The true nature of things is in their particulars, not in generalities; we know the world through its infinite variations, not through abstract rules that pretend to govern them.

The mind itself is the seat of action. We do not act because we think, but we think because the possibility of action is always before us.

The mind is furnished with a set of instincts which seek out certain kinds of phenomena and ask for explanations of certain kinds of congruity in those phenomena. Order is the one thing we cannot do without.

The task of life is not so much to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.