“Individuality is founded in feeling and the recesses of feeling, the darker, blinder strata of character, are the only places in the world in which we catch real fact in the making, and directly perceive how events happen, and how work is actually done.”
– William James
“Wisdom is learning what to overlook.”
– William James
“The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.”
– William James
“Truth lives, in fact, for the most part on a credit system. Our thoughts and beliefs pass, so long as nothing challenges them, just as bank-notes pass so long as nobody refuses them.”
– William James
“Those thoughts are truth which guide us to beneficial interaction with sensible particulars as they occur, whether they copy these in advance or not.”
– William James
“Truth is what works.”
– William James
“We have to live today by what truth we can get today and be ready tomorrow to call it falsehood.”
– William James
“Time itself comes in drops.”
– William James
“The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community.”
– William James
“Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity successful men act as though they have accomplished or are enjoying something. Soon it becomes a reality. Act, look, feel successful, conduct yourself accordingly, and you will be amazed at the positive results.”
– William James
“Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they’ve got a second.”
– William James
“The god whom science recognizes must be a God of universal laws exclusively, a God who does a wholesale, not a retail business. He cannot accommodate his processes to the convenience of individuals.”
– William James
“Man lives for science as well as bread.”
– William James
“There must be something solemn, serious, and tender about any attitude which we denominate religious. If glad, it must not grin or snicker if sad, it must not scream or curse.”
– William James
“Whenever you’re in conflict with someone, there is one factor that can make the difference between damaging your relationship and deepening it. That factor is attitude.”
– William James
“The sway of alcohol over mankind is unquestionably due to its power to stimulate the mystical faculties of human nature, usually crushed to earth by the cold facts and dry criticisms of the sober hour.”
– William James
“Pessimism leads to weakness, optimism to power.”
– William James
“Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity successful men act as though they have accomplished or are enjoying something. Soon it becomes a reality. Act, look, feel successful, conduct yourself accordingly, and you will be amazed at the positive results.”
– William James
“The sway of alcohol over mankind is unquestionably due to its power to stimulate the mystical faculties of human nature, usually crushed to earth by the cold facts and dry criticisms of the sober hour.”
– William James
“The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated.”
– William James
“Begin to be now what you will be hereafter.”
– William James
“Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.”
– William James
“The ideas gained by men before they are twenty-five are practically the only ideas they shall have in their lives.”
– William James
“How to gain, how to keep, how to recover happiness is in fact for most men at all times the secret motive of all they do, and of all they are willing to endure.”
– William James
“Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity successful men act as though they have accomplished or are enjoying something. Soon it becomes a reality. Act, look, feel successful, conduct yourself accordingly, and you will be amazed at the positive results.”
– William James
“A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, and life is after all a chain.”
– William James
“To change ones life: Start immediately. Do it flamboyantly.”
– William James
“This life is worth living, we can say, since it is what we make it.”
– William James
“The great use of life is to spend it for something that will outlast it.”
– William James
“The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes.”
– William James