It takes a wonderful brain and exquisite senses to produce a few stupid ideas.
George SantayanaRead
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.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The pursuit of an ideal can deeply influence a person's life, often conveying that ideal more powerfully than words can.
This quote by George Santayana suggests that striving for an ideal, even if it remains unexpressed in words, can profoundly shape oneβs existence and actions. The notion highlights that the essence of our aspirations and principles can manifest through our way of living and being, possibly conveying deeper truths than spoken language ever could.
Themes
IdealLifeAspirationExpressionPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be shared at a graduation speech to inspire students to follow their ideals.
More from George Santayana
All quotes βThe 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.
George SantayanaRead
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.
George SantayanaRead
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.
George SantayanaRead
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.
George SantayanaRead
All living souls welcome whatsoever they are ready to cope with; all else they ignore, or pronounce to be monstrous and wrong, or deny to be possible.
George SantayanaRead
Similar quotes
Before I die many will die with me and they'll deserve it. See you in Hell.
Kurt CobainRead
So when a great man dies For years beyond our ken The light he leaves behind him lies Upon the paths of men.
Johann Heinrich PestalozziRead
There is no polite way to say that business is destroying the world.
Paul HawkenRead
Do something for somebody everyday for which you do not get paid.
Albert SchweitzerRead
Our aim is to achieve a socialist system of society, which, by eliminating the division of mankind into classes, by eliminating all exploitation of man by man and nation by nation, will inevitably eliminate the very possibility of war.
Vladimir LeninRead
God's grace and forgiveness, while free to the recipient, are always costly for the giver.
Timothy KellerRead