Be patient and sympathetic with the type of mind that cuts a poor figure in examinations. It may, in the long examination… — William James Copy Share Image
The states of consciousness are all that psychology needs to do her work with. Metaphysics or theology may prove the Soul to… — William James Copy Share Image
In this real world of sweat and dirt, it seems to me that when a view of things is 'noble,' that ought… — William James Copy Share Image
The most any one can do is to confess as candidly as he can the grounds for the faith that is in… — William James Copy Share Image
Do something everyday for no other reason than you would rather not do it, so that when the hour of dire need… — William James Copy Share Image
Both thought and feeling are determinants of conduct, and the same conduct may be determined either by feeling or by thought. — William James Copy Share Image
What do believers in the Absolute mean by saving that their belief affords them comfort? They mean that since in the Absolute… — William James Copy Share Image
Any object not interesting in itself may become interesting through becoming associated with an object in which an interest already exists. The… — William James Copy Share Image
Plasticity, then, in the wide sense of the word, means the possession of a structure weak enough to yield to an influence,… — William James Copy Share Image
Mental fire is what won't burn real sticks; mental water is what won't necessarily (though of course it may) put out even… — William James Copy Share Image
Pretend what we may, the whole man within us is at work when we form our philosophical opinions. — William James Copy Share Image
Romeo wants Juliet as the filings want the magnet; and if no obstacles intervene he moves towards her by as straight a… — William James Copy Share Image
We may be in the Universe as dogs and cats are in our libraries, seeing the books and hearing the conversation, but… — William James Copy Share Image
It is as if there were in the human consciousness a sense of reality, a feeling of objective presence, a perception of… — William James Copy Share Image
A Beethoven string-quartet is truly, as some one has said, a scraping of horses' tails on cats' bowels, and may be exhaustively… — William James Copy Share Image
“However inadequate our ideas of causal efficacy may be, we are less wide of the mark when we say that our ideas… — William James Copy Share Image
The stream of thought flows on; but most of its segments fall into the bottomless abyss of oblivion. Of some, no memory… — William James Copy Share Image
No matter how full a reservoir of maxims one may possess, and no matter how good one's sentiments may be, if one… — William James Copy Share Image
The greatest enemy of any one of our truths may be the rest of our truths. — William James Copy Share Image
Asceticism may be a mere expression of organic hardihood, disgusted with too much ease. — William James Copy Share Image
The greatest discovery of the 19th century was not in the realm of the physical sciences, but the power of the subconscious… — William James Copy Share Image
There is no doubt that healthy-mindedness is inadequate as a philosophical doctrine, because the evil facts which it refuses positively to account… — William James Copy Share Image
Marvelous as may be the power of my dog to understand my moods, deathless as his affection and fidelity, his mental state… — William James Copy Share Image
The attitude of unhappiness is not only painful, it is mean and ugly. What can be more base and unworthy than the… — William James Copy Share Image
Man, whatever else he may be, is primarily a practical being, whose mind is given him to aid in adapting him to… — 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
