Robert King Merton, sociologist (1910-2003)

Most institutions demand unqualified faith; but the institution of science makes skepticism a virtue. -Robert King Merton, sociologist (1910-2003)

Demand? Unqualified? A little strong for most institutions.

Voltaire, philosopher (1694-1778)

It is lamentable, that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy of the rest of mankind. -Voltaire, philosopher (1694-1778)

This isn’t really true, though in some times and places, or perhaps even in all times and all places, some people, have been infected by this idea. True patriotism can coexist in the same heart and mind with the appropriate love of mankind.

Rumi, poet and mystic (1207-1273)

There is a field beyond all notions of right and wrong. Come, meet me there. -Rumi, poet and mystic (1207-1273)

It is a false and dangerous idea to think that there is any realm of human activity that is beyond considerations of right and wrong.

Samuel Butler, poet (1612-1680)

For blocks are better cleft with wedges,
Than tools of sharp or subtle edges,
And dullest nonsense has been found
By some to be the most profound. -Samuel Butler, poet (1612-1680)

A blockhead can’t be taught using subtle reasoning. Simple and direct is the way to go. Often this is the best approach even for people with open minds.

H.L. Mencken, writer, editor, and critic (1880-1956)

You can't do anything about the length of your life, but you can do something about its width and depth. -H.L. Mencken, writer, editor, and critic (1880-1956)

Good one. Although of course you can do something about the length of your life, at least to the effect of shortening it.

Robert M. Pirsig, author and philosopher (b. 1928)

When people are fanatically dedicated to political or religious faiths or any other kind of dogmas or goals, it's always because these dogmas or goals are in doubt. -Robert M. Pirsig, author and philosopher (b. 1928)

I don’t know what counts as “fanatical dedication” to Pirsig, but as it stands I would say this is baloney, typical modern pseudo-sophistication. I would be less annoyed if he had left out the “always.” But perhaps it is a Zen thing that I should be less critical of.

Aldous Huxley, novelist (1894-1963)

The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline towards the religion of solitude. -Aldous Huxley, novelist (1894-1963)

I don’t think this is necessarily true, especially if one’s religion is Christianity rather that the religion of solitude. Powerful and original Christian minds realize that what they have is a gift intended to benefit others, so they forgo solitude, at least to some extent, in favor of service.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, novelist, Nobel laureate (1918-2008)

We do not err because truth is difficult to see. It is visible at a glance. We err because this is more comfortable. -Alexander Solzhenitsyn, novelist, Nobel laureate (1918-2008)

I don’t think it is as simple as this quote seems to suggest. True, sometimes we turn away from the truth we see because of sloth, but some people work very hard to promote something they believe in passionately, but which is in fact false. It is hard to imagine that they see the truth but are expending so much effort to undermine it. It seems to me that they are blinded by ideology, which makes useful discussion very difficult.

Edith Wharton, novelist (1862-1937)

I begin to see what marriage is for. It's to keep people away from each other. Sometimes I think that two people who love each other can be saved from madness only by the things that come between them: children, duties, visits, bores, relations, the things that protect married people from each other. -Edith Wharton, novelist (1862-1937)

It is sad that anyone would come to this conclusion about marriage, especially someone as influential, at least in her own time, as Edith Wharton. In Christian marriage, at any rate, husband and wife become one flesh, and not just physically but one in mind and heart. The danger in a Christian marriage is precisely that children, duties, and other such things will come between them.

Bill Copeland

"Try to be like the turtle - at ease in your own shell." -- Bill Copeland

What does this mean?  Be at ease in your own body? That’s good!
Be happily isolated from the world around you, including the social world? Not a good idea!

Viktor Frankl, author, neurologist and psychiatrist, Holocaust survivor (1905-1997)

What is to give light must endure burning. -Viktor Frankl, author, neurologist and psychiatrist, Holocaust survivor (1905-1997)

Add to this the quote from the desert fathers: If you will you can be all flame.

Plato

"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws." – Plato

One of the purposes of law is to train the person in what it means to be good, so laws have an important function for the good as well as to restrain the evil.

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies. -Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, philosopher (1844-1900)

Ridiculous!

Theodore Roethke, poet (1908-1963)

May my silences become more accurate. -Theodore Roethke, poet (1908-1963)

Very thought provoking! On reflection I have come to realize that often my silence in a given situation is not because it is the best response but rather flows from discomfort, inappropriate anger, ignorance, or some other cause. Clearly, this leads to problems in communication. Further reflection makes me realize that becoming more accurate in my silences is not an easy matter. It can’t be addressed directly.

Matsuo Basho, poet (1644-1694)

Seek not to follow in the footsteps of men of old; seek what they sought. -Matsuo Basho, poet (1644-1694)

Better still simply to seek truth and goodness.

Ernest Hemingway

"Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know." -- Ernest Hemingway

I know lots of very intelligent people who are happy. I happens that they are also people of faith, so maybe Hemingway would say that disqualifies them from the “intelligent.”

H.L. Mencken, writer, editor, and critic (1880-1956)

Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on "I am not too sure." -H.L. Mencken, writer, editor, and critic (1880-1956)

Very ironic that Mencken is so “morally certain” about this opinion. Personally I am skeptical whenever someone uses the word “always.”

