Bertrand Russell Quotes - Page 22

• To think I have spent my life on absolute muck.

  Bertrand Russell

  Math, Thinking, Absolutes

  "A Mathematician's Miscellany". Book by John Edensor Littlewood, 1953.

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• Our use of the phrase 'The Dark Ages' to cover the period from 600 to 1000 marks our undue concentration on Western Europe. [...] From India to Spain, the brilliant civilisation of Islam flourished. What was lost to Christendom at this time was not lost to civilisation, but quite the contrary. [...] To us it seems that West-European civilisation is civilisation, but this is a narrow view.

  Bertrand Russell

  Islamic, Views, Civilization

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “History of Western Philosophy: Collectors Edition”, p.325, Routledge

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• Gradually, ... the aspect of science as knowledge is being thrust into the background by the aspect of science as the power of manipulating nature. It is because science gives us the power of manipulating nature that it has more social importance than art. Science as the pursuit of truth is the equal, but not the superior, of art. Science as a technique, though it may have little intrinsic value, has a practical importance to which art cannot aspire.

  Bertrand Russell

  Art, Knowledge, Science

  Bertrand Russell (2017). “The Scientific Outlook”, p.16, Routledge

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• My conclusion is that there is no reason to believe any of the dogmas of traditional theology and, further, that there is no reason to wish that they were true. Man, in so far as he is not subject to natural forces, is free to work out his own destiny. The responsibility is his, and so is the opportunity.

  Bertrand Russell

  Believe, Responsibility, Opportunity

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• My own view on religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source of untold misery to the human race. I cannot, however, deny that it has made some contributions to civilisation. It helped in early days to fix the calendar, and it caused Egyptian priests to chronicle eclipses with such care that in time they became able to predict them. These two services I am prepared to acknowledge, but I do not know of any others.

  Bertrand Russell

  Race, Views, Two

  Bertrand Russell, John Greer Slater, Peter Köllner (1996). “A Fresh Look at Empiricism: 1927-42”, p.214, Psychology Press

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• A man without a bias cannot write interesting history - if indeed such a man exists.

  Bertrand Russell

  Writing, Men, History

  Bertrand Russell (2014). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell”, p.465, Routledge

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• There's a Bible on that shelf there. But I keep it next to Voltaire - poison and antidote.

  Bertrand Russell

  Doubt, Atheism, Next

  "Kenneth Harris Talking To: Bertrand Russell". 1971.

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• If one lived for ever the joys of life would inevitably in the end lose their savour. As it is, they remain perennially fresh.

  Bertrand Russell

  Joy, Ends, Savour

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.16, Lulu Press, Inc

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• Intelligence, it might be said, has caused our troubles; but it is not unintelligence that will cure them. Only more and wiser intelligence can make a happier world

  Bertrand Russell

  World, Might, Trouble

  Bertrand Russell, Andrew G. Bone (2003). “Man's Peril, 1954-55”, p.220, Psychology Press

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• There are some simple maxims which I think might be commended to writers of expository prose. First: never use a long word if a short word will do. So, if you want to make a statement with a great many qualifications, put some of the qualifications in separate sentences. Third: do not let the beginning of your sentence lead the reader to an expectation which is contradicted by the end.

  Bertrand Russell

  Simple, Thinking, Long

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.37, Routledge

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• The average man's opinions are much less foolish than they would be if he thought for himself.

  Bertrand Russell

  Inspirational, Men, Average

  Bertrand Russell (1992). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959”, p.427, Psychology Press

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• Worry is a form of fear.

  Bertrand Russell

  Worry, Form

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “The Conquest of Happiness”, p.43, Lulu Press, Inc

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• When people begin to philosophize they seem to think it necessary to make themselves artificially stupid.

  Bertrand Russell

  Philosophy, Stupid, Thinking

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.201, Routledge

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• Suppose atomic bombs had reduced the population of the world to one brother and sister; should they let the human race die out?

  Bertrand Russell

  Brother, Race, Population

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “Human Society in Ethics and Politics”, p.47, Routledge

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• Religions that teach brotherly love have been used as an excuse for persecution, and our profoundest scientific insight is made into a means of mass destruction.

  Bertrand Russell

  Hippie, Mean, Mass Destruction

  Bertrand Russell, John G. Slater, Peter Köllner (1997). “Last Philosophical Testament: 1943-68”, p.87, Psychology Press

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• Good nature is, of all moral qualities, the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for the others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish for ever.

  Bertrand Russell

  Struggle, Quality, Needs

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “In Praise of Idleness”, p.1, Lulu Press, Inc

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• The commonest objection to birth control is that it is against nature.

  Bertrand Russell

  Birth Control, Birth, Objections

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.64, Routledge

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• America... where law and custom alike are based upon the dreams of spinsters...

  Bertrand Russell

  Dream, Law, America

  "Marriage and Morals".

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• The process of philosophizing, to my mind, consists mainly in passing from those obvious, vague, ambiguous things, that we feel quite sure of, to something precise, clear, definite, which by reflection and analysis we find is involved in the vague thing that we start from, and is, so to speak, the real truth of which that vague thing is a sort of shadow.

  Bertrand Russell

  Real, Philosophical, Reflection

  Bertrand Russell (1972). “Russell's Logical atomism”

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• Fanaticism is the danger of the world, and always has been, and has done untold harm. I might almost say that I was fanatical against fanaticism.

  Bertrand Russell

  Done, World, Might

  "The Future of Science". Book by Bertrand Russell, p. 79; also in BBC The Listener, Vol. 61 (1959), p. 505, 1959.

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• Indemnity for the past and security for the future.

  Bertrand Russell

  Future, Past, Security

  "Memoir of Fox". Book by Siegfried Sassoon, vol. iii, 1928.

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• At the age of eleven, I began Euclid, with my brother as my tutor. ... I had not imagined that there was anything so delicious in the world. After I had learned the fifth proposition, my brother told me that it was generally considered difficult, but I had found no difficulty whatsoever. This was the first time it had dawned on me that I might have some intelligence.

  Bertrand Russell

  Brother, Science, Age

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Autobiography”, p.25, Routledge

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• Insight, untested and unsupported, is an uncertain guarantee of the truth.

  Bertrand Russell

  Guarantees, Uncertain, Insight

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• Owing to the identification of religion with virtue, together with the fact that the most religious men are not the most intelligent, a religious education gives courage to the stupid to resist the authority of educated men, as has happened, for example, where the teaching of evolution has been made illegal. So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence; and in this respect ministers of religion follow gospel authority more closely than in some others.

  Bertrand Russell

  Religious, Stupid, Teaching

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “Education and the Social Order”, p.73, Routledge

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• No man is liberated from fear who dare not see his place in the world as it is; no man can achieve the greatness of which he is capable until he has allowed himself to see his own littleness.

  Bertrand Russell

  Greatness, Men, World

  Bertrand Russell, Richard A. Rempel, Beryl Haslam (2000). “Uncertain Paths to Freedom: Russia and China, 1919-22”, p.19, Psychology Press

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