The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.
Rene DescartesRead
In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Improving the mind requires reflection and contemplation rather than just acquiring knowledge.
Rene Descartes suggests that genuine intellectual growth comes not merely from accumulating facts or learning new information, but from taking the time to reflect deeply on what we already know. This idea emphasizes the importance of critical thinking and personal insight in the process of learning and understanding.
Themes
ContemplateImprovementMindLearningReflection
In practice
Example use cases
During a seminar on personal development.
More from Rene Descartes
All quotes βIf we possessed a thorough knowledge of all the parts of the seed of any animal (e.g. man), we could from that alone, be reasons entirely mathematical and certain, deduce the whole conformation and figure of each of its members, and, conversely if we knew several peculiarities of this conformation, we would from those deduce the nature of its seed.
Rene DescartesRead
Mathematics is a more powerful instrument of knowledge than any other that has been bequeathed to us by human agency.
Rene DescartesRead
Before examining this more carefully and investigating its consequences, I want to dwell for a moment in the contemplation of God, to ponder His attributes in me, to see, admire, and adore the beauty of His boundless light, insofar as my clouded insight allows. Believing that the supreme happiness of the other life consists wholly of the contemplation of divine greatness, I now find that through less perfect contemplation of the same sort I can gain the greatest joy available in this life.
Rene DescartesRead
I am accustomed to sleep and in my dreams to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake.
Rene DescartesRead
The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.
Rene DescartesRead
Similar quotes
A basic element of the American dream is equal access to education as the lubricant of social and economic mobility.
Nicholas KristofRead
They will not stop me, I will get my education, if it is in home, school or any place
Malala YousafzaiRead
It is not enough for the teacher to love the child. She must first love and understand the universe. She must prepare herself, and truly work at it.
Maria MontessoriRead
At O'Reilly, the way we think about our business is that we're not a publisher; we're not a conference producer; we're a company that helps change the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators.
Tim O'ReillyRead
The competitions between fiction and nonfiction, short and long, electronic and paper, are not battles in which there can be only one victor. After all, we exist in a world where more kinds of writing than ever are greeted with interest and enthusiasm.
Celeste NgRead
Education has now become the chief problem of the world, its one holy cause. The nations that see this will survive, and those that fail to do so will slowly perish. . . . There must be re-education of the will and of the heart as well as of the intellect; and the ideals of service must supplant those of selfishness and greed.
G. Stanley HallRead