"The Synthesis consists in assuming the Causes discovered and established as Principles, and by them explaining the Phænomena proceeding from them, and proving the Explanations."
Principles quotes
Principles
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Principles quotes (page 10 of 117)
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"That every will must consider every other will its equal would be a principle hostile to life, an agent of the dissolution and destruction of man, an attempt to assassinate the future of man, a sign of weariness, a secret path to nothingness."
"No one expects this nation to become a theocracy, where Christianity is the only value, but we do indeed say that the essential values and founding principles of the nation should not be ignored."
"A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations, and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever rejects it does of necessity fly to anarchy or to despotism. Unanimity is impossible. The rule of a minority, as a permanent arrangement, is wholly inadmissible; so that, rejecting the majority principle, anarchy or despotism in some form is all that is left."
"Be flexible, but stick to your principles."
"I tend to approach things from a physics framework. And physics teaches you to reason from first principles rather than by analogy."
"Happiness and freedom begin with a clear understanding of one principle: Some things are within our control, and some things are not."
"When one cultivates to the utmost the principles of his nature, and exercises them on the principle of reciprocity, he is not far from the path."
"When we deal with questions relating to principles of law and their applications, we do not suddenly rise into a stratosphere of icy certainty."
"All these constructions and the laws connecting them can be arrived at by the principle of looking for the mathematically simplest concepts and the link between them."
"Reverence for life affords me my fundamental principle of morality."
"Most men and women lead lives at the worst so painful, at the best so monotonous, poor and limited that the urge to escape, the longing to transcend themselves if only for a few moments, is and has always been one of the principal appetites of the soul."
"This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games. All games are basically hostile. Winners and losers. We see them all around us: the winners and the losers. The losers can oftentimes become winners, and the winners can very easily become losers."
"Nothing defines humans better than their willingness to do irrational things in the pursuit of phenomenally unlikely payoffs. This is the principle behind lotteries, dating, and religion."
"We must have faith in the people of this country and faith in our principles."
"Be firm on principle but flexible on method."
"There may be thousands of principles of Marxism, but in the final analysis they can be summed up in one sentence: Rebellion is justified."
"The proper exegetical principle is this: Mosaic law is still to be enforced, by the church or the State or both, unless there is a specific injunction to the contrary in the New Testament."
"Within ten days thou wilt seem a god to those to whom thou art now a beast and an ape, if thou wilt return to thy principles and the worship of reason."
"Freemasonry is an order whose leading star is philanthropy and whose principles inculcate an unceasing devotion to the cause of virtue and morality."