Best existence & firsts Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

Source: Felix Holt: The Radical

“If "freedom" means, first of all, the responsibility of every individual for the rational determination of his own personal, professional and social existence, then there is no greater fear than that of the establishment of general freedom.”

Ifs Firsts Mean Individual Social Freedom Existence Responsibility Greater Determination Rational Establishment

Author:Wilhelm Reich

“It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose, should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist: the threat is rather to life itself.”

Source: The Sea Around Us

“It is quite clear to me that the religious paradise of youth, which [I] lost, was a first attempt to free myself from the chains of the 'merely personal,' from an existence which is dominated by wishes, hopes, and primitive feelings.”

Thinking Firsts Feelings Lost Wish Religious Existence Clear Youth Chains Paradise Primitive Thinking God

Book:A Stubbornly Persistent Illusion: The Essential Scientific Works of Albert Einstein

Source: A Stubbornly Persistent Illusion: The Essential Scientific Works of Albert Einstein

“The present mode of life on earth is madness, which is nontheless lethal for being legal. Rational existence is possible, but it calls for a world consciousness and a world design. People who develop the habit of thinking of themselves as world citizens are fulfilling the first requirement of sanity in our time.”

People Thinking World Firsts Earth Existence Consciousness Design Habit Citizens Madness Rational Our Time Sanity Fulfilling Requirements World Citizen

Author:Norman Cousins

“The origin of the political relations between the United States and France is coeval with the first years of our independence. The memory of it is interwoven with that of our arduous struggle for national existence. Weakened as it has occasionally been since that time, it can by us never be forgotten, and we should hail with exultation the moment which should indicate a recollection equally friendly in spirit on the part of France.”

Source: John Quincy Adams, 1767-1848; chronology, documents, bibliographical aids

“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

“[My father] impressed upon me from the first, that the manner in which the world came into existence was a subject on which nothing was known: that the question, "Who made me?" cannot be answered, because we have no experience or authentic information from which to answer it; and that any answer only throws the difficulty a step further back, since the question immediately presents itself, "Who made God?”

World Firsts Made Father Answers Existence Known Steps Subjects Information Difficulty Impressed

Book:Autobiography John Stuart Mill: Top Biography

Source: Autobiography John Stuart Mill: Top Biography

“The birth of a new fact is always a wonderful thing to experience. It's dualistically called a "discovery" because of the presumption that it has an existence independent of anyone's awareness of it. When it comes along, it always has, at first, a low value. Then, depending on the value-looseness of the observer and the potential quality of the fact, its value increases, either slowly or rapidly, or the value wanes and the fact disappears.”

Firsts Facts Values Existence Quality Wonderful Awareness Birth Lows Discovery Increase Independent Disappear Wonderful Things Observers Presumption Looseness

Author:Robert M. Pirsig

“The first premise of all human history is, of course, the existence of living human individuals. Thus the first fact to be established is the physical organisation of these individuals and their consequent relation to the rest of nature.”

Firsts Humans Facts Courses Individual Existence Relation Human History Premises Organisation

Book:The German Ideology

Source: The German Ideology

“"There is one basis of science," says Descartes, "one test and rule of truth, namely, that whatever is clearly and distinctly conceived is true." A profound psychological mistake. It is true only of formal logic, wherein the mind never quits the sphere of its first assumptions to pass out into the sphere of real existences; no sooner does the mind pass from the internal order to the external order, than the necessity of verifying the strict correspondence between the two becomes absolute. The Ideal Test must be supplemented by the Real Test, to suit the new conditions of the problem.”

“It seems that it is impossible to live without discovering the purpose of your life. And the first thing which a person should do is to understand the meaning of life. But the majority of people who consider themselves to be educated are proud that they have reached such great height that they cease to care about the meaning of existence.”

People Should Firsts Persons Seems Care Purpose Existence Impossible Proud Majority Cease Educated Height Meaning Of Life Discovering Great Heights

Author:Leo Tolstoy

“The mother's love is at first an absorbing delight, blunting all other sensibilities; it is an expansion of the animal existence; it enlarges the imagined range for self to move in: but in after years it can only continue to be joy on the same terms as other long-lived love--that is, by much suppression of self, and power of living in the experience of another.”

Years Firsts Long Self Moving Joy Mother Term Love Is Animal Existence Delight Range Sensibility Expansion Absorbing Suppression Mother's Love

Book:Felix Holt: The Radical

Source: Felix Holt: The Radical

“Blasphemy and prayer are one. Both assert the existence of a superior power. The first, however, with conviction.”

