|
Belief |
|
| "He does not believe who does not live
according to his belief." |
| -- Dr. Thomas Fuller (1608-61), English
clergyman, writer |
|
| "I can tell you, honest friend, what to
believe: believe life; it teaches better than book or orator." |
| -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832),
German writer, scientist |
|
| "A belief is not true because it is
useful." |
| -- Henri-Frédéric Amiel (1821-81), Swiss
philosopher, poet |
|
| "A belief is not merely an idea the mind
possesses; it is an idea that possesses the mind." |
| -- Robert Oxton Bolt (b. 1924), English writer |
|
| "The
mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and
tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls
a butterfly."
|
|
--
Richard
David Bach |
|
| "Belief
consists in accepting the affirmations of the soul; unbelief, in denying
them." |
| -- Ralph
Waldo Emerson, American writer, philosopher |
|
|
"Live your beliefs and you can turn the world
around." |
| -- Henry David
Thoreau, American writer, author, naturalist |
|
| "The belief that there is only one truth
and that oneself is in possession of it seems to me the deepest root
of all evil that is in the world." |
| -- Max Born (1882-1970), German physicist |
|
| "The
outer conditions of a person's life will always be found to reflect their
inner beliefs." |
| -- James Lane Allen (1849-1923),
American novelist |
|
| "Frisbeetarianism is the belief that when
you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck." |
| -- George (Denis) Carlin (b.
1937), American comedian, entertainer |
|
| “The mind can
assert anything, and pretend it has proved it. My beliefs I test on
my body, on my intuitional consciousness, and when I get a response
there, then I accept.” |
| -- D. H. Lawrence |
|
| "In my belief, you
cannot deal with the most serious things in the world unless you also
understand the most amusing." |
| -- Sir Winston Leonard Spenser
Churchill (1874-1965), British Prime Minister, author |
|
| "The
belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are
quite capable of every wickedness." |
| -- Joseph Conrad (1857-1924),
Polish-born British novelist |
|
| "Man
is made by his belief. As he believes, so he is." |
| -- Bhagavad Gita (c. BC 400) |
|
| "To believe with certainty we must begin
with doubting." |
| -- Stanislaus I |
|
| "Absurdity, n.: A statement or belief manifestly
inconsistent with one's own opinion." |
| -- Ambrose Bierce (1842 - 1914), American
writer, The Devil's Dictionary |
|
| "Seek not to understand that thou mayest
believe, but believe that thou mayest understand." |
| -- Saint Augustine |
|
| “Nothing
is easier than self-deceit. For what each man wishes, that he also
believes to be true.” |
| -- Demosthenes |
|
| "Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth
living and your belief will help create the fact." |
| -- William James (1842-1910),
American psychologist, philosopher |
|
| "Man
is fed with fables through life, and leaves it in the belief he knows
something of what has been passing, when in truth he has known nothing but
what has passed under his own eye." |
| -- Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826),
3rd US President |
|
| "Love is the mistaken belief that one
woman differs from another." |
| -- Henry Louis Mencken
(1880-1956), American editor, critic |
|
| "A
man of good will with a little effort and belief in his own powers can
enjoy a deep, tranquil, rich life -- provided he go his own way. He need
not and should not think of making a good living, but rather of creating a
good life for himself. To live one's own life is still the best way of
life, always was, and always will be." |
| -- Henry Miller (1891-1980),
American writer |
|
| "Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel
man." |
| -- Thomas Paine (1737-1809),
British-born American writer, Revolutionary leader |
|
| "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said
it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and
your own common sense." |
| -- Buddha (563?-483? BC), Indian mystic, founder of Buddhism |
|
| "Believe
in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but
reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or
happy." |
| -- Norman Vincent Peale |
|
| "I would never die for my beliefs because I might be
wrong." |
| -- Bertrand Russel (1872-1970),
British philosopher, mathematician, social critic, writer |
|
| "My belief is that to have no wants is
divine". |
| -- Socrates (470?-399 BC), Greek
philosopher |
|
| "Live your beliefs and you can turn the world around." |
| -- Henry David Thoreau
(1817-62), American writer, author, naturalist |
|
| "Dogmatism does not mean the absence of
thought, but the end of thought." |
| -- Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936),
British writer |
|
| "Man is a being born to believe. And if no
church comes forward with its title-deeds of truth to guide him, he
will find altars and idols in his own heart and his own
imagination." |
| -- Benjamin "Dizzy" Disraeli
(1804-81), British politician |
|
| "I do not believe today everything I
believed yesterday; I wonder will I believe tomorrow everything I
believe today." |
| -- Matthew Arnold (1822-88), British poet |
|
| "If you believe you can, you probably can.
