John Locke wrote:Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company and reflection must finish him.
What worries you, masters you.
Government has no other end, but the preservation of property.
All wealth is the product of labor.
No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience.
Fortitude is the guard and support of the other virtues.
All mankind... being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.
I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts.
The only fence against the world is a thorough knowledge of it.
Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has a right to, but himself.
Thomas Hobbes wrote:Curiosity is the lust of the mind.
Hell is truth seen too late
“Scientia potentia est.
Knowledge is power.”
For such is the nature of man, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; Yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves: For they see their own wit at hand, and other mens at a distance.
The condition of man . . . is a condition of war of everyone against everyone
“Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man, the same consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition there is no place for industry... no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”
Leisure is the mother of Philosophy
The source of every crime, is some defect of the understanding; or some error in reasoning; or some sudden force of the passions. Defect in the understanding is ignorance; in reasoning, erroneous opinion.
Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.
So that in the nature of man,
we find three principal causes of quarrel:
First, Competition;
Secondly, Dissidence;
Thirdly, Glory.
The first, maketh men invade for Gain;
the second, for Safety;
and the third, for Reputation.
The first use Violence, to make themselves Masters of other men's persons, wives, children and cattle;
the second, to defend them;
the third, for trifles, as a word, a smile, a different opinion, and any other sign of undervalue, either direct in their Persons, or by reflexion in their Kindred, their Friends, their Nation, their Profession, or their Name.”
Homo homini lupus
Words are the counters of wise men, and the money of fools.
The first and fundamental law of Nature, which is, to seek peace and follow it.
For it can never be that war shall preserve life, and peace destroy it.
Covenants, without the sword, are but words and of no strength to secure a man at all.
When all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is war, which provideth for every man, by victory or death.
For to accuse requires less eloquence, such is man's nature, than to excuse; and condemnation, than absolution, more resembles justice.
If men are naturally in a state of war, why do they always carry arms and why do they have keys to lock their doors?
it is one thing to desire, another to be in capacity fit for what we desire.
God put me on this Earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I'm so far behind that I'll never die".
A man's conscience and his judgment are the same thing, and, as the judgment, so also the conscience may be erroneous
What is the heart but a spring, and the nerves but so many strings, and the joints but so many wheels, giving motion to the whole body?
The universe, the whole mass of things that are, is corporeal, that is to say, body, and hath the dimensions of magnitude, length, breadth and depth. Every part of the universe is ‘body’ and that which is not ‘body’ is no part of the universe, and because the universe is all, that which is no part of it is nothing, and consequently nowhere.
René Descartes wrote:The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.
It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well.
The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.
Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it.
If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.
Each problem that I solved became a rule, which served afterwards to solve other problems.
In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate.
Everything is self-evident.
Perfect numbers like perfect men are very rare.
Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power.
Francis Bacon wrote:Knowledge is power
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.
Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
Cure the disease and kill the patient.
Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is.
If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties.
The best part of beauty is that which no picture can express.
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.
Truth is the daughter of time, not of authority.
Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
Fixed Cross wrote:Anyone know some Baudrillard?
The Simulacrum.
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