Firsts Prayer Existence Conviction Superiors Blasphemy

Book:Faustus

Source: Faustus

“His [Turgot's] first important literary and scholastic effort was a treatise On the Existence of God. Few fragments of it remain, but we are helped to understand him when we learn that he asserted, and to the end of his life maintained, his belief in an Almighty Creator and Upholder of the Universe. It did, indeed, at a later period suit the purposes of his enemies, exasperated by his tolerant spirit and his reforming plans, to proclaim him an atheist; but that sort of charge has been the commonest of missiles against troublesome thinkers in all times.”

“The first step in the direction of a world rule of law is the recognition that peace no longer is an unobtainable ideal but a necessary condition of continued human existence. But to take even this step we must return to a calm and responsible frame of mind in which we can face the long patient tasks ahead.”

World Mind Firsts Humans Long Faces Law Existence Steps Conditions Return Ideals Tasks Responsible Patient Calm Recognition First Steps Rule Of Law Human Existence Frame Of Mind

Author:Margaret Mead

“The existence of poverty is the proof of an unjust and ill-organised society, and our public charities are but the first tardy awakening in the conscience of a robber.”

Firsts Existence Poverty Conscience Charity Ill Awakening Proof Unjust Robbers Organised

Book:Essays divine and human with thoughts and aphorisms

Source: Essays divine and human with thoughts and aphorisms

“Know that the difficulties which lead to confusion in the question what is the purpose of the Universe or of any of its parts, arise from two causes: first, man has an erroneous idea of himself, and believes that the whole world exists only for his sake; secondly, he is ignorant both about the nature of the sublunary world, and about the Creator's intention to give existence to all beings whose existence is possible, because existence is undoubtedly good.”

Knows Men World Giving Firsts Believe Two Ideas Whole Purpose Universe Causes Existence Difficulty Intention Sake Creator Arise Whole World Ignorant Confusion

Book:The Guide for the Perplexed

Source: The Guide for the Perplexed

“It's not true that you should first think up an idea for a better world and only then "put it into practice," but, rather, through the fact of your existence in the world, you create the idea or manifest it - create it, as it were, from the "material of the world," articulate it in the "language of the world."”

Thinking World Should Firsts Ideas Facts Language Existence Practice Materials Manifest

Author:Vaclav Havel

“Divinity reveals herself in all things. Everything has Divinity latent within itself. For she enfolds and imparts herself even unto the smallest beings, and from the smallest beings, according to their capacity. Without her presence nothing would have being, because she is the essence of the existence of the first unto the last being.”

Firsts Lasts Existence Capacity All Things Essence Divinity Smallest Impart Latent

Author:Giordano Bruno

“Childhood, at its best, is a perpetual adventure, in the truest sense of that overtaxed word: a setting forth into trackless lands that might have come to existence the instant before you first laid eyes on them.”

Firsts Might Eye Existence Land Childhood Adventure Setting Settings Instant Perpetual Truest

Book:Maps and Legends

Source: Maps and Legends

“The great goal of the backlash is to nurture a cultural class war, and the first step in doing so, as we have seen, is to deny the economic basis of social class. After all, you can hardly deride liberals as society's "elite" or present the GOP as the party of the common man if you acknowledge the existence of the corporate world - the power that creates the nation's real elite, that dominates its real class system, and that wields the Republican Party as its personal political sidearm.”

“Now if you ask me, in conclusion, "Well, what, then should properly be done?" Obviously war, but I mean in regard to this issue I would say: Any way possible permission should be refused and if they go ahead and build it, the government should bomb it out of existence, evacuating it first, with no compensation to any of the property owners involved in this monstrosity.”

Ifs Way Should Firsts Wells Mean War Done Government Asks Existence Issues Involved Regard Property Conclusion Ask Me Bombs Owners Permission Compensation Monstrosity

Author:Leonard Peikoff

“The first life insurance societies where formed in England in the years between 1692 and 1720. In America, life insurance became available to the clergy through the Presbyterian Ministers Fund, founded in 1759 (still in existence), and the Episcopal Corporation, founded ten years later (subsequently merged).”

Years Firsts Stills America Existence Ten England Available Corporations Ministers Fund Clergy Presbyterians

Author:Andrew Tobias

“If we want to postulate a deity capable of engineering all the organized complexity in the world, either instantaneously or by guiding evolution, that deity must have been vastly complex in the first place. The creationist, whether a naive Bible-thumper or an educated bishop, simply postulates an already existing being of prodigious intelligence and complexity. If we are going to allow ourselves the luxury of postulating organized complexity without offering an explanation, we might as well make a job of it and simply postulate the existence of life as we know it!”

“Wherever the Industrial system has reached its second generation it is threatened by two mortal perils. The first is the demand by an organized proletariat for sustenance without relation to the product of its labor; a demand which threatens the very existence of PROFIT (on the necessary presumption of which Capitalism reposes). The second, and immediately graver danger is that of a revolt for the confiscation of the means of production.”

