Top 15 Michael Faraday Quotes

Nothing is too wonderful to be true if it be consistent with the laws of nature.

There’s nothing quite as frightening as someone who knows they are right.

A man who is certain he is right is almost sure to be wrong.

It is right that we should stand by and act on our principles; but not right to hold them in obstinate blindness, or retain them when proved to be erroneous.

But still try for who knows what is possible!

Shall we educate ourselves in what is known, and then casting away all we have acquired, turn to ignorance for aid to guide us among the unknown?

I will simply express my strong belief, that that point of self-education which consists in teaching the mind to resist its desires and inclinations, until they are proved to be right, is the most important of all, not only in things of natural philosophy, but in every department of daily life.

No matter what you look at, if you look at it closely enough, you are involved in the entire universe.

In place of practising wholesome self-abnegation, we ever make the wish the father to the thought: we receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us; whereas the very reverse is required by every dictate of common sense.

Nature is our kindest friend and best critic in experimental science if we only allow her intimations to fall unbiased on our minds.

Do not refer to your toy-books, and say you have seen that before. Answer me rather, if I ask you, have you understood it before?

The force of the temptation which urges us to seek for such evidence and appearances as are in favour of our desires, and to disregard those which oppose them, is wonderfully great. In this respect we are all, more or less, active promoters of error. In place of practising wholesome self-abnegation, we ever make the wish the father to the thought: we receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us; whereas the very reverse is required by every dictate of common sense.

…we receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us; whereas the very reverse is required by every dictate of common sense.

but let me, as an old man, who ought by this time to have profited by experience, say that when I was younger, I found I often misinterpreted the intentions of people, and found they did not mean what at the time I supposed they meant; and, further, that as a general rule, it was better to be a little dull of apprehension, where phrases seemed to imply pique, and quick in perception, when on the contrary they seemed to imply kindly feeling. The real truth never fails ultimately to appear; and opposing parties if wrong, are sooner convinced when replied to forbearingly, than when overwhelmed. All I mean to say is, that it is better to be blind to the results of partisanship, and quick to see good will. One has more happiness in oneself, in endeavoring to follow the things that make for peace. You can hardly imagine how often I have been heated in private when opposed, as I have thought unjustly and superciliously, and yet I have striven, and succeeded I hope, in keeping down replies of the like kind. And I know I have never lost by it. I would not say all this to you did I not esteem, you as a true philosopher and friend.

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