A Quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
To have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a civilized man.
Related Quotes
To doubt one's own first principles is the mark of a civilized man. Don't defend past actions; what is right today may be wrong tomorrow. Don't be consistent; consistency is the refuge of fools.
The mark of a truly civilized man is confidence in the strength and security derived from the inquiring mind.
It seems to me impossible for a civilized man to love or worship, or respect the God of the Old Testament. A really civilized man, a really civilized woman, must hold such a God in abhorrence and contempt.
As we become civilized we are governed less by persons and more by principles. . . . The best of all leaders is the man who teaches people to lead themselves.
The mark of a civilized man is his willingness to re-examine his most cherished beliefs.
Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant.
Without ambition one starts nothing. Without work one finishes nothing. The prize will not be sent to you. You have to win it. The man who knows how will always have a job. The man who also knows why will always be his boss. As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.
Too often we forget our principles in order to hold onto power; I will always put principles first, not my own power.
In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad
As to methods, there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods.
Sometimes we forge our own principles and sometimes we accept others' principles, or holistic packages of principles, such as religion and legal systems. While it isn't necessarily a bad thing to use others' principles - it's difficult to come up with your own, and often much wisdom has gone into those already created - adopting pre-packaged principles without much thought exposes you to the risk of inconsistency with your true values.
And in spite of everything, Ireland remains the brain of the Kingdom. The English, judiciously practical and ponderous, furnish the over-stuffed stomach of humanity with a perfect gadget--the water closet. The Irish, condemned to express themselves in a language not their own, have stamped on it the mark of their own genius and compete for glory with the civilized nations. This is then called English literature.
Justice, sir, is the great interest of man on earth. It is the ligament which holds civilized beings and civilized nations together.
Cherishing children is the mark of a civilized society.
For all our penny-wisdom, for all our soul-destroying slavery to habit, it is not to be doubted that all men have sublime thoughts; that all men value the few real hours of life; they love to be heard; they love to be caught up into the vision of principles. We mark with light in the memory the few interviews we have had, in the dreary years of routine and of sin, with souls that made our souls wiser; that spoke what we thought; that told us what we knew; that gave us leave to be what we only were.
A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’
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