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Doubt Quotes

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Doubt Quotes

“The student who would build his knowledge on solid foundations, and proceed by just degrees to the pinnacles of truth, is directed by the great philosopher of France to begin by doubting of his own existence. In like manner, whoever would complete any arduous and intricate enterprise, should, as soon as his imagination can cool after the first blaze of hope, place before his own eyes every possible embarrassment that may retard or defeat him. He should first question the probability of success, and then endeavour to remove the objections that he has raised.”

Source: The Rambler: A Periodical Paper, Published in 1750, 1751, 1752

“Doubt is a profound and effective spiritual motivation. Without doubt, no truism is transcended, no new knowledge found, no expansion of the imagination possible. Doubt is unsettling to the ego and those who are drawn to ideologies that promise the dispelling of doubt by preferring certainties never grow.”

Spiritual Motivation Found Grows Growth Imagination Doubt Promise Ego Profound Ideology Certainty Expansion Truism New Knowledge Dispelling

Author:James Hollis

“It is the imagination pressing back against the pressure of reality. It seems, in the last analysis, to have something to do with our self-preservation; and that, no doubt, is why the expression of it, the sound of its words, helps us to live our lives.”

Self Helping Reality Seems Lasts Sound Imagination Doubt Our Lives Expression Pressure Analysis No Doubt Preservation Self Preservation

Book:The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination

Source: The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination

“Social life is filled with doubts and vain aspirings; solitude, when the imagination is dethroned, is turned to weariness and ennui.”

Life Is Social Imagination Doubt Solitude Filled Vain Social Life Weariness Ennui

Author:Letitia Elizabeth Landon

“I doubt that the imagination can be suppressed. If you truly eradicated it in a child, he would grow up to be an eggplant.”

Ifs Children Grows Imagination Growing Up Doubt My Imagination Children Imagination Eggplant

Book:The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction

Source: The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction

“It has, moreover, been proven that horror, nastiness, and the frightful are what give pleasure when one fornicates. Beauty is a simple thing; ugliness is the exceptional thing. And fiery imaginations, no doubt, always prefer the extraordinary thing to the simple thing.”

Giving Imagination Simple Pleasure Beauty Doubt Horror Extraordinary No Doubt Proven Exceptional Ugliness Simple Things Fiery Extraordinary Things Nastiness

Book:The 120 days of Sodom and other writings

Source: The 120 days of Sodom and other writings

“For the first time I understood the dogma of eternal pain... For the first time my imagination grasped the height and depth of the Christian horror. Then I said: "It is a lie, and I hate your religion. If it is true, I hate your God." From that day I have had no fear, no doubt. For me, on that day, the flames of hell were quenched. From that day I have passionately hated every orthodox creed. That Sermon did some good.”

“Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that showeth best by day; but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt that, if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves?”

Ifs Men Mind May Light Lying Imagination Pleasure Poor Numbers Opinion Taken Doubt Add Vain Melancholy Diamond Pearls Mixtures Flattering Valuation

Book:Bacon's Essays: Top Essays

Source: Bacon's Essays: Top Essays

“When we play music we describe the echo the tableau of natural forms, their shapes and arrangements, as uncovered by the composer's imagination, which yet must be filtered through our own. There is no other way. And in acknowledging this tableau, this revelation, we must "hesitate", we must doubt, as the composer doubted, for no valid creation can issue unscarred by doubt, by that vast flux of wonder which precedes the construction of being.”

Way Play Form Imagination Natural Wonder Issues Doubt Creation Shapes Revelations Construction Composer Echoes Arrangements Doubted Flux Natural Forms Tableau

Author:Russell Sherman