Pablo Picasso, painter, and sculptor (1881-1973)

Art is the elimination of the unnecessary. -Pablo Picasso, painter, and sculptor (1881-1973)

Clearly, a minimalist’s view, not an eternal verity, although I suppose it depends on what one considers necessary. I imagine an artist of the Baroque period considered his flourishes necessary!

Josh Billings, columnist and humorist (1818-1885)

Ambition is like hunger; it obeys no law but its appetite. -Josh Billings, columnist and humorist (1818-1885)

But like hunger it can be controlled. Hunger doesn’t have to be gluttony and ambition doesn’t have to be sinful pride. Temperance and humility can be cultivated.

James M. Barrie, novelist, short-story writer, playwright (1860-1937)

We should be slower to think that the man at his worst is the real man, and certain that the better we are ourselves the less likely is he to be at his worst in our company. Every time he talks away his own character before us he is signifying contempt for ours. -James M. Barrie, novelist, short-story writer, and playwright (1860-1937)

Not a very pithy statement, but very worth pondering, and taking to heart.

Alice Roosevelt Longworth,

"I have a simple philosophy: Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. Scratch where it itches." -- Alice Roosevelt Longworth

Can a position so mindless be called a philosophy?  It seems to rule out judgment altogether.

John Bradshaw, educator, counselor, motivational speaker, author

"Ego is to the true self what a flashlight is to a spotlight." -- John Bradshaw

Taking “ego” to mean self-centeredness or self-concern, I would agree that Bradshaw identifies what should be, but I fear that these days the reality for many is quite the opposite. Our modern culture more and more promotes the ideal of autonomous individualism, the tyranny of the self. Ego becomes all there is.

John Locke, philosopher (1632-1704)

One unerring mark of the love of truth is not entertaining any proposition with greater assurance than the proofs it is built upon will warrant. -John Locke, philosopher (1632-1704)

The problem in the present age, or I suppose really in any age, is what counts as a proof, what kind of warrant is accepted or required.

John Locke, philosopher (1632-1704)

A sound mind in a sound body, is a short but full description of a happy state in this world. -John Locke, philosopher (1632-1704)

Locke left something out. Man is more than just a mind in a body. He is also a spiritual being, and unless he is in a sound relationship with God he is not in a happy state in this world, let alone in the next.

Dag Hammarskjold, Secretary General of the United Nations, Nobel laureate (1905-1961)

If only I may grow: firmer, simpler, -- quieter, warmer. -Dag Hammarskjold, Secretary General of the United Nations, Nobel laureate (1905-1961)

Good one!

Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller, poet and dramatist (1759-1805)

As freely as the firmament embraces the world, / or the sun pours forth impartially his beams, / so mercy must encircle both friend and foe. -Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller, poet and dramatist (1759-1805)

Or as Jesus put it, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,  that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. Mt. 5:43-45 

Francois De La Rochefoucauld, moralist (1613-1680)

It is more often from pride than from ignorance that we are so obstinately opposed to current opinions; we find the first places taken, and we do not want to be the last. -Francois De La Rochefoucauld, moralist (1613-1680)

Sometimes it is neither pride nor ignorance that makes us obstinately opposed to some current opinion, but rather reasoned judgment that this particular opinion must be opposed.

Bertrand Russell

Every advance in civilization has been denounced as unnatural while it was recent. -Bertrand Russell, philosopher, mathematician, author, Nobel prize in literature (1872-1970)

Unfortunately, some of those "advances" are no longer denounced as they should be.

Lao Tzu

"If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading." -- Lao Tzu

The question is, of course, am I currently going in the right direction?

Joseph Joubert, essayist (1754-1824)

Never cut what you can untie. -Joseph Joubert, essayist (1754-1824)


Excellent!

Charlie Chaplin, actor, director, and composer (1889-1977)

Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot. -Charlie Chaplin, actor, director, and composer (1889-1977)

Viewed from the end, an individual’s life might be either, depending on one’s eternal home. But from God’s perspective, seeing all lives of all men from end to end, human history must be a comedy, unless it transcends those categories.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery, author and aviator (1900-1945)

And the fox said to the little prince: men have forgotten this truth, but you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. -Antoine de Saint-Exupery, author and aviator (1900-1945)

For what sense of tame is this true? I would agree with this understanding:  if I change a living thing so that it can no longer live as it once did, then I have a responsibility to enable it to in its new state. I would say that George and Joy Adamson fulfilled this responsibility in regard to the lioness Elsa when they enabled her to survive in the wild after being raised in captivity. They tamed Elsa, perhaps without realizing what was happening, but then took great efforts to enable her to live on her own, and not just survive but in fact flourish.

John Leonard, critic (1939-2008)

To be capable of embarrassment is the beginning of moral consciousness. Honor grows from qualms. -John Leonard, critic (1939-2008)

I would agree with this, but would add that embarrassment is the lowest level of moral consciousness, and that to grow to higher levels, such as remorse, is certainly not automatic.

Emily Dickinson, poet (1830-1886)

Anger as soon as fed is dead- / 'Tis starving makes it fat. -Emily Dickinson, poet (1830-1886)

I think not. One’s anger may dissipate after being expressed, but it isn’t the venting that causes it to fade but rather a mental turn that follows. Expressing anger may in fact lead to increasing rage in some people some times. On the other hand, nursing one’s anger silently will indeed make it grow, but truly starving it will kill it.