William James · Skopia

Quotes

24

Philosophical speech

I firmly disbelieve, myself, that our human experience is the highest form of experience extant in the universe. I believe rather that we stand in much the same relation to the whole of the universe as our canine and feline pets do to the whole of human life. They inhabit our drawing-rooms and libraries. They take part in scenes of whose significance they have no inkling. They are merely tangent to curves of history the beginnings and ends and forms of which pass wholly beyond their ken. So we are tangent to the wider life of things.

Pragmatism · 1906

★ 6.0

Psychological literature

An act has no ethical quality whatever unless it be chosen out of several all equally possible.

The Principles of Psychology · 1890

★ 5.4

Psychological literature

We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and never to be undone. Every smallest stroke of virtue or of vice leaves its never so little scar... Nothing we ever do is, in strict scientific literalness, wiped out.

The Principles of Psychology · 1890

★ 5.3

Psychological literature · Religious literature

Objective evidence and certitude are doubtless very fine ideals to play with, but where on this moonlit and dream-visited planet are they found?

The Will to Believe · 1896

★ 5.3

All 24 in quotes →

Books

2

The Varieties of Religious Experience

1902★ 7.0

Pragmatism and Other Writings

1907★ 6.6