I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong.

Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Russell

Profession: Philosopher
Nationality: British


I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong. Bertrand Russell

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The first effect of emancipation from the Church was not to make men think rationally, but to open their minds to every sort of antique nonsense.

The less rational a man is, the oftener he will fail to perceive how what injures others also injures him, because hatred or envy will blind him. Therefore, although I do not pretend that enlightened self-interest is the highest morality, I do maintain that, if it became common, it would make the world an immeasurably better place than it is.

The mind is a strange machine which can combine the materials offered to it in the most astonishing ways.

My own belief is that in most ages and in most places obscure psychological forces led men to adopt systems involving quite unnecessary cruelty, and that this is still the case among the most civilized races at the present day.

The essence of the conception of righteousness, therefore, is to afford an outlet for sadism by cloaking cruelty as justice.

The 'practical' man, as this word is often used, is one who recognizes only the material needs, who realizes that men must have food for the body, but is oblivious of the necessity of providing food for the mind.

Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty—a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture, without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of painting or music, yet sublimely pure, and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show.

Envy consists in seeing things never in themselves, but only in their relations. If you desire glory, you may envy Napoleon, but Napoleon envied Caesar, Caesar envied Alexander, and Alexander, I daresay, envied Hercules, who never existed.

Fear is I believe a most effective tool in destroying the soul of an individual - and the soul of a people.

It is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatsoever for supposing it is true.

All movements go too far.

Never try to discourage thinking, for you are sure to succeed.

And where a solution appears possible, the new logic provides a method which enables us to obtain results that do not merely embody personal idiosyncrasies, but must command the assent of all who are competent to form an opinion.

The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation.