F. H. Bradley Quotes

As my father [Javāharlāl Nehrū] said, you have to keep an open mind, but you have to pour something into it - otherwise ideas slip away like sand between your fingers.

To arrive at a contradiction is to confess an error in one's thinking; to maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one's mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality.

The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing, to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts.

To fix the thoughts by writing, and subject them to frequent examinations and reviews, is the best method of enabling the mind to detect its own sophisms, and keep it on guard against the fallacies which it practices on others

Only superficial minds approach an idea with delicacy.

An open mind but not an empty head.

Concentration comes not from trying hard to focus on something, but from keeping your mind open and directing it at nothing.

It is a gift when someone can challenge you and open your mind to new ideas.

There is a distinct difference between having an open mind and having a hole in your head from which your brain leaks out.

Geometry enlightlens the intellect and sets one's mind right

Perhaps it is even more important to know what one should not think about than what one should think about.

The mutual confidence on which all else depends can be maintained only by an open mind and a brave reliance upon free discussion.

Having an open mind does not necessarily lead to perfection. It is your ability to observe, analyze, discern, and understand the true essence that basic principles contain that point the way to perfection.

You have to have a temperament to grab ideas and do sensible things. Most people don’t grab the right ideas or don’t know what to do with them.

Philosophy means the complete liberty of the mind.

People say that practicing Zen is difficult, but there is a misunderstanding as to why. It is not difficult because it is hard to sit in the cross- legged position, or to attain enlightenment. It is difficult because it is hard to keep our mind pure and our practice pure in its fundamental sense.

I take a dose of mathematics every day to prevent my brain from becoming quite soft.

Follow the wandering, the distraction, find out why the mind has wandered; pursue it, go into it fully. When the distraction is completely understood, then that particular distraction is gone. When another comes, pursue it also.

The Goal of Education is to Help People Use Their Minds Better

Meditation trains the mind the way physical exercise strengthens the body.

My mind wanders a lot, but fortunately it's too weak to go very far.

Certainly any president - Democrat, Republican, liberal, conservative - should keep an open mind until they get the briefing.

Every ten years you should delete from your mind a few ideas that your experience has proven to be false.

I come to every case with an open mind. Every case is new to me.

Why is the mind incapable of deciding its own subject matter? Why when we desperately want to think of one thing to we invariably think of another?