65 Quotes by Bernard Williams

A friend is a lot of things, but a critic isn’t.

Americans are optimists. They hope they’ll be wealthy someday – and they’re positive they can get one more brushful of paint out of an empty can.

What will the professor’s justification do, when they break down the door, smash his spectacles, take him away?

That an action would be cowardly is not often found by an agent to be a consideration in its favor, but it could be, and in a counterethical way, ministering to a masochism of shame.

Disagreement does not necessarily have to be overcome. It may remain an important and constitutive feature of our relations to others.

I like the word 'indolence'. It makes my laziness seem classy.

If there's one theme in all my work, it's about authenticity and self-expression. It's the idea that some things are, in some real sense, really you - or express what you and others aren't.

Disagreement does not necessarily have to be overcome. It may remain an important and constitutive feature of our relations to others and also be seen as something that is merely to be expected in the light of the best explanations we have of how such disagreement arises.

People who express themselves in paradoxes are in a strong position; and the more outrageous the paradox, in general the stronger the position.