Bertrand Russell Quotes

We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.

The truth is a trap: you can not get it without it getting you; you cannot get the truth by capturing it, only by its capturing you.

First he appeared in the class of inorganic things,
Next he passed therefrom into that of plants,
For years he lived as one of the plants,
Remembering naught of his inorganic state so different,
And when he passed from the vegetive to the animal state
He had no remembrance of his state as a plant.

In man (as the only rational creature on earth) those natural capacities which are directed to the use of his reason are to be fully developed only in the race, not in the individual.

Life seems to me essentially passion, conflict, rage... It is only intellect that keeps me sane; perhaps this makes me overvalue intellect against feeling.

Walter Scott has no business to write novels, especially good ones. It is not fair. He has fame and profit enough as a poet, and should not be taking the bread out of other people's mouths. I do not like him, and do not mean to like Waverley if I can help it, but fear I must.

To effectively communicate, we must realize that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with others.

Every day, every year, and for every graduating class, there is a choice to be made, the same option for all grown-ups to make: to be one of three types of Americans — those who embrace liberty for all, those who won’t, or those who are indifferent — and only the first do the work of creating a more perfect union.

I'm out here a thousand miles from my home
Walkin' a road other men have gone down
I'm seein' your world of people and things
Your paupers and peasants and princes and kings

I think we need some new Christmas carols with a more modern approach. Of course, I wouldn't abandon the religious theme completely. How about "Holy Christ, the Christmas Tree's on Fire"? Or "Jesus, Can You Believe It's Christmas Again?" This ought to get the ball rolling; I'm hoping you people will take it from here.

This discipline and rough treatment are a furnace to extract the silver from the dross. This testing purifies the gold by boiling the scum away.

Schultz: You must speak.
Jewish barber: I can't.
Schultz: It's our only hope.

It is possible and imperative that we discover
A brave and startling truth.

For this too is a very pleasant strand woven into the Cynic's pattern of life; he must needs be flogged like an ass, and while he is being flogged he must love the men who flog him, as though he were the father or brother of them all.

The Rose that Grew from Concrete (2000)

It is that wind it is that voice buzzing it is whispering and whistling in the wires miles upon miles upon miles on the wires in the wind in the subway track in the rolling road in the not silent bush it is the voice of the noise here it comes the Third World Express they must say, here we go again.