If you believe you won't, you most assuredly won't. Belief is the
ignition switch that gets you off the launching pad." |
| -- Denis Waitley |
|
| "Belief is almost inevitably a suspension
of searching and critical thinking. There are many beliefs worth
having. I will not discuss them here. My concern is that too often
we people are prone to latch on to the first beliefs thrust on us,
and thereby to end the critical search for what we really hold to be
true." |
| -- Albert Emerson Unaterra (1952-2002),
American writer |
|
| "In religion and politics people's beliefs and
convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without
examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the
questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other
non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass
farthing." |
| -- Mark Twain (1835-1910),
[Samuel Langhorne Clemens] American author, humorist |
|
| "Religion is the fashionable substitute for belief."
|
| -- Oscar Fingall O'Flahertie
Wills Wilde (1854-1900), Irish writer, playwright |
|
| "We are slow to believe that which if
believed would hurt our feelings." |
| -- Ovid |
|
|
"Culture is the arts elevated to a set of beliefs." |
| -- Thomas
(Kennerly)
"Tom" Wolfe (b. 1931), American writer, journalist |
|
| "The phrases that men hear or repeat
continually, end by becoming convictions and ossify the organs of
intelligence." |
| -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832),
German writer, scientist |
|
| "The outer conditions of a person's life
will always be found to reflect their inner beliefs." |
| -- James Lane Allen (1849-1923), American
novelist |
|
| "Our firmest convictions are apt to be the
most suspect, they mark our limitations and our bounds. Life is a
petty thing unless it is moved by the indomitable urge to extend its
boundaries." |
| -- Jose Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955), Spanish
writer, author |
|
| "I don't believe in an afterlife, so I don't
have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even
more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of
heaven would be even worse." |
| -- Isaac Asimov (1920-92), Russian-born
American scientist |
|
| "If you were to destroy in mankind the
belief in immortality, not only love but every living force
maintaining the life of the world would at once be dried up.
Moreover, nothing then would be immoral, everything would be
permissible, even cannibalism." |
| -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Russian novelist |
|
| "Believe nothing merely because you have
been told it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out
of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination
and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the
benefit, the welfare of all beings -- that doctrine believe and
cling to, and take it as your guide." |
| -- Buddha (563?-483? BC), Indian mystic,
founder of Buddhism |
|
| "I don't believe in anything or anyone,
only in Zorba. Not because Zorba is better than the others; not at
all, not a little bit! He's a brute like the rest! But I believe in
Zorba because he's the only being I have in my power, the only one I
know. All the rest are ghosts. I see with these eyes, I hear with
these ears, I digest with these guts. All the rest are ghosts, I
tell you. When I die, everything'll die. The whole Zorbatic world
will go to the bottom!" |
| -- Nikos Kazantzakis (1883 -
1957), Greek novelist |
|
| "You will recall that I began my
address { Nobel prize acceptance} with a reference to the girl born
in Afghanistan today. Even though her mother will do all in her
power to protect and sustain her, there is a one-in-four risk that
she will not live to see her fifth birthday. Whether she does is
just one test of our common humanity – of our belief in our
individual responsibility for our fellow men and women. But it is
the only test that matters." |
| -- Kofi Annan, Ghanian Secretary-General of the
United Nations |
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