Our volitional habits depend, then, first, on what the stock of ideas is which we have; and, second, on the habitual coupling… — William James Copy Share Image
I am only a philosopher, and there is only one thing that a philosopher can be relied on to do, and that… — William James Copy Share Image
In all primary school work the principle of multiple impressions is well recognized. — William James Copy Share Image
“See the exquisite contrast of the types of mind! The pragmatist clings to facts and concreteness, observes truth at its work in… — William James Copy Share Image
“[There are, in us] possibilities that take our breath away, and show a world wider than either physics or philistine ethics can… — William James Copy Share Image
What every genuine philosopher (every genuine man, in fact) craves most is praise although the philosophers generally call it recognition! — William James Copy Share Image
O my Bergson, you are a magician, and your book is a marvel, a real wonder in the history of philosophy .… — William James Copy Share Image
To some of us the thought of God is like a sort of quiet music playing in the background of the mind. — William James Copy Share Image
“The most violent revolutions in an individual's beliefs leave most of his old order standing. Time and space, cause and effect, nature… — William James Copy Share Image
“It never occurs to most of us .. that the question 'what is the truth' is no real question (being irrelative to… — William James Copy Share Image
Feed the growing human being, feed him with the sort of experience for which from year to year he shows a natural… — 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
It is not probable that the reader will be satisfied with any of these solutions, and contemporary philosophers, even rationalistically minded ones,… — 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
