The function of ignoring, of inattention, is as vital a factor in mental progress as the function of attention itself. — William James Copy Share Image
So with the man who has daily inured himself to habits of concentrated attention, energetic volition, and self-denial in unnecessary things. He… — William James Copy Share Image
The exercise of voluntary attention in the schoolroom must therefore be counted one of the most important points of training that take… — William James Copy Share Image
From all these facts there emerges a very simple abstract program for the teacher to follow in keeping the attention of the… — William James Copy Share Image
The last peculiarity of consciousness to which attention is to be drawn in this first rough description of its stream is that… — William James Copy Share Image
All that we need explicitly to note is that, the more the passive attention is relied on, by keeping the material interesting;… — William James Copy Share Image
We divert our attention from disease and death as much as we can; the slaughterhouses are huddled out of sight and never… — William James Copy Share Image
Geniuses are commonly believed to excel other men in their power of sustained attention . . . But it is their genius… — William James Copy Share Image
The prescription is that the subject must be made to show new aspects of itself; to prompt new questions; in a word,… — William James Copy Share Image
That reality is 'independent' means that there is something in every experience that escapes our arbitrary control. If it be a sensible… — William James Copy Share Image
In teaching, you must simply work your pupil into such a state of interest in what you are going to teach him… — William James Copy Share Image
A genius is the man in whom you are least likely to find the power of attending to anything insipid or distasteful… — William James Copy Share Image
“Everyone knows what attention is. It is taking possession of the mind, in clear and vivid form, of one out of what… — William James Copy Share Image
Effort is the one strictly undervalued and original contribution we make to this world. — William James Copy Share
We are all potentially such sick men. The sanest and best of us are of one clay with lunatics and prison-inmates. And whenever we… — William James Copy Share
In the dim background of our mind we know meanwhile what we ought to be doing: getting up, dressing ourselves, answering the person who… — William James Copy Share
“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… — William James Copy Share
Woe to him whose beliefs play fast and loose with the order which realities follow in his experience; they will lead him nowhere or… — William James Copy Share
We never fully grasp the import of any true statement until we have a clear notion of what the opposite untrue statement would be. — William James Copy Share
Most people, probably, are in doubt about certain matters ascribed to their past. They may have seen them, may have said them, done them,… — William James Copy Share
“How soon, indeed, are human things forgotten! As we meet here this morning, the Southern sun is shining on their place of burial, and… — William James Copy Share
There can be no difference anywhere that does not make a difference somewhere. — William James Copy Share
It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. — William James Copy Share
The pragmatist turns away from abstraction and insufficiency, from verbal solutions, from bad a priori reasons, from fixed principles, closed systems, and pretended absolutes… — William James Copy Share
