"I used generally to have tea with in his [Russell's] rooms in Trinity when I went to Cambridge. A more brilliant intellect I never met, but he was much more approachable than McTaggart had been at first; and he had a peculiar charm of his own. His writings were most pessimistic, but he himself always appeared in the best of spirits—a feature which I had also noticed in pessimists on frontier expeditions. Apparently the way really to enjoy oneself is to be full of dark forebodings and expect the worst; then if the worst actually happens it is only what one had expected, and if anything less than the worst occurs one can be in uproarious good-humour."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Francis Younghusband, The Light of Experience: A Review of Some Men and Events of My Time (1927), p. 219
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russell
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Bertrand Russell
1872
britischer Mathematiker, Philosoph und Schriftsteller
562 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Bertrand Russell →
Related Quotes
"Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to e…"
"The next stage in the development of a desirable form of sensitiveness is sympathy. There is a purely physical sympat…"
"He was not an ascetic, but he despised luxury and the pursuit of artificial pleasures of the senses."
"The supposed wisdom of proverbs is mainly imaginary. As a rule, proverbs go in pairs which say opposite things. The o…"
"The beliefs appropriate to the impulse of aggression may be seen in Bernhardi, or in the early Mohammedan conquerors,…"
"A book is a friend."
"I do not think it possible to get anywhere if we start from scepticism. We must start from a broad acceptance of what…"
"As we all know, Mr. Russell produces a different system of philosophy every few years..."
"Wherever one finds oneself inclined to bitterness, it is a sign of emotional failure: a larger heart, and a greater s…"
"Some modern philosophers have gone so far as to say that words should never be confronted with facts but should live …"