“It has been asserted, that a moral Atheist would be a monster beyond the power of nature to create: I reply, that it is not more strange for an Atheist to live virtuously, than for a Christian to abandon himself to crime! If we believe the last kind of monster, why dispute the existence of the first?”

Ifs Firsts Believe Kind Has Beens Would Be Christian Lasts Existence Moral Atheism Crime Strange Atheist Positive Atheism Monsters Abandon Disputes Power Of Nature

Book:An Historical and Critical Dictionary

Source: An Historical and Critical Dictionary

“I chose not to jump into the media frenzy and defend myself, though I was begged to be on every single TV show in existence. They want to blame entertainment? Isn't religion the first real entertainment? People dress up in costumes, sing songs and dedicate themselves in eternal fandom.”

People Want Firsts Real Shows Song Existence Atheism Media Tvs Eternal Dresses Blame Entertainment Positive Atheism Tv Shows Costumes Frenzy Fandoms

Author:Marilyn Manson

“Maybe it's not as clear-cut as that. Maybe it's the very presence of one thing - light or darkness - that necessitates the existence of the other. Think about it, people couldn't become legendary heroes if they hadn't first done something to combat darkness. Doctors could do no good if there weren't diseases for them to treat.”

People Ifs Thinking Firsts Done Light Existence Darkness Clear Cutting One Thing Hero Disease Doctors Treats Combat Legendary

Book:Embrace

Source: Embrace

“Whatever way you put it, I am here only because my world is here. When I took my first breath, my world was born with me. When I die, my world dies with me. In other words, I wasn't born into a world that was already here before me, nor do I live simply as one individual among millions of other individuals, nor do I leave everything behind to live on after me. People live thinking of themselves as members of a group or society. However, this isn't really true. Actually, I bring my own world into existence, live it out, and take it with me when I die.”

People Thinking World Way Firsts Dies Individual Born My Own Behinds Existence Millions Groups Members Breaths Really True Live Simply My Own World

Book:Opening the Hand of Thought: Approach to Zen

Source: Opening the Hand of Thought: Approach to Zen

“Agreeable society is the first essential in constituting the happiness and of course the value of our existence.”

Firsts Values Courses Existence Society Essentials

Book:The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia II, Correspondence 1782-1786

Source: The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia II, Correspondence 1782-1786

“The first time I received an award, I was very surprised. I did not know whether to accept it or not. But I came to the conclusion that I should accept awards in the name of the poorest poor, as a form of homage to them. I think that basically, when awards are given to me, the existence of the poor in the world is being recognized.”

Thinking Knows World Should Firsts Form Names Given Poor Existence Accepting Poverty First Time Conclusion Awards Poorest Homage

Author:Mother Teresa

“I had left home (like all Jewish girls) in order to eat pork and take birth control pills. When I first shared an intimate evening with my husband, I was swept away by the passion (so dormant inside myself) of a long and tortured existence. The physical cravings I had tried so hard to deny, finally and ultimately sated ... But enough about the pork.”

Firsts Long Hard Enough Home Order Girl Passion Left Existence Birth Husband Deny Evening Intimate My Husband Craving Pills Birth Control Pork Dormant Swept Away Sated Birth Control Pills

Author:Roseanne Barr

“Poverty, the existence of the poor, was the first cause of riches.”

Firsts Causes Poor Existence Poverty Riches

Author:Peter Kropotkin

“Secretly in my heart, I believe food is a doorway to almost every dimension of our existence. ... Food never was just food. From the time a cave person first came out from under a rock, food has been a little bit of everything: who we are spiritually as well as what keeps us alive. It's a gathering place, and in the best of all worlds it's possible that when people of one country sit down to eat another culture's food it will open their minds to the culture itself. Food is a doorway to understanding, and it can be as profound or as facile as you would like it to be.”

“You must realize first of all that you are the proof of everything, including yourself. None can prove your existence, because his existence must be confirmed by you first. Your being and knowing you owe nobody. Remember, you are entirely on your own. You do not come from somewhere, you do not go anywhere. You are timeless being and awareness.”

Firsts Remember Realizing Existence Knowing Awareness Prove Including Proof Timeless Remember You Remembers You

Author:Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

“I believe that that foolish man of Galilee, Jesus Christ, had something to tell us, to tell me. Not considering his existence here, I would immediately go into despair. Immediately. And forgetting him, I would first despair of the institutional church and its hierarchy, and only later, of the Jews.”

Men Firsts Believe Jesus I Believe Christ Church Forget Existence Despair Jesus Christ Jew Foolish Considering Hierarchy Foolish Man

Author:Elias Chacour

“It was at first communicated to you that the Government, by order of the Jemiet had decided to destroy completely all the Armenians living in Turkey...An end must be put to their existence, however criminal the measures taken may be, and no regard must be paid to either age or sex nor to conscientious scruples.”

