Herbert Spencer Quotes
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Religion is the recognition that all things are manifestations of a Power which transcends our knowledge.
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Education has for its object the formation of character.
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Surely in much talk there cannot choose but be much vanity. Loquacity is the fistula of the mind,--ever-running and almost incurable, let every man, therefore, be a Phocion or Pythagorean, to speak briefly to the point or not at all; let him labor like them of Crete, to show more wit in his discourse than words, and not to pour out of his mouth a flood of the one, when he can hardly wring out of his brains a drop of the other.
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A man's liberties are none the less aggressed upon because those who coerce him do so in the belief that he will be benefited.
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In societies of low civilization, there is no money.
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Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded.
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Never educate a child to be a gentleman or lady alone, but to be a man, a woman.
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There is no origin for the idea of an afterlife, save the conclusion which the savage draws from the notion suggested by dreams.
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Hero-worship is strongest where there is least regard for human freedom.
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We too often forget that not only is there 'a soul of goodness in things evil,' but very generally also, a soul of truth in things erroneous.
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No one can be perfectly happy till all are happy.
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Morality knows nothing of geographical boundaries, or distinctions of race.
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Thus poetry, regarded as a vehicle of thought, is especially impressive partly because it obeys all the laws of effective speech, and partly because in so doing it imitates the natural utterances of excitement.
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People are beginning to see that the first requisite to success in life is to be a good animal.
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Every cause produces more than one effect.
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If they are sufficiently complete to live, they do live, and it is well they should live. If they are not sufficiently complete to live, they die, and it is best they should die.
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If every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man, then he is free to drop connection with the state-to relinquish its protection, and to refuse paying toward its support.
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We have a priori reasons for believing that in every sentence there is some one order of words more effective than any other; and that this order is the one which presents the elements of the proposition in the succession in which they may be most readily put together.
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The question of questions for the politicians should ever be-What type of social structure am I tending to produce? But this is a question he never entertains.
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The existence of a first cause of the universe is a necessity of thought ... Amid the mysteries which become more mysterious the more they are thought about, there will remain the one absolute certainty that we are over in the presence of an Infinite, Eternal Energy from which all things proceed.
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Lusts are like agues; the fit is not always on, and yet the man is not rid of his disease; and some men's lusts, like some agues, have not such quick returns as others.
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A nation's institutions and beliefs are determined by it's character.
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Life is not for learning nor is life for working, but learning and working are for life.
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The tyrant is nothing but a slave turned inside out.