The Will to Believe: And Other Essays in Popular Philosophy |
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Common terms and phrases
A. R. Wallace absolutely abstract actually appears believe better casuistic chance character conceiving conception concrete consciousness course demands determinism deterministic divine dogmatically Edmund Gurney emotional empiricism empiricist environment escape essence eternal ethical philosophy evidence evil existence experience fact faith feel genius give gnosticism Grant Allen Hegel hegelian human hypothesis ideal identity indeterminism individual infinite intellectual judgment kind living logical matter mean mediumship ment mental metaphysical mind monism mood moral moral universe nature of things negation ness never notion object option outward passion pessimism phenomena philosopher physical point of view position possible practical principle prove pure question rational reason reflex action relations religion religious result scepticism scientific seems sense simply sort space subjectivism suppose sure theism theoretic thinker thou thought tion true truth unity universe whole word
Popular passages
Page 152 - With Earth's first Clay They did the Last Man knead, And there of the Last Harvest sowed the Seed: And the first Morning of Creation wrote What the Last Dawn of Reckoning shall read.
Page 165 - Past utterance and past belief, And past the blasphemy of grief, The mysteries of nature's heart, — And though no muse can these impart, Throb thine with nature's throbbing breast, And all is clear from east to west.
Page 162 - Ah Love! could you and I with Him conspire To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire, Would not we shatter it to bits — and then Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire!
Page 229 - They parted - ne'er to meet again! But never either found another To free the hollow heart from paining They stood aloof, the scars remaining, Like cliffs, which had been rent asunder; A dreary sea now flows between; But neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder, Shall wholly do away, I ween, The marks of that which once hath been.
Page 62 - These then are my last words to you: Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.
Page 27 - There are, then, cases where a fact cannot come at all unless a preliminary faith exists in its coming. And where faith in a fact can help create the fact, that would be an insane logic which should say that faith running ahead of scientific evidence is the 'lowest kind of immorality' into which a thinking being can fall.
Page 213 - He saith among the trumpets, Ha, ha ; and he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains and the shouting.
Page 213 - Every sort of energy and endurance, of courage and capacity for handling life's evils, is set free in those who have religious faith. For this reason the strenuous type of character will on the battle-field of human history always outwear the easy-going type, and religion will drive irreligion to the wall.
Page 26 - A social organism of any sort whatever, large or small, is what it is because each member proceeds to his own duty with a trust that the other members will simultaneously do theirs. Wherever a desired result is achieved by the cooperation of many independent persons, its existence as a fact is a pure consequence of the precursive faith in one another of those immediately concerned. A government, an army, a commercial system, a ship, a college, an athletic team, all exist on this condition, without...
Page 44 - Wherefore, like a coward, dost thou forever pip and whimper, and go cowering and trembling ? Despicable biped ! what is the sum-total of the worst that lies before thee? Death? Well, Death; and say the pangs of Tophet too, and all that the Devil and Man may, will, or can do against thee! Hast thou not a heart; canst thou not suffer whatsoever it be; and, as a Child of Freedom, though outcast, trample Tophet itself under thy feet, while it consumes thee? Let it come, then ; I will meet it and defy...