Herbert Spencer Quotes
"Opinion is ultimately determined by the feelings, and not by the intellect."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Feelings, Intellect, Opinion)
"Our lives are universally shortened by our ignorance."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Ignorance)
"People are beginning to see that the first requisite to success in life is to be a good animal."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Life, Success, People, Beginning, First)
"Science is organized knowledge."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Science, Knowledge)
"Society exists for the benefit of its members, not the members for the benefit of society."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Society)
"The behavior of men to the lower animals, and their behavior to each other, bear a constant relationship."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Men, Animals, Behavior)
"The fact disclosed by a survey of the past that majorities have been wrong must not blind us to the complementary fact that majorities have usually not been entirely wrong."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Blind, Fact, Past, Wrong)
"The great aim of education is not knowledge but action."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Education, Knowledge, Action)
"The more specific idea of Evolution now reached is - a change from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a definite, coherent heterogeneity, accompanying the dissipation of motion and integration of matter."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Change, Idea, Evolution, Now)
"The Republican form of government is the highest form of government: but because of this it requires the highest type of human nature, a type nowhere at present existing."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Government, Nature, Human nature, Present, Republican)
"The wise man must remember that while he is a descendant of the past, he is a parent of the future."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Future, Man, Past)
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Poetry)
"Volumes might be written upon the impiety of the pious."
- Herbert Spencer
"We all decry prejudice, yet are all prejudiced."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Prejudice)
"We do not commonly see in a tax a diminution of freedom, and yet it clearly is one."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Freedom, Tax)
"What a cage is to the wild beast, law is to the selfish man."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Law, Man)
"When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has the greater will be his confusion."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Knowledge, Confusion, Man, Order, Will)
"Old forms of government finally grow so oppressive that they must be thrown off even at the risk of reigns of terror."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Government, Old, Risk, Terror)
"Be bold, be bold, and everywhere be bold."
- Herbert Spencer
"The preservation of health is a duty. Few seem conscious that there is such a thing as physical morality."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Health, Morality, Duty)
"Government is essentially immoral."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Government)
"A jury is a group of twelve people of average ignorance."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: People, Ignorance, Jury)
"A jury is composed of twelve men of average ignorance."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Men, Ignorance, Jury)
"A living thing is distinguished from a dead thing by the multiplicity of the changes at any moment taking place in it."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Living, Multiplicity)
"All socialism involves slavery."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Slavery, Socialism)
"An argument fatal to the communist theory, is suggested by the fact, that a desire for property is one of the elements of our nature."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Nature, Argument, Desire, Fact, Property, Theory)
"Objects we ardently pursue bring little happiness when gained; most of our pleasures come from unexpected sources."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Happiness)
"Civilization is a progress from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity toward a definite, coherent heterogeneity."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Civilization, Progress)
"Divine right of kings means the divine right of anyone who can get uppermost."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Kings, Right)
"Every cause produces more than one effect."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Cause, Effect)
"Hero-worship is strongest where there is least regard for human freedom."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Freedom)
"How often misused words generate misleading thoughts."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Thoughts, Misleading, Words)
"In science the important thing is to modify and change one's ideas as science advances."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Change, Science, Ideas)
"Life is the continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Life)
"Love is life's end, but never ending. Love is life's wealth, never spent, but ever spending. Love's life's reward, rewarded in rewarding."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Love, Life, Wealth, End, Ending, Reward)
"Marriage: a ceremony in which rings are put on the finger of the lady and through the nose of the gentleman."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Ceremony, Lady, Gentleman)
"Marriage: A word which should be pronounced "mirage"."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Word)
"Music must take rank as the highest of the fine arts - as the one which, more than any other, ministers to the human spirit."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Music, Rank, Spirit)
"No one can be perfectly free till all are free; no one can be perfectly moral till all are moral; no one can be perfectly happy till all are happy."
- Herbert Spencer
"Education has for its object the formation of character."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Education, Character)