Maxims and Reflections Part 24

The history of philosophy, of science, of religion, all shows that opinions spread in ma.s.ses, but that that always comes to the front which is more easily grasped, that is to say, is most suited and agreeable to the human mind in its ordinary condition. Nay, he who has practised self-culture in the higher sense may always reckon upon meeting an adverse majority.

547

There is much that is true which does not admit of being calculated; just as there are a great many things that cannot be brought to the test of a decisive experiment.

548

It is just for this that man stands so high, that what could not otherwise be brought to light should be brought to light in him.

What is a musical string, and all its mechanical division, in comparison with the musician's ear? May we not also say, what are the elementary phenomena of nature itself compared with man, who must control and modify them all before he can in any way a.s.similate them to himself?

549

To a new truth there is nothing more hurtful than an old error.

550

The ultimate origin of things is completely beyond our faculties; hence when we see anything come into being, we look upon it as having been already there. This is why we find the theory of _emboitement_ intelligible.

551

There are many problems in natural science on which we cannot fittingly speak unless we call metaphysics to our aid; but not the wisdom of the schools, which consists in mere verbiage. It is that which was before physics, exists with it, and will be after it.

552

Since men are really interested in nothing but their own opinions, every one who puts forward an opinion looks about him right and left for means of strengthening himself and others in it. A man avails himself of the truth so long as it is serviceable; but he seizes on what is false with a pa.s.sionate eloquence as soon as he can make a momentary use of it; whether it be to dazzle others with it as a kind of half-truth, or to employ it as a stopgap for effecting an apparent union between things that have been disjointed. This experience at first caused me annoyance, and then sorrow; and now it is a source of mischievous satisfaction. I have pledged myself never again to expose a proceeding of this kind.

553

Everything that we call Invention or Discovery in the higher sense of the word is the serious exercise and activity of an original feeling for truth, which, after a long course of silent cultivation, suddenly flashes out into fruitful knowledge. It is a revelation working from within on the outer world, and lets a man feel that he is made in the image of G.o.d. It is a synthesis of World and Mind, giving the most blessed a.s.surance of the eternal harmony of things.

554

A man must cling to the belief that the incomprehensible is comprehensible; otherwise he would not try to fathom it.

555

There are pedants who are also rascals, and they are the worst of all.

556

A man does not need to have seen or experienced everything himself. But if he is to commit himself to another's experiences and his way of putting them, let him consider that he has to do with three things--the object in question and two subjects.

557

The supreme achievement would be to see that stating a fact is starting a theory.

558

If I acquiesce at last in some ultimate fact of nature, it is, no doubt, only resignation; but it makes a great difference whether the resignation takes place at the limits of human faculty, or within the hypothetical boundaries of my own narrow individuality.

559

If we look at the problems raised by Aristotle, we are astonished at his gift of observation. What wonderful eyes the Greeks had for many things!

Only they committed the mistake of being over-hasty, of pa.s.sing straightway from the phenomenon to the explanation of it, and thereby produced certain theories that are quite inadequate. But this is the mistake of all times, and still made in our own day.

560

Hypotheses are cradle-songs by which the teacher lulls his scholars to sleep. The thoughtful and honest observer is always learning more and more of his limitations; he sees that the further knowledge spreads, the more numerous are the problems that make their appearance.

561

Our mistake is that we doubt what is certain and want to establish what is uncertain. My maxim in the study of Nature is this: hold fast what is certain and keep a watch on what is uncertain.

562

What a master a man would be in his own subject if he taught nothing useless!

563

The greatest piece of folly is that every man thinks himself compelled to hand down what people think they have known.

564

If many a man did not feel obliged to repeat what is untrue, because he has said it once, the world would have been quite different.

565

Every man looks at the world lying ready before him, ordered and fas.h.i.+oned into a complete whole, as after all but an element out of which his endeavour is to create a special world suited to himself.

Capable men lay hold of the world without hesitation and try to shape their course as best they can; others dally over it, and some doubt even of their own existence.

The man who felt the full force of this fundamental truth would dispute with no one, but look upon another's mode of thought equally with his own, as merely a phenomenon. For we find almost daily that one man can think with ease what another cannot possibly think at all; and that, too, not in matters which might have some sort of effect upon their common weal or woe, but in things which cannot touch them at all.

566

There is nothing more odious than the majority; it consists of a few powerful men to lead the way; of accommodating rascals and submissive weaklings; and of a ma.s.s of men who trot after them, without in the least knowing their own mind.

567

When I observe the luminous progress and expansion of natural science in modern times, I seem to myself like a traveller going eastwards at dawn, and gazing at the growing light with joy, but also with impatience; looking forward with longing to the advent of the full and final light, but, nevertheless, having to turn away his eyes when the sun appeared, unable to bear the splendour he had awaited with so much desire.

568

We praise the eighteenth century for concerning itself chiefly with a.n.a.lysis. The task remaining to the nineteenth is to discover the false syntheses which prevail, and to a.n.a.lyse their contents anew.

569

A school may be regarded as a single individual who talks to himself for a hundred years, and takes an extraordinary pleasure in his own being, however foolish and silly it may be.