Quotations by Author

Bertrand Russell

To fear love is to fear life, and those who fear life are already three parts dead.

So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.

The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others.

The fundamental defect of fathers is that they want their children to be a credit to them.

No man can be a good teacher unless he has feelings of warm affection toward his pupils and a genuine desire to impart to them what he himself believes to be of value.

Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

Machines are worshipped because they are beautiful and valued because they confer power; they are hated because they are hideous and loathed because they impose slavery.

Reason is a harmonising, controlling force rather than a creative one.

The degree of one's emotion varies inversely with one's knowledge of the facts -- the less you know the hotter you get.

The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.

The secret of happiness is this: let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions to the things and persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly rather than hostile.

Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind.... This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.

We are faced with the paradoxical fact that education has become one of the chief obstacles to intelligence and freedom of thought.

William James used to preach "the will to believe". For my part, I should wish to preach "the will to doubt". What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the wish to find out, which is the exact opposite.

Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts. Fear is the main source of superstition, . . .. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom. I wish to preach "the will to doubt". What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite.

My own view on religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source of untold misery to the human race. I cannot, however, deny that it has made some contributions to civilization. It helped in early days to fix the calendar, and it caused Egyptian priests to chronicle eclipses with such care that in time they became able to predict them. These two services I am prepared to acknowledge, but I do not know of any others.

Dogma demands authority, rather than intelligent thought, as the source of opinion; it requires persecution of heretics and hostility to unbelievers; it asks of its disciples that they should inhibit natural kindness in favour of systematic hatred.

Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence, it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines.

Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand-in-hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those two things. In this world we can now begin a little to understand things, and a little to master them by the help of science, which has forced its way step by step against the Christian religion, against the churches, and against the opposition of all the old precepts. Science can help us to get over this craven fear in which mankind has lived for so many generations. Science can teach us, and I think our own hearts can teach us, no longer to look around for imaginary supports, no longer to invent allies in the sky, but rather to look to our own efforts here below to make this world a fit place to live in, instead of the sort of place that the churches in all these centuries have made it.

Are you never afraid of God's judgment in denying him? "Most certainly not. I also deny Zeus and Jupiter and Odin and Brahma, but this causes me no qualms. I observe that a very large portion of the human race does not believe in God and suffers no visible punishment in consequence. And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that He would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt His existence."

There is no excuse for deceiving children. And when, as must happen in conventional families, they find that their parents have lied, they lose confidence in them and feel justified in lying to them.

Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do.

The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy; I mean that if you are happy you will be good.