It is not sheer malice that pricks our ears to evil reports about our fellow men. For there are frequent moments when we feel lower than the lowest of mankind, and this opinion of ourselves isolates us. Hence the rumor that all flesh is base comes almost as a message of hope. It breaks down the wall that has kept us apart, and we feel one with humanity.
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Our knowledge and our ability to handle our problems progress through the open conflict of ideas, through the tests of read more
Our knowledge and our ability to handle our problems progress through the open conflict of ideas, through the tests of phenomenological adequacy, inner consistency, and practical-moral consequences. Reason may err, but it can be moral. If we must err, let it be on the side of our creativity, our freedom, our betterment.
When we can't dream any longer, we die.
When we can't dream any longer, we die.
The power of habit and the charm of novelty are the two adverse forces which explain the follies of mankind.
The power of habit and the charm of novelty are the two adverse forces which explain the follies of mankind.
We envy those whose possessions or achievements are a reflection on our own. They are our neighbors and equals. It read more
We envy those whose possessions or achievements are a reflection on our own. They are our neighbors and equals. It is they, above all who make plain the nature of our failure.
It seems, in fact, as though the second half of a man's life is made up of nothing, but the read more
It seems, in fact, as though the second half of a man's life is made up of nothing, but the habits he has accumulated during the first half.
In matters of intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard for any other consideration.
In matters of intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard for any other consideration.
Every extreme attitude is a flight from the self.
Every extreme attitude is a flight from the self.
There are in fact four very different stumbling blocks in the way of grasping the truth, which hinder every man read more
There are in fact four very different stumbling blocks in the way of grasping the truth, which hinder every man however learned, and scarcely allow anyone to win a clear title to wisdom, namely, the example of weak and unworthy authority, longstanding custom, the feeling of the ignorant crowd, and the hiding of our own ignorance while making a display of our apparent knowledge.
To illustrate the difference between the innovator and the dull crowd of routinists who cannot even imagine that any improvement read more
To illustrate the difference between the innovator and the dull crowd of routinists who cannot even imagine that any improvement is possible, we need only refer to a passage in Engel's most famous book. Here, in 1878, Engels apodictically announced that military weapons are "now so perfected that no further progress of any revolutionizing influence is any longer possible." Henceforth "all further [technological] progress is by and large indifferent for land warfare. The age of evolution is in this regard essentially closed." This complacent conclusion shows in what the achievement of the innovator consists: he accomplishes what other people believe to be unthinkable and unfeasible.
