James, William

"The moral equivalent of war is the only thing that will give force and meaning to religious emotion."

"The greatest discovery my generation has made is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their thinking."

"Our passions shape our books; our books shape our passions."

"The only real valuable thing is intuition."

"A man has as many social selves as there are distinct groups of persons about whose opinion he cares."

"There will always be a part of you that is a victim of your childhood."

"The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working."

"Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second."

"Faith means belief in something concerning which doubt is theoretically possible."

"Human beings are born into this little span of life of which the best thing is its friendships and intimacies."

"The hell to be endured hereafter, of which theology makes so much account, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves in this world by habitually fashioning our characters in the wrong way."

"Mysteries are not necessarily miracles."

"Psychology is a science, and teaching is an art; and sciences never generate arts directly out of themselves."

"The secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow."

"A single successful experiment is worth a thousand expert opinions."

"There is no greater judgement on the quality of a society than the degree to which it cares for its most vulnerable members."

"Keep the faculty of effort alive in you by a little gratuitous exercise every day."

"We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and cannot escape them."

"The greatest discovery of this generation is not in the realm of external nature, but in the realm of human nature."

"The true eternal principle of endeavor and the ever strengthened unity of consciousness in which we find our highest joy."

"There is nothing so absurd or incredible that it has not sometimes been asserted by some philosopher."

"To change one's life: start immediately, do it flamboyantly, no exceptions."

"You make a great, very great mistake if you think that psychology, being the science of the mind's laws, is something apart from biology."

"Human history in one perspective is the recital of the gradual discovery of all the laws of nature."

"The great anodyne of life is work."

"Intellectualism to-day has changed its manners; it has become less assured of its pretensions."

"What holds attention determines action."

"The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual; the individual isolates himself without the sustenance of the community."

"Happiness is the natural fruit of duty."

"The real tragedy is the tragedy of the man who never in his life braces himself for his one supreme effort."