of view of thwarted virtue, the merit of allowing an outlet for those impulses of aggression which cowardice, disguised as morality, restrains in their more spontaneous forms. War has the same merit. You must not kill you neighbor, whom perhaps you genuinely hate, but by a little propaganda this hate can be transferred to some foreign nation, against whom all your murderous impulses become patriotic heroism.

  Bertrand Russell

  Hate, War, Patriotic

  4 Copy quote

• From the height of their disillusionment they look down upon those whom they despise as simple souls. For my part I have no sympathy with this outlook. All disenchantment is to me a malady, which, it is true, certain circumstances may render inevitable, but which none the less, when it occurs, is to be cured as soon as possible, not to be regarded as a higher form of wisdom.

  Bertrand Russell

  Simple, Soul, May

  4 Copy quote

• Mathematics rightly viewed possesses not only truth but supreme beauty.

  Bertrand Russell

  Math, Western Philosophy, Mathematics

  "The Study of Mathematics" (1902)

  44 Copy quote

• To avoid the various foolish opinions to which mankind are prone, no superhuman genius is required. A few simple rules will keep you, not from all error, but from silly error.

  Bertrand Russell

  Silly, Simple, Errors

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.66, Routledge

  6 Copy quote

• To fear love is to fear life.

  Bertrand Russell

  Love You, Love Life, Love Is

  Marriage and Morals (1929) ch. 19

  23 Copy quote

• When you come to look into this argument from design, it is a most astonishing thing that people can believe that this world, with all the things that are in it, with all its defects, should be the best that omnipotence and omniscience has been able to produce in millions of years.

  Bertrand Russell

  Believe, Years, Omnipotence

  Bertrand Russell, John Greer Slater, Peter Köllner (1996). “A Fresh Look at Empiricism: 1927-42”, p.185, Psychology Press

  4 Copy quote

• The pursuit of knowledge is, I think, mainly actuated by love of power. And so are all advances in scientific technique.

  Bertrand Russell

  Power, Thinking, Technique

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “Human Society in Ethics and Politics”, p.164, Routledge

  17 Copy quote

• Education, which was at first made universal in order that all might be able to read and write, has been found capable of serving quite other purposes. By instilling nonsense it unifies populations and generates collective enthusiasm.

  Bertrand Russell

  Education, Writing, School

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.61, Routledge

  8 Copy quote

• You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress in humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or every mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principle enemy of moral progress in the world.

  Bertrand Russell

  Christian, War, Race

  Bertrand Russell, Robert Edward Egner (1961). “The basic writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959”

  12 Copy quote

• The moral thing I should wish to say to them is very simple; I should say: "Love is wise - Hatred is foolish." In this world, which is getting more and more closely interconnected, we have to learn to tolerate each other.

  Bertrand Russell

  Wise, Love Is, Hatred

  YouTube Channel "RationalOutlet"/"Bertrand Russell - The Wisest Man", www.youtube.com. May 28, 2010.

  8 Copy quote

• Is the set of all sets which are not members of themselves a member of itself?

  Bertrand Russell

  Members

  4 Copy quote

• It is entirely clear that there is only one way in which great wars can be permanently prevented, and that is the establishment of an international government with a monopoly of serious armed force.

  Bertrand Russell

  War, Government, Serious

  David Herbert Lawrence, Bertrand Russell (1948). “Letters to Bertrand Russell”

  5 Copy quote

• The difficulty is old, but none the less real. An omnipotent being who created a world containing evil not due to sin must Himself be at least partially evil.

  Bertrand Russell

  God, Real, Evil

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Bertrand Russell's Best”, p.33, Routledge

  5 Copy quote

You May Also Like:

Ludwig Wittgenstein

Gottlob Frege

Alfred North Whitehead

David Hume

Russell Crowe

G. H. Hardy

Immanuel Kant

Jean-Paul Sartre