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Bertrand Russell Quotes


Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence, it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines.

Religions that teach brotherly love have been used as an excuse for persecution, and our profoundest scientific insight is made into a means of mass destruction.

Religions, which condemn the pleasures of sense, drive men to seek the pleasures of power. Throughout history power has been the vice of the ascetic.

Right discipline consists, not in external compulsion, but in the habits of mind which lead spontaneously to desirable rather than undesirable activities.

Science is what you know, philosophy is what you don't know.

Sin is geographical.

So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.

The coward wretch whose hand and heart Can bear to torture aught below, Is ever first to quail and start From the slightest pain or equal foe.

The degree of one's emotions varies inversely with one's knowledge of the facts.

The demand for certainty is one which is natural to man, but is nevertheless an intellectual vice.

The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd.

The fundamental concept in social science is Power, in the same sense in which Energy is the fundamental concept in physics.

The fundamental defect of fathers, in our competitive society, is that they want their children to be a credit to them.

The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.

The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists. That is why they invented Hell.

The megalomaniac differs from the narcissist by the fact that he wishes to be powerful rather than charming, and seeks to be feared rather than loved. To this type belong many lunatics and most of the great men of history.

The most savage controversies are about matters as to which there is no good evidence either way.

The observer, when he seems to himself to be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing the effects of the stone upon himself.

The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation.

The place of the father in the modern suburban family is a very small one, particularly if he plays golf.