Rene Descartes
The two operations of our understanding, intuition and deduction, on which alone we have said we must rely in the acquisition of knowledge.Collection: Knowledge
It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well.Collection: Brainy
The senses deceive from time to time, and it is prudent never to trust wholly those who have deceived us even once.Collection: Time
I am accustomed to sleep and in my dreams to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake.Collection: Dreams
I think; therefore I am.Collection: Brainy
Each problem that I solved became a rule, which served afterwards to solve other problems.Collection: Science
I hope that posterity will judge me kindly, not only as to the things which I have explained, but also to those which I have intentionally omitted so as to leave to others the pleasure of discovery.Collection: Hope
If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.Collection: Truth
When it is not in our power to follow what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable.Collection: Power
I am indeed amazed when I consider how weak my mind is and how prone to error.Collection: Amazing
A state is better governed which has few laws, and those laws strictly observed.Collection: Government
Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power.Collection: Power
The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.Collection: Good
The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.
Common sense is the most fairly distributed thing in the world, for each one thinks he is so well-endowed with it that even those who are hardest to satisfy in all other matters are not in the habit of desiring more of it than they already have.
Whenever anyone has offended me, I try to raise my soul so high that the offense cannot reach it.
Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it.
Perfect numbers like perfect men are very rare.
An optimist may see a light where there is none, but why must the pessimist always run to blow it out?
In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate.
Travelling is almost like talking with those of other centuries.
The first precept was never to accept a thing as true until I knew it as such without a single doubt.
Illusory joy is often worth more than genuine sorrow.
Everything is self-evident.
It is only prudent never to place complete confidence in that by which we have even once been deceived.
There is nothing so strange and so unbelievable that it has not been said by one philosopher or another.
Nothing is more fairly distributed than common sense: no one thinks he needs more of it than he already has.
One cannot conceive anything so strange and so implausible that it has not already been said by one philosopher or another.
De omnibus dubitandumCollection: Philosophical
The only thing we have power over in the universe is our own thoughts.Collection: Universe
We do not describe the world we see, we see the world we can describe.Collection: World
It is not enough to have a good mind. The main thing is to use it well.Collection: Inspirational
Doubt is the origin of wisdomCollection: Doubt
By 'God', I understand, a substance which is infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, supremely powerful, and which created both myself and everything else [...] that exists. All these attributes are such that, the more carefully I concentrate on them, the less possible it seems that they could have originated from me alone. So, from what has been said it must be concluded that God necessarily exists.Collection: Powerful
Conquer yourself rather than the world.Collection: World
Omnia apud me mathematica fiunt.Collection: Philosophical
The only thing that I know, is that I know nothingCollection: Knows
I know that I exist; the question is, What is this 'I' that 'I' know.Collection: Knowledge
How can you be certain that your whole life is not a dream?Collection: Dream
The chief cause of human errors is to be found in the prejudices picked up in childhood.Collection: Education
I can doubt everything, except one thing, and that is the very fact that I doubt. Simply put - I think, therefore I amCollection: Thinking
Reason is nothing without imagination.Collection: Imagination
Truths are more likely to be discovered by one man than by a nationCollection: Inspirational
Common sense is the most widely shared commodity in the world, for every man is convinced that he is well supplied with it.Collection: Humorous
You just keep pushing. You just keep pushing. I made every mistake that could be made. But I just kept pushing.Collection: Perseverance
We never understand a thing so well,and make it our own, as when we have discovered it for ourselves.Collection: Knowledge
God alone is the author of all the motions in the world.Collection: World
...it is certain that I am really distinct from my body, and can exist without it.Collection: Body
I was convinced that our beliefs are based much more on custom and example than on any certain knowledge.Collection: Atheism
Situations in life often permit no delay; and when we cannot determine the course which is certainly best, we must follow the one which is probably the best. This frame of mind freed me also from the repentance and remorse commonly felt by those vacillating individuals who are always seeking as worthwhile things which they later judge to be bad.Collection: Situations In Life