On Truth: A Systematic Inquiry

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Kegan Paul, Trench & Company, 1889 - 580 páginas
 

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Página 243 - Whatever power such a being may have over me, there is one thing which he shall not do : he shall not compel me to worship him. I will call no being good, who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow-creatures ; and if such a being can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go.
Página 242 - glad tidings" that there exists a Being in whom all the excellences which the highest human mind can conceive, exist in a degree inconceivable to us, I am informed that the world is ruled by a being whose attributes are infinite, but what they are we cannot learn, nor what are the principles of his government, except that "the highest human morality which we are capable of conceiving" does not sanction them ; convince me of it, and I will bear my fate as I may.
Página 285 - Man's craving to know the causes at work in each event he witnesses, the reasons why each state of things he surveys is such as it is and no other, is no product of high civilization, but a characteristic of his race down to its lowest stages. Among rude savages it is already an intellectual appetite whose satisfaction claims many of the moments not engrossed by war or sport, food or sleep.
Página 285 - The Fuegians rank amongst the lowest barbarians; but I was continually struck with surprise how closely the three natives on board HMS Beagle, who had lived some years in England, and could talk a little English, resembled us in disposition and in most of our mental faculties.
Página 399 - Ask your imagination if it will accept a vibrating multiple proportion — a numerical ratio in a state of oscillation ? I do not think it will. You cannot crown the edifice by this abstraction. The scientific imagination, which is here authoritative, demands as the origin and cause of a series of ether waves a particle of vibrating matter quite as definite, though it may be excessively minute, as that which gives origin to a musical sound.
Página 5 - nothing is certain" he obviously contradicts himself, since he thereby affirms the certainty of uncertainty. He says that, which, if true, absolutely contradicts what he has declared to be true. But a man who affirms what the system he professes to adopt forbids him to affirm, and who declares that he believes what he also declares to be unbelievable, should hardly complain if he is called "foolish.
Página 286 - Even granting that intellectual, moral, and political life may, on a broad view, be seen to progress together, it is obvious that they are far from advancing with equal steps. It may be taken as a man's rule of duty in the world, that he shall strive to know as well as he can find out, and do as well as he knows how. But the parting asunder of these two great principles, that separation of intelligence from virtue which accounts for so much of the wrongdoing of mankind, is continually seen to happen...
Página 285 - Beagle," with the many little traits of character, showing how similar their minds were to ours ; and so it was with a full-blooded negro with whom I happened once to be intimate.
Página 243 - ... does not sanction them, — convince me of it, and I will bear my fate as I may. But when I am told that I must believe this, and at the same time call this Being by the names which express and affirm the highest human morality, I say in plain terms that I will not. Whatever power such a Being may have over me, there is one thiug which he shall not. do,— he shall not compel me to worship him.
Página 474 - Why should she not sometimes add superabundant parts, seeing she so often omits essential ones? How many animals are there not which lack sense and limbs? Why is it considered so necessary that every part in an individual should be useful to the other parts and to the whole animal? Should it not be enough that they do not injure each other nor stand in the way of each other's fair development...

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