There can be no difference anywhere that does not make a difference somewhere. — William James Copy Share Image
The war for our Union, with all the constitutional issues which it settled, and all the military lessons which it gathered in,… — William James Copy Share Image
Who does not see that we are likely to ascertain the distinctive significance of religious melancholy and happiness, or of religious trances,… — William James Copy Share Image
The first thing that intellect does with an object is to class it with something else. — William James Copy Share Image
Consciousness... does not appear to itself chopped up in bits. Such words as 'chain' or 'train' do not describe it fitly as… — William James Copy Share Image
Science can tell us what exists; but to compare the worths, both of what exists and of what does not exist, we… — William James Copy Share Image
Every time a resolve or a fine glow of feeling evaporates without bearing practical fruit is worse than a chance lost; it… — William James Copy Share Image
It does not follow, because our ancestors made so many errors of fact and mixed them with their religion, that we should… — William James Copy Share Image
There is no being capable of a spiritual life who does not have within him a jungle. Where the wolf constantly HOWLS… — William James Copy Share Image
We want all our friends to tell us our bad qualities; it is only the particular ass that does so whom we… — William James Copy Share Image
We have grown literally afraid to be poor. We despise anyone who elects to be poor in order to simplify and save… — William James Copy Share Image
The first thing the intellect does with an object is to class it along with something else. But any object that is… — William James Copy Share Image
One hears of the mechanical equivalent of heat. What we now need to discover in the social realm is the moral equivalent… — William James Copy Share Image
Failure, then, failure! so the world stamps us at every turn. We strew it with our blunders, our misdeeds, our lost opportunities,… — William James Copy Share Image
It is true that so far as wealth gives time for ideal ends and exercise to ideal energies, wealth is better than… — William James Copy Share Image
Even if matter could do every outward thing that God does, the idea of it would not work as satisfactorily, because the… — William James Copy Share Image
Effort is the one strictly undervalued and original contribution we make to this world. — William James Copy Share Image
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 Image
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 Image
“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 Image
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 Image
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 Image
Human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind. — William James Copy Share Image
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 Image
“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 Image
