Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt. The more stupid the man, the larger his stock of adamantine assurances, the heavier his load of faith.

For men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt. The more stupid the man, the larger his stock of adamantine assurances, the heavier his load of faith.

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, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on - I am not too sure.

To have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a civilized man.

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.

Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience.

It is only by having desire thwarted, and thereby learning to control it—in other words, by becoming civilized—that men become fully human.

That's the way with civilized men. When they can't explain something by their half-baked science, they refuse to believe it.

To be genuinely civilized means to be able to walk straightly and to live honorably without the props and crutches of one or another of the childish dreams which have so far supported men. That such a life is likely to be ecstatically happy I will not claim. But that it can be lived in quiet content, accepting resignedly what cannot be helped not expecting the impossible, and being thankful for small mercies, this I would maintain. That it will be difficult for men in general to learn this lesson I do not deny. But that it will be impossible I would not admit since so many have learned it already.

To be civilized is to be able to criticize what we believe without ceasing to believe in it.

Reasonable men adapt themselves to the world. Unreasonable men adapt the world to themselves. That´s why all progress depends on unreasonable men.

"But to become civilized means to dress as elaborately and prettily as possible, and to make a show of your clothes so your neighbors will envy you, and for that reason both civilized foxes and civilized humans spend most of their time dressing themselves." "I don't," declared the shaggy man. "That is true," said the King, looking at him carefully; "but perhaps you are not civilized."

a man should be just cultured enough to be able to look with suspicion upon culture at first, not second hand.

Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience. If we could learn from mere experience, the stones of London would be wiser than its wisest men.