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Volition Quotes

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Volition Quotes

“If love in society is to represent a better one, it cannot do so as a peaceful enclave, but only by conscious opposition. This, however, demands precisely the element of voluntariness that the bourgeois, for whom love can never be natural enough, forbid it. Loving means not letting immediacy wither under the omnipresent weight of mediation and economics, and in such fidelity it becomes itself mediated, as a stubborn counter-pressure. He alone loves who has the strength to hold fast to love.”

LoveStrengthAuthenticityFidelityVolition
Book:Minima Moralia: Reflections on a Damaged Life
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“So, how is it that you don’t have a girlfriend?” I asked boldly. Joel shrugged. “Have you ever had a girlfriend?” There was no way that he’d never had a girlfriend. He shrugged again. “You’re not serious.” “You’re surprised?” “I’m sorry, do you own a mirror?” Joel laughed in that I’ll-never-understand-women kind of way. “I’ve never wanted one,” he admitted, though it seemed that there was more to it. “What? A mirror? Or a girlfriend?” He laughed again, even harder this time. “A girlfriend.” “Are you gay?” He smiled. “No, I’m not gay.” “Oh.” I blushed. Why was I being so nosy all of a sudden?”

LoveRomanceYoung AdultVolitionSeverance
Book:Volition
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“In ancient times, the greatest source of freedom was believed to be self-knowledge, in the Middle Ages - self-discipline, in the modern era - self-determination, while today it is believed to be self-satisfaction. The first liberates the mind, the second the spirit, the third the will, while the fourth - the desire to get rid of the other three.”

LiberationSelf DeterminationSelf KnowledgeSelf DisciplineComplacencySelf DestructionPersonal FreedomVolitionSelf Satisfaction
Author:Jakub Bożydar Wiśniewski
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“In the second place, however, history is made in such a way that the final result always arises from conflicts between many individual wills, of which each in turn has been made what it is by a host of particular conditions of life. Thus there are innumerable intersecting forces, an infinite series of parallelograms of forces which give rise to one resultant — the historical event. This may again itself be viewed as the product of a power which works as a whole unconsciously and without volition. For what each individual wills is obstructed by everyone else, and what emerges is something that no one willed. Thus history has proceeded hitherto in the manner of a natural process and is essentially subject to the same laws of motion. But from the fact that the wills of individuals — each of whom desires what he is impelled to by his physical constitution and external, in the last resort economic, circumstances (either his own personal circumstances or those of society in general) — do not attain what they want, but are merged into an aggregate mean, a common resultant, it must not be concluded that they are equal to zero. On the contrary, each contributes to the resultant and is to this extent included in it.”

IndividualHistoryPowerEconomicsUnconsciousWillCollectivismVolitionHistorical MaterialismAggregate
Book:On Historical Materialism
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“... for our sake loosing within Himself the bonds of bodily birth, He granted us through spiritual birth, according to our own volition, power to become children of God instead of children of flesh and blood if we have faith in His Name (cf. Jn. 1:12-13). For the Savior the sequence was, first of all, incarnation and bodily birth for my sake; and so thereupon the birth in the Spirit through baptism, originally spurned by Adam, for the sake of my salvation and restoration by grace, or, to describe it even more vividly, my very remaking.”

IfsFirstsChildrenChristianSpiritualSpiritNamesGraceBloodBirthSalvationSakeFleshGrantedOrthodoxSaviorHave FaithAdamSequenceRestorationIncarnationOrthodox ChristianChild Of GodBaptismCfsFlesh And BloodVolition
Author:Maximus the Confessor
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“Botha swimmer and a drowned man are in the water; the latter is borne by the water and controlled by it, while the swimmer is borne along by his own power and of his own volition. Every movement made by the drowned man - indeed, every act and word that issue from him - comes from the water, not from him... The saints are like this. They have died before death.”

MenMadeWisdomWaterIssuesMovementDiedSaintIslamicLatterControlledSwimmerVolitionBefore Death
Author:Rumi
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“A man with a half volition goes backwards and forwards, and makes no way on the smoothest road; a man with a whole volition advances on the roughest, and will reach his purpose, if there be even a little worthiness in it. The man without a purpose is like a ship without a rudder - a waif, a nothing, a no man. Have a purpose in life and having it, throw such strength of mind and muscle into your work as God has given you.”

IfsMenWayMindLittlesWholePurposeGivenHalfAttitudeAchieveHe ManShipsMusclesPurpose Of LifeBackwardsWorthinessStrength Of MindVolitionRudders
Author:Thomas Carlyle
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“This is one of man's oldest riddles. How can the independence of human volition be harmonized with the fact that we are integral parts of a universe which is subject to the rigid order of nature's laws?”

MenHumansFactsLawScienceOrderUniverseNatureSubjectsIndependenceRiddleVolition
Book:The new science: 3 complete works: Where is science going? The universe in the light of modern physics; The philosophy of physics
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“We must look deeply into the nature of our volition to see whether it is pushing us in the direction of liberation from suffering and toward peace and compassion, or in the direction of affliction and misery. What is it that we really want deep in our heart? Is it money, fame, power? Or is it finding inner peace, being able to live life fully and enjoy the present moment?”

