Virtues

"Reason progressive, Instinct is complete; Swift Instinct leaps; slow reason feebly climbs. Brutes soon their zenith reach. * * * In ages they no more Could know, do, covet or enjoy."

"I am not going to question your opinions. I am not going to meddle with your belief. I am not going to dictate to you mine. All that I say is, examine; enquire. Look into the nature of things. Search out the ground of your opinions, the for and the against. Know why you believe, understand what you believe, and possess a reason for the faith that is in you… But your spiritual teachers caution you against enquiry — tell you not to read certain books; not to listen to certain people; to beware of profane learning; to submit your reason, and to receive their doctrines for truths. Such advice renders them suspicious counsellors. By their own creed you hold your reason from their God. Go! ask them why he gave it."

"And what is reason? Be she thus defined: Reason is upright stature in the soul."

"Reason [no more can] ever influence the Will, and operate as a motive,… than the eyes, which show a man his road, can enable him to move from place to place; or than a ship provided with a compass, can sail without a wind."

"It must have required enormous effort for man to overcome his natural tendency to live like the animals in a continual present. Moreover, the development of rational thought actually seems to have impeded man's appreciation for the significance of time. ... Belief that the ultimate reality is timeless is deeply rooted in human thinking, and the origin of rational investigation of the world was the search for permanent factors that lie behind the ever-changing pattern of events."

"That which exercises reason is more excellent than that which does not exercise reason; there is nothing more excellent than the universe, therefore the universe exercises reason."

"Id nobis maxime nocet, quod non ad rationis lumen sed ad similitudinem aliorum vivimus."

"Reason is the test of ridicule, and not ridicule the test of truth."

"Reason deceives us more often than does nature."

"Reason is the glory of human nature, and one of the chief eminences whereby we are raised above our fellow-creatures, the brutes, in this lower world."

"Domina omnium et regina ratio."

"When we affirm that philosophy begins with wonder, we are affirming in effect that sentiment is prior to reason."

"Reason, sometimes, seems to me to be the faculty our soul possesses of understanding nothing about our body!"

"A man demonstrates his rationality, not by a commitment to fixed ideas, stereotyped procedures, or immutable concepts, but by the manner in which, and the occasions on which, he changes those ideas, procedures, and concepts."

"According to Blanchette and Campbell (2012), ―deductive reasoning in particular has often been seen as a hallmark of human intelligence and of the potential for logical thinking (159). Deductive reasoning consists of the method in which inference is constructed logically through valid conclusions from a set of premises (Wassertheil-Smoller & Smoller, 2015). The process of deductive reasoning consists of drawing a conclusion that is based on multiple arguments that are commonly presumed to be truthful or legitimate. Through deductive reasoning, individuals assume that the set of premises are truthful, and consequently, the conclusions that arise from these valid premises must in turn, produce legitimate truthful conclusions (Walton, 1990). According to Heit and Rotello (2010), deductive reasoning is ―more heavily influenced by slower analytic processes that encompass more deliberative, and typically more accurate, reasoning (805). Individuals who use deductive reasoning adopt rules,properties, and facts to reach a conclusion. Deductive reasoning starts out with a general premise, or hypothesis, and explores the possibilities to draw a particular, logical conclusion."

"What a return do we make for those blessings we have received! and how disrespectfully do we treat the gospel of Christ to which we owe that clear light both of reason and of nature which we now enjoy, when we endeavor to set up reason and nature in opposition to it! Ought the withered hand, which Christ has restored and made whole, to be lifted up against Him?"

"As with the research on deductive reasoning, research on inductive reasoning shows that affect impacts an individual‘s ability to inductively reason (Evans et al., 1993). For example, research shows that positive moods have been shown to promote imagination, ingenuity, creative and integrative thinking (Isen et al., 1985; Isen et al., 1987; Salovey et al., 1993), increase working memory load (Seibert & Ellis, 1991), enhance the ability to interpret information and increase cognitive flexibility (Isen & Daubman, 1984; Isen, 1999), and increase performance on a number of cognitive tasks (Ashby & Isen, 1999; Isen, 1999). Negative moods have been shown to decrease accuracy of judgment, deteriorate cognitive processing, and diminish decision making (Palfai & Salovey, 1993; Channon & Baker, 1994; Oaksford, Morris, Graigner, &Williams, 1996; Goel & Dolan, 2003; Blanchette & Richards, 2004; Blanchette, 2006). Again, as with deductive reasoning, conflicting results have also been found."

"I have no other but a woman's reason I think him so because I think him so."

"His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff; you shall seek all day ere you find them; and when you have them, they are not worth the search."

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

"Though reason is not to be relied upon as a guide universally sufficient to direct us what to do, yet it is generally to be relied upon and obeyed when it tells us what we are not to do."

"Good reasons must, of force, give place to better."

"Give you a reason on compulsion! if reasons were as plentiful as blackberries, I would give no man a reason upon compulsion, I."

"But since the affairs of men rest still incertain, Let's reason with the worst that may befall."

"Every why hath a wherefore."

"Sure, he that made us with such large discourse, Looking before and after, gave us not That capability and god-like reason To fust in us unus'd."

"Strong reasons make strong actions."

"Reasoning will never make a Man correct an ill Opinion, which by Reasoning he never acquired."

"When even the brightest mind in our world has been trained up from childhood in a superstition of any kind, it will never be possible for that mind, in its maturity, to examine sincerely, dispassionately, and conscientiously any evidence or any circumstance which shall seem to cast a doubt upon the validity of that superstition. I doubt if I could do it myself."

"To ingenious attempts at explaining by the light of reason things which want the light of history to show their meaning, much of the learned nonsense of the world has indeed been due."

