Bertrand Russell Quotes

Love is something far more than the 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.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Desire Live Lonely Love Man Philosophy Sex Woman
A sense of duty is useful in work but offensive in personal relations. People wish to be liked, not to be endured with patient resignation.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Endurance Patience People Relationship
The greatest challenge to any thinker is stating the problem in a way that will allow a solution.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Greatness Problem Science Thinking
Life is nothing but a competition to be the criminal rather than the victim.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Crime Deep Life Philosophy Reality
Science is what you know, philosophy is what you don’t know.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Deep Philosophy Science Yourself
Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Absence Animal Believe Man Philosophy Satisfaction
Boredom is therefore a vital problem for the moralist, since at least half the sins of mankind are caused by the fear of it.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Deep Fear Mankind Problem Sin
Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Acceptance Be Yourself Deep Fear
I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Believe Death Myself Wrong
Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Death Happiness Love True
No one ever gossips about the virtues of others.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Oneself Virtue
Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Deep Philosophy Try Yourself
To like many people spontaneously and without effort is perhaps the greatest of all sources of personal happiness.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Effort Greatness Happiness People Philosophy
Men who are unhappy, like men who sleep badly, are always proud of the fact.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Happiness Man Philosophy
There is no reason to suppose that the world had a beginning at all. The idea that things must have a beginning is really due to the poverty of our thoughts.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Beginning Ideas Philosophy Reason World
So far as I can remember there is not one word in the gospels in praise of intelligence.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Intelligence Myself Religious Remember
Conventional people are roused to fury by departure from convention, largely because they regard such departure as a criticism of themselves.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Angry Leave People Philosophy
I think we ought always to entertain our opinions with some measure of doubt. I shouldn’t wish people dogmatically to believe any philosophy, not even mine.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Believe Doubt Myself People Philosophy Thinking
Love is wise, hatred is foolish.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Hate Love One Liner Wisdom
It is the preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Deep Freedom Philosophy
What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Believe Deep Willing
To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Happiness Philosophy Satisfaction
Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Deep Feeling Happiness Live
Politics is largely governed by sententious platitudes which are devoid of truth.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Deep Politics Truth
Love can flourish only as long as it is free and spontaneous; it tends to be killed by the thought of duty. To say that it is your duty to love so-and-so is the surest way to cause you to hate him of her.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Freedom Hate Kill Love Philosophy Relationship
A man is rational in proportion as his intelligence informs and controls his desires.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Desire Intelligence Man
Nothing is so exhausting as indecision, and nothing is so futile.
BERTRAND RUSSELL

Decision Deep Philosophy

Famous Mathematicians