Quotes By Author
Quotations By Bertrand Russell
Beliefs
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
Beliefs
In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.
Beliefs
The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence that it is not utterly absurd; indeed, in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more often likely to be foolish than sensible.
Beliefs
What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite.
Books
If a law were passed giving six months to every writer of a first book, only the good ones would do it.
Books
There must be an ideal world, a sort of mathematician's paradise where everything happens as it does in textbooks.
Capitalism
Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim: The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate.
Change
Change is one thing, progress is another. “Change” is scientific, “progress” is ethical; change is indubitable, whereas progress is a matter of controversy.
Convention
Conventional people are roused to fury by departure from convention, largely because they regard such departure as a criticism of themselves.
Equality
In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors, for, from the time of Jefferson onward, the doctrine that all men are equal applies only upwards, not downwards.
Freedom
Freedom of opinion can only exist when the government thinks itself secure.
Happiness
If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give.
Happiness
Italy, and the spring and first love all together should suffice to make the gloomiest person happy.
Happiness
Man needs, for his happiness, not only the enjoyment of this or that, but hope and enterprise and change.
Ideals
Much that passes as idealism is disguised hatred or disguised love of power.
Individuality
In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors, for, from the time of Jefferson onward, the doctrine that all men are equal applies only upwards, not downwards.
Love
Love is something far more than desire for sexual intercourse; it is the principal means of escape from the loneliness which afflicts most men and women throughout the greater part of their lives.
Love
Many people when they fall in love look for a little haven of refuge from the world, where they can be sure of being admired when they are not admirable, and praised when they are not praiseworthy.
Marriage
Marriage is for women the commonest mode of livelihood, and the total amount of undesired sex endured by women is probably greater in marriage than in prostitution.
Religion
Religions that teach brotherly love have been used as an excuse for persecution, and our profoundest scientific insight is made into a means of mass destruction.
Understanding
The theoretical understanding of the world, which is the aim of philosophy, is not a matter of great practical importance to animals, or to savages, or even to most civilised men.