WantLooksHeartMomentsMotivationalAbleSufferingEnjoyCompassionFameFindingsMiseryInner PeaceLiberationLive LifePushingPresent MomentAfflictionEnjoy LifeFollow Your HeartListen To Your HeartMoments In TimeListen To YourselfVolitionCherish Every MomentFinding Inner Peace
Author:Nhat Hanh
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“Here was the astounding fact: the race did go forward; the race did achieve; and in every way the race grew better. Progress through irrational and astounding blunders, whose outrageousness bedwarfed the wildest cliches of romance, was what Kennaston found everywhere. All this, then, also was foreplanned, just as all happenings at Storisende had been, in his puny romance; and the puppets, here to, moved as they thought of their own volition, but really in order to serve a denouement in which many of them had not any personal part or interest...”

WayFactsRomanceOrderFoundInterestRaceProgressAchieveGrewHappeningsMovedIrrationalClichePuppetsBlundersVolitionDenouement
Author:James Branch Cabell
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“This kind of internal "telepathic" intercourse, which was to serve me in all my wanderings, was at first difficult, innefective, and painful. But in time I came to be able to live through the experiences of my host with vividness and accuracy, while yet preserving my own individuality, my own critical intelligence, my own desires and fears. Only when the other had come to realize my presence within him could he, by a special act of volition, keep particular thoughts secret from me.”

FirstsKindAbleDesireDifficultRealizingMy OwnSecretSpecialParticularIndividualityPainfulCriticalWanderInternalsHostIntercourseAccuracyVolitionVividness
Book:Star Maker
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“Faculty Psychology is getting to be respectable again after centuries of hanging around with phrenologists and other dubious types. By faculty psychology I mean, roughly, the view that many fundamentally different kinds of psychological mechanisms must be postulated in order to explain the facts of mental life. Faculty psychology takes seriously the apparent heterogeneity of the mental and is impressed by such prima facie differences as between, say, sensation and perception, volition and cognition, learning and remembering, or language and thought.”

KindMeanDifferentFactsRememberOrderLanguageDifferencesViewsPsychologyCenturyTypePerceptionPsychologicalFacultySensationsMechanismDifferent KindsImpressedRespectableCognitionDubiousHanging AroundVolition
Author:Jerry Fodor
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“The Jesuits are a MILITARY organization, not a religious order. Their chief is a general of an army, not the mere father abbot of a monastery. And the aim of this organization is power - power in its most despotic exercise - absolute power, universal power, power to control the world by the volition of a single man. Jesuitism is the most absolute of despotisms - and at the same time the greatest and most enormous of abuses.”

MenWorldOrderFatherReligiousMilitaryExerciseOrganizationUniversalAbuseArmyAbsolutesAimMereEnormousChiefsDespotismAbsolute PowerMonasteriesSingle ManVolitionJesuit
Author:Napoleon Bonaparte
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“Good and evil are essential differences of the act of the will. For good and evil pertain essentially to the will; just as truth and falsehood pertain to the reason, the act of which is distinguished essentially by the difference of truth and falsehood (according as we say that an opinion is true or false.) Consequently, good and evil volition are acts differing in species.”

ReasonEvilDifferencesOpinionEssentialsSpeciesGood And EvilFalsehoodDistinguishedVolitionTruth And FalsehoodTrue Or False
Book:Basic Writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, Volume 2
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“Reason, in a strict sense, as meaning the judgment of truth and falsehood, can never, of itself, be any motive to the will, and can have no influence but so far as it touches some passion or affection. Abstract relations of ideas are the object of curiosity, not of volition. And matters of fact, where they are neither good nor evil, where they neither excite desire nor aversion, are totally indifferent, and whether known or unknown, whether mistaken or rightly apprehended, cannot be regarded as any motive to action.”

IdeasMatterReasonFactsTruthActionDesirePassionEvilKnownInfluenceObjectsJudgmentRelationCuriosityAffectionJudgementMotiveAbstractFalsehoodIndifferentStrictMistakenMatter Of FactAversionVolitionTruth And Falsehood
Book:A Dissertation on the Passions: The Natural History of Religion : a Critical Edition
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“The Marxist combination of materialism and determinism is fatally anti-humanistic. It denies a consciousness, a mind, that is independent of material conditions and class relations. It denies a will and volition that are capable of shaping the course of history. It denies an individuality that is not reducible to class. It denies both the idea and the reality of freedom, a freedom that is something more than the "bourgeois" freedom to buy and sell. It denies a morality that transcends class interests. And it denies the spirituality of man.”

MenMindIdeasRealitySpiritualityCoursesInterestFreedomConsciousnessClassConditionsMaterialsMoralityCapableRelationIndependentSellsIndividualityDenyCombinationMaterialismMarxismBourgeoisMarxistDeterminismHumanisticVolition
Book:On Looking Into the Abyss: Untimely Thoughts on Culture and Society
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“Though it is folly to suppose that happiness is a matter of volition, and that we can make ourselves content and cheerful whenever we choose - a theory that many poor hypochondriacs are taunted with till they are nigh driven mad - yet, on the other hand, no sane mind is ever left without the power of self-discipline and self-control in a measure, which measure increases in proportion as it is exercised.”

MindSelfMatterHandsLeftPoorTheoryDisciplineIncreaseMadDrivenProportionFollySaneSelf ControlSelf DisciplineCheerfulVolitionDiscipline And Self ControlHypochondriac
Author:Dinah Maria Murlock Craik
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“We're trying to win business by doing a good job for the clients, as opposed to, "We think being big and universal is just a great, wonderful thing." It's not a morality thing. It's a "Does it work for the client?" thing. Everything we do is because a client uses us. Everything we do is because a client chose to use us of his own free volition.”

ThinkingTryingDoeUseBigsJobsWinningWonderfulMoralityUniversalClientsGood JobWonderful ThingsVolition
Author:Jamie Dimon
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