Firsts May Ends Government Age Order Sex Existence Taken Decided Paid Regard Criminals Genocide Turkeys Scruples Armenians Armenian Genocide

Author:Talaat Pasha

“First and foremost, you do not have to live up to or emulate the lives of any of your predecessors. But at the very least, you should know about them. You will have your own life, interests, and ideas of what you want or do not want in life. Do what you enjoy doing. Be honest with yourself and others. Don't think of satisfying anyone: your elders, peers, government, religion, or children who will come after you. Develop meaningful ideals, and become conscious of others, their existence, and their lives.”

“When I first moved to New York I wanted to be a dancer, I danced professionally for years, living a hand-to-mouth existence.”

Years Firsts Hands Wanted Existence New York Mouths Moved Dancer

Author:Madonna Ciccone

“The personality of the artist, at first a cry or a cadence or a mood and then a fluid, and lambent narrative, finally refines itself out of existence, impersonalises itself, so to speak. The aesthetic image in the dramatic form is life purified in and reprojected from the human imagination. The mystery of aesthetic like that of material creation is accomplished. The artist, like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails.”

“Let us, then, take our compass; we are something, and we are not everything. The nature of our existence hides from us the knowledge of first beginnings which are born of the nothing; and the littleness of our being conceals from us the sight of the infinite. Our intellect holds the same position in the world of thought as our body occupies in the expanse of nature.”

World Firsts Body Born Existence Knowledge Position Sight Infinite Intellect Infinity Compass Expanse

Book:Thoughts

Source: Thoughts

“It is a human circumstance that when we are born we have not yet come into existence. We are lured into our special human existence by a mothering presence that gratifies our innate urges to be suckled, held, rocked, caressed. But that same gratifying presence puts limits on desire and rations satisfaction. In this sense the mother is also the first lawgiver.”

Firsts Humans Mother Desire Born Existence Special Circumstances Limits Satisfaction Urges Innate Human Existence Mothering Rations

Book:Adolescence: The Farewell to Childhood

Source: Adolescence: The Farewell to Childhood

“The adolescent frequently supposes that she is breaking out of the confines of her mundane, schoolgirl existence simply in order to break rules and defy authority. . . . She rids herself of the "oughts" and "musts" that convert every minor infraction into a sin of omission or commission. It certainly does not occur to her or to her family that by questioning the moral standards she erected as a child she is taking the first steps in her journey toward a firmer, more reasonable, less harsh, more ethical form of conscience.”

Firsts Children Doe Form Order Sin Existence Moral Steps Break Journey Authority Standards Conscience Reasonable Ethical First Steps Questioning Minors Adolescence Harsh Mundane Omission

Author:Louise J. Kaplan

“Whoever considers morality the main objective of human existence, seems to me like a person who defines the purpose of a clock asnot going wrong. The first objective for a clock, is, however, that it does run; not going wrong is an additional regulative function. If not a watch's greatest accomplishment were not going wrong, unwound watches might be the best.”

“The once-surprising existence of non-Euclidean models of Euclid's first four axioms can be seen as a sort of mathematical joke.”

Firsts Science Existence Four Models Jokes Mathematics Mathematical Surprising Axioms Euclid

Author:John Allen Paulos

“The mere existence of an additional child or children in the family could signify Less. Less time alone with parents. Less attention for hurts and disappointments. Less approval for accomplishments. . . . No wonder children struggle so fiercely to be first or best. No wonder they mobilize all their energy to have more or most. Or better still, all.”

Firsts Children Stills Energy Parent Hurt Existence Attention Wonder Struggle Mere Disappointment Accomplishment Approval Sibling Me Alone Rivalry Alone Time Sibling Rivalry

Author:Adele Faber

“Is there any wilderness of sand in the deserts of Arabia, is there any prospect of desolation among the ruins of Palestine, which can rival the repelling effect on the eye, and the depressing influence on the mind, of an English country town in the first stage of its existence, and in the transition state of its prosperity?”

Source: The Woman in White: Wilkie Collins Top Collections

“The lust of dominion innovates so imperceptibly that we become complete despots before our wanton abuse of power is perceived; the tyranny first exercised in the nursery is exhibited in various shapes and degrees in every stage of our existence.”

Firsts Existence Stage Shapes Degrees Abuse Various Lust Tyranny Dominion Nursery Abuse Of Power Wanton Despots

Author:Johann Georg Ritter von Zimmermann

“A prejudice may be an unreasoned judgment, he [Hibben] pointed out, but an unreasoned judgment is not necessarily an illogical judgment. ... First, there are those judgments whose verification has simply dropped out of memory. ... The second type of unreasoned judgments we hold is the opinions we adopt from others ... The third class of judgments in Professor Hibben's list comprises those which have subconscious origin. The material that furnishes their support does not reach the focal point of consciousness, but psychology insists upon its existence.”

Existence Quotes

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Existence Quotes