It takes a wonderful brain and exquisite senses to produce a few stupid ideas.
George SantayanaRead
What religion a man shall have is a historical accident, quite as much as what language he shall speak.
Interpretation
A person's religion is often determined by historical circumstances rather than personal choice.
George Santayana suggests that the religion to which a person adheres is largely influenced by historical context, similar to the language they speak. This implies that both religion and language are products of cultural and societal circumstances rather than inherent truth or personal disposition, encouraging a reflection on how external factors shape individual beliefs and identities.
In practice
In a discussion about the influence of culture on personal beliefs.
It takes a wonderful brain and exquisite senses to produce a few stupid ideas.
The working of great institutions is mainly the result of a vast mass of routine, petty malice, self interest, carelessness and sheer mistake. Only a residual fraction is thought.
There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval. The dark background which death supplies brings out the tender colours of life in all their purity.
Not to believe in love is a great sign of dullness. There are some people so indirect and lumbering that they think all real affection rests on circumstantial evidence.
To feel beauty is a better thing than to understand how we come to feel it. To have imagination and taste, to love the best, to be carried by the contemplation of nature to a vivid faith in the ideal, all this is more, a great deal more, than any science can hope to be.
The vital straining towards an ideal, definite but latent, when it dominates a whole life, may express that ideal more fully than could the best chosen words.
It is a poor reverie which invites a nap. One must even wonder whether, in this "failing asleep", the subconscious itself does not undergo a decline in being.
There is a dark side in all of us. And for us 'bad' people, the bad side dominates. I think there is a great sadness in villains, and I have tried to put that across. We cannot stop ourselves doing what we are doing.
A sudden silence in the middle of a conversation suddenly brings us back to essentials: it reveals how dearly we must pay for the invention of speech.
I was a Muslim once, remember, and it was when I was most devout that I was most full of hate.
The Freudian theory is one of the most important foundation stones for an edifice to be built by future generations, the dwelling of a freer and wiser humanity.
Everybody must be managed. Queens must be managed. Kings must be managed, for men want managing almost as much as women, and that's saying a good deal.
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