"Most people in reasoning, dear Phaedrus, use notions that not only are "ready-made," but have actually been made by nobody. No one is responsible for them, and so they serve every one badly."

"When the dictators of today appeal to reason, they mean that they possess the most tanks. They were rational enough to build them; others should be rational enough to yield to them."

"The more the concept of reason becomes emasculated, the more easily it lends itself to ideological manipulation and to propagation of even the most blatant lies. … Subjective reason conforms to anything."

"Reason is a religious duty and quality of the mind; and exercise of the judgment upon all occasions and subjects is true and most divine worship."

"Like other traditions, the tradition of reason is learnt, not innate. It too lies between instinct and reason; and the question of the real reasonableness and truth of this tradition of proclaimed reason and truth must now also scrupulously be examined."

"Those may justly be reckoned void of understanding that do not bless and praise God; nor do men ever rightly use their reason till they begin to be religious, nor live as men till they live to the glory of God. As reason is the substratum or subject of religion (so that creatures which have no reason are not capable of religion), so religion is the crown and glory of reason, and we have our reason in vain, and shall one day wish we had never had it, if we do not glorify God with it."

"Does being situated within traditions really mean being subject to prejudices and limited in one's freedom? Is not, rather, all human existence, even the freest, limited and qualified in various ways? If this is true, the idea of an absolute reason is not a possibility for historical humanity. Reason exists for us only in concrete historical terms—i.e., it is not its own master but remains constantly dependent on the given circumstances in which it operates."

"The light of reason ever gleams on the margin of an unmeasured and immeasurable ocean of mystery; and however far we push our discoveries, the line of light only moves on, and has infinite and unfathomable darkness beyond it."

"The Way to see by Faith, is to shut the Eye of Reason: The Morning Daylight appears plainer when you put out your Candle."

"To say that madness is dazzlement is to say that the madman sees the day, the same day that rational men see, as both live in the same light, but that when looking at that very light, nothing else and nothing in it, he sees it as nothing but emptiness, night and nothingness. Darkness for him is another way of seeing the day. Which means that in looking at the night and the nothingness of the night, he does not see at all. And that in the belief that he sees, he allows the fantasies of his imagination and the people of his nights to come to him as realities. For that reason, delirium and dazzlement exist in a relation that is the essence of madness, just as truth and clarity, in their fundamental relation, are constitutive of classical reason. In that sense, the Cartesian progression of doubt is clearly the great exorcism of madness. Descartes closes his eyes and ears the better to see the true light of the essential day, thereby ensuring that he will not suffer the dazzlement of the mad, who open their eyes and only see night, and not seeing at all, believe that they see things when they imagine them. In the uniform clarity of his closed senses, Descartes has broken with all possible fascination, and if he sees, he knows he really sees what he is seeing. Whereas in the madman’s gaze, drunk on the light that is night, images rise up and multiply, beyond any possible self-criticism, since the madman sees them, but irremediably separated from being, since the madman sees nothing. Unreason is to reason as dazzlement is to daylight."

"If you will not hear reason, she will surely rap your knuckles."

"Polished steel will not shine in the dark; no more can reason, however refined, shine efficaciously, but as it reflects the light of Divine truth—shed from heaven."

"The language of reason unaccompanied by kindness will often fail of making an impression. It has no effect on the understanding, because i touches not the heart. The language of kindness unassociated with reason will frequently be unable to persuade: because though it may gain upon the affections, it wants that which is necessary to convince the judgement. But let reason and kindness be united in your discourse; and seldom will even pride or prejudice find it easy to resist."

"Auctoritas siquidem ex vera ratione processit, ratio vero nequaquam ex auctoritate. Omnis enim auctoritas, quae vera ratione non approbatur, infirma videtur esse. Vera autem ratio, quum virtutibus suis rata atque immutabilis munitur, nullius auctoritatis adstipulatione roborari indigent."

"Copernicanism and other "rational" views exist today only because reason was overruled at some time in their past. (The opposite is also true: witchcraft and other "irrational" views had ceased to be influential only because reason was overruled at some time in their past.)"

"One who knows not who he is and to what end he was born; what kind of world this is and with whom he is associated therein; one who cannot distinguish Good and Evil, Beauty and Foulness,... Truth and Falsehood, will never follow Reason in shaping his desires and impulses and repulsions, nor yet in assent, denial, or suspension of judgment; but will in one word go about deaf and blind, thinking himself to be somewhat, when he is in truth of no account. Is there anything new in all this? Is not this ignorance the cause of all the mistakes and mischances of men since the human race began?"

"Knowest thou what kind of speck you art in comparison with the Universe?—That is, with respect to the body; since with respect to Reason, thou art not inferior to the Gods, nor less than they. For the greatness of Reason is not measured by length or height, but by the resolves of the mind. Place then thy happiness in that wherein thou art equal to the Gods."

"Study how to give as one that is sick: that thou mayest hereafter give as one that is whole. Fast; drink water only; abstain altogether from desire, that thou mayest hereafter confirm thy desire to Reason."

"If reason is to be realized in the sensuous world, it must be possible for many rational beings to live together as such; and this is permanently possible only if each free being makes it its law to limit its own freedom by the conception of the freedom of all others. For each free being having the physical power to check or destroy the freedom of other free beings, and being dependent in its free actions only upon its will; it is only when all free beings have voluntarily made it their law (rule of action) never so to check the freedom of all others that a community of free beings becomes possible, wherein such a check never occurs."

"A wise man, who puts himself under the government of reason, will be able to receive an injury with calmness, and to treat the person who committed it with lenity; for he will rank injuries among the casual events of life, and will prudently reflect that he can no more stop the natural current of human passions, than he can curb the stormy winds."