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We can act as if there were a God; feel as if we were free; consider Nature as if she… — William James

Psychological literature

We can act as if there were a God; feel as if we were free; consider Nature as if she were full of special designs; lay plans as if we were to be immortal; and we find then that these words do make a genuine difference in our moral life.

William James
The Varieties of Religious Experience · 1902
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Other tags relating to this quote
Topic
Power of thoughtBeliefs
Genre
Psychological literature
Time
1902
Person
William James
Provenance
Current citation
James, William. "The Reality of the Unseen." The Varieties of Religious Experience, edited by Martin E. Marty. Penguin Classics, 1982.
Original citation
James, William. "The Reality of the Unseen." Gifford Lecture. c. 1902, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland. Lecture.

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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.

William James
Pragmatism · 1906
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