“How generous was it to offer gifts to people one knew would never accept them?” Quote by Alain de Botton
“Philosophy had supplied Socrates with convictions in which he had been able to have rational, as opposed to hysterical, confidence when faced with disapproval.” PhilosophyAbleConvictionRationalHystericalDisapproval Author:Alain de Botton
“It would scarcely be acceptable, for example, to ask in the course of an ordinary conversation what our society holds to be the purpose of work.” PurposeCoursesAsksExampleConversationOrdinaryOur SocietyAcceptable Author:Alain de Botton
“Someone who has thought rationally and deeply about how the body works is likely to arrive at better ideas about how to be healthy than someone who has followed a hunch. Medicine presupposes a hierarchy between the confusion the layperson will be in about what is wrong with him, and the more accurate knowledge available to doctors reasoning logically. At the heart of Epicureanism is the thought that we are as bad at answering the question "What will make me happy?" as "What will make me healthy?" Our souls do not spell out their troubles.” HeartIdeasSoulBodyTroubleHealthyDoctorsMedicineAvailableConfusionReasoningSpellsAccurateHierarchyMake Me HappyHunchesEpicureanismBody Work Author:Alain de Botton
“We don't exist unless there is someone who can see us existing, what we say has no meaning until someone can understand, while to be surrounded by friends is constantly to have our identity confirmed; their knowledge and care for us have the power to pull us from our numbness. In small comments, many of them teasing, they reveal they know our foibles and except them and so, in turn, accept that we have a place in the world.” KnowsWorldCareTurnsAcceptingIdentityCommentPlaces In The WorldTeaseNumbnessFoiblesSurrounded By Friends Author:Alain de Botton
“Why, then, if expensive things cannot bring us remarkable joy, are we so powerfully drawn to them?” IfsJoyExpensiveRemarkable Author:Alain de Botton
“Happiness may be difficult to obtain. The obstacles are not primarily financial.” MayDifficultFinancialObstacles Author:Alain de Botton
“Our greatest furies spring from events which violate our sense of the ground of our existence.” ExistenceEventsSpringFury Author:Alain de Botton
“By travelling across frontiers, on horseback and in the imagination, Montaigne invited us to to exchange local prejudices and the self division they induced for less constraining identities as citizens of the world.” WorldSelfImaginationIdentityCitizensPrejudiceLocalsDivisionInvitedFrontiersHorseback Author:Alain de Botton
“It is striking how much more seriously we are likely to be taken after we have been dead a few centuries.” Has BeensTakenCentury Author:Alain de Botton