3 Quotes by Willam James

The faculty of voluntarily bringing back a wandering attention, over and over again, is the very root of judgment, character, and will. ... An education which should improve this faculty would be the education par excellence.

This easy acceptance of an opaque limit to our speculative insight; this satisfaction with a Being whose character we simply apprehend without comprehending anything more about him, and with whom after a certain point our dealings can be only of a volitional and emotional sort; above all, this sitting down contended with a blank unmediated dualism - are they not the very picture of unfaithfulness to the rights and duties of our theoretic reasons?

The greatest use of life is to spend it for something that will outlast it.