Then there are the fanatical atheists whose intolerance is of the same kind as the intolerance of the religious fanatics and comes from the same source.
I believe that whatever we do or live for has its causality; it is good, however, that we cannot see through to it.
The idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I am unable to take seriously.
What separates me from most so-called atheists is a feeling of utter humility toward the unattainable secrets of the harmony of the cosmos.
But if the longing for the achievement of the goal is powerfully alive within us, then shall we not lack the strength to find the means for reaching the goal and for translating it into deeds.
As to science, we may well define it for our purpose as “methodical thinking directed toward finding regulative connections between our sensual experiences”.
While it is true that science, to the extent of its grasp of causative connections, may reach important conclusions as to the compatibility and incompatibility of goals and evaluations, the independent and fundamental definitions regarding goals and values remain beyond science’s reach.
If men as individuals surrender to the call of their elementary instincts, avoiding pain and seeking satisfaction only for their own selves, the result for them all taken together must be a state of insecurity, of fear, and of promiscuous misery.
Although I cannot believe that the individual survives the death of his body, feeble souls harbor such thought through fear or ridiculous egotism.
In art, and in the higher ranges of science, there is a feeling of harmony which underlies all endeavor. There is no true greatness in art or science without that sense of harmony.
Most people go on living their everyday life: half-frightened, half indifferent, they behold the ghostly tragic-comedy that is being performed on the international stage before the eyes and ears of the world.
Man usually avoids attributing cleverness to somebody else unless it is an enemy.
What humanity owes to personalities like Buddha, Moses, and Jesus ranks for me higher than all the achievements of the enquiring and constructive mind.
A man has to work so hard so that something of his personality stays alive. A tomcat has it so easy, he has only to spray and his presence is there for years on rainy days.
Those who have an interest in keeping the machinery of war going will stop at nothing to make public opinion subservient to their murderous ends.
I like to think the moon is there even if I am not looking at it.
What a deep faith in the rationality of the structure of the world and what a longing to understand even a small glimpse of the reason revealed in the world there must have been in Kepler and Newton to enable them to unravel the mechanism of the heavens in long years of lonely work!
Hunger, love, pain, fear are some of those inner forces which rule the individual’s instinct for self preservation.
The highest principles for our aspirations and judgments are given to us in the Jewish-Christian religious tradition.
A theory is the more impressive the greater is the simplicity of its premises, the more different are the kinds of things it relates and the more extended the range of its applicability.