A N Whitehead Quotes & Sayings

Religion is the last refuge of human savagery. — Alfred North Whitehead

Religion is what a person does in his solitariness. — Alfred North Whitehead

So far as the mere imparting of information is concerned, no university has had any justification for existence since the popularization of printing in the fifteenth century. — Alfred North Whitehead

It belongs to the self-respect of intellect to pursue every tangle of thought to its final unravelment. — Alfred North Whitehead

God is the unlimited conceptual realization of the absolute wealth of potentiality. — Alfred North Whitehead

Systems, scientific or philosophic, come and go. Each method of limited understanding is at length exhausted. In its prime each system is a triumphant success: in its decay it is an obstructive nuisance. — Alfred North Whitehead

The study of mathematics is apt to commence in disappointment ... We are told that by its aid the stars are weighed and the billions of molecules in a drop of water are counted. Yet, like the ghost of Hamlet's father, this great science eludes the efforts of our mental weapons to grasp it. — Alfred North Whitehead

A general definition of civilization: a civilized society is exhibiting the fine qualities of truth, beauty, adventure, art, peace. — Alfred North Whitehead

In modern times the belief that the ultimate explanation of all things was to be found in Newtonian mechanics was an adumbration of the truth that all science, as it grows towards perfection, becomes mathematical in its ideas. — Alfred North Whitehead

It was a magnificent operation, from seed to bale, but not one of them could be prideful of their labor. It had been stolen from them. Bled from them. The tunnel, the tracks, the desperate souls who found salvation in the coordination of its stations and timetables - this was a marvel to be proud of. She wondered if those who had built this thing had received their proper reward. — Colson Whitehead

Weeks passed, but my Word-A-Day Calendar was stuck on motherfucker. — Colson Whitehead

They were exiles, but Hob provided a type of protection once they settled in. By playing up their strangeness, the way a slave simpered and acted childlike to escape a beating, they evaded the entanglements of the quarter. The walls of Hob made a fortress some nights, rescuing them from the feuds and conspiracies. White men eat you up, but sometimes colored folk eat you up, too. She — Colson Whitehead

To see chains on another person and be glad they are not your own - such was the good fortune permitted colored people, defined by how much worse it could be any moment. — Colson Whitehead

"One and one make two" assumes that the changes in the shift of circumstance are unimportant. But it is impossible for us to analyze this notion of unimportant change. — Alfred North Whitehead

The Universe is vast. Nothing is more curious than the self-satisfied dogmatism with which mankind at each period of its history cherishes the delusion of the finality of existing modes of knowledge. Skeptics and believers are alike. At this moment scientists and skeptics are the leading dogmatists. Advance in detail is admitted; fundamental novelty is barred. This dogmatic common sense is the death of philosophic adventure. — Alfred North Whitehead

All he felt now was envy. These people had expectations. Of the world, of the future, it didn't matter
expectation was such an innovative concept to him that he couldn't help but be a bit moved by what they were saying. Whatever that was. — Colson Whitehead

The real history does not get written, because it is not in people's brains but in their nerves and vitals. — Alfred North Whitehead

The masks had been made in Korea, delivering back to the West the faces they had given the rest of the globe: presidents, screen stars, and mass murderers. The rubber filament inevitably snapped from the staple after five minutes. The graft wouldn't take. — Colson Whitehead

A monster is a person who has stopped pretending. — Colson Whitehead

The weak link-- she liked the ring of it. To seek the imperfection in the chain that keeps you in bondage. Taken individually, the link was not much. But in concert with its fellows, a mighty iron that subjugated millions despite its weakness. The people she chose, young and old, from the rich part of town or the more modest streets, did not individually persecute Cora. As a community, they were shackles. If she kept at it, chipping away at weak links wherever she found them, it might add up to something. — Colson Whitehead

Spoiler: I didn't win the Main Event. You had suspicions, you say? For one thing, the subtitle of this book would be "The Amazing Life-Affirming Story of an Unremarkable Jerk Who Won the World Series of Poker!" instead of having the word "Death" in it. For another, do these sound like the words of a motherfucker who won a million goddamn dollars? — Colson Whitehead

This isn't going to un-fuck itself. — Colson Whitehead

Two people, two hands, and two songs, in this case "Big Shot" and "Bette Davis Eyes." The lyrics of the two songs provided no commentary, honest or ironic, on the proceedings. They were merely there and always underfoot, the insistent gray muck that was pop culture. It stuck to our shoes and we tracked it through our lives. — Colson Whitehead

Identification of rhythm as the casual counterpart of life; wherever there is some life, only perceptible to us when the analogies are sufficiently close. — Alfred North Whitehead

The doctor was a frequent visitor at Miss Trumball's establishment, preferring it to the Lanchester house, whose girls had a saturnine disposition in his opinion, as if imported from Maine or other gloom-loving provinces. — Colson Whitehead

There are no whole truths; all truths are half-truths. It is trying to treat them as whole truths that plays the devil. — Alfred North Whitehead

It's like peanut butter and chocolate. Each is great, but they're better together. — Richard Whitehead

Growing up devouring horror comics and novels, and being inspired to become a writer because of horror novels, movies, and comic books, I always knew I was going to write a horror novel. — Colson Whitehead

The deepest definition of youth is life as yet untouched by tragedy. — Alfred North Whitehead

War can protect; it cannot create. — Alfred North Whitehead