The instant field of the present is at all times what I call the 'pure' experience. It is only virtually or potentially… — William James Copy Share Image
To know an object is to lead to it through a context which the world provides — 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
The 'I think' which Kant said must be able to accompany all my objects, is the 'I breathe' which actually does accompany… — 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. — 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
The most natively interesting object to a man is his own personal self and its fortunes. We accordingly see that the moment… — William James Copy Share Image
If the topic be highly abstract, show its nature by concrete examples. If it be unfamiliar, trace some point of analogy in… — William James Copy Share Image
If, then, you wish to insure the interest of your pupils, there is only one way to do it; and that is… — William James Copy Share Image
Modern transcendental idealism, Emersonianism, for instance, also seems to let God evaporate into abstract Ideality. Not a deity in concreto, not a… — William James Copy Share Image
The entire routine of our memorized acquisitions, for example, is a consequence of nothing but the Law of Contiguity. The words of… — William James Copy Share Image
The gist of the matter is this: Every impression that comes in from without, be it a sentence which we hear, an… — 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
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
Compared with men, it is probable that brutes neither attend to abstract characters, nor have associations by similarity. Their thoughts probably pass… — 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
