George Santayana Quotes

The Bible and the Church have been the greatest stumbling blocks in the way of women’s emancipation.

I don't want to do anything to embarrass my family or my church because the town that I come from is so small. There are certain things that I just can't be part of because of my foundation.

The Church says: the body is a sin. Science says: the body is a machine. Advertising says: The body is a business. The Body says: I am a fiesta.

Those who take refuge behind theological barbed wire fences, quite often wish they could have more freedom of thought, but fear the change to the great ocean of truth as they would a cold bath.

I never lost my faith...But like all modern Catholics, I felt for a time that I had outgrown the church. Now it is a bone of contention in my soul that I did not share my faith with my kids, as my parents did with me. It was a source of grace when I needed it. I have been greatly nurtured and inspired by my faith.

For myself, as, no doubt, for most of my contemporaries, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation. The liberation we desired was simultaneously liberation from a certain political and economic system and liberation from a certain system of morality. We objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom.

I've been labelled many times - a criminal, an anarchist, a rebel, sometimes human garbage, but never a philosopher, which is a pity because that's what I am. I chose a life apart from the common flow, not only because the common flow makes me sick but because I question the logic of the flow, and not only that - I don't know if the flow exists! Why should I chain myself to the wheel when the wheel itself might be a construct, an invention, a common dream to enslave us?

In marriage a little licence, a little independence there must be between people living together day in and day out in the same house.

[Responding to repeated questions about traveling in Africa without a husband:] I am looking for him.

What is freedom? There is no such thing as absolute freedom!

Hollywood - that's a place where love is viewed both pragmatically and philosophically in the saying, 'Tis better to have loved and divorced than never to have had any publicity at all.

Religious liberty, hey, it's about religious liberty. And there has to be a melding of both. We're living in a time where you have to have a melding of both. But it's very unfair what they're doing to religion in this country.

Yes, I'm married, but I'm not a corpse.

One word of truth outweighs the whole world.

You have the rest of your life to be married. Enjoy falling in love. When girls get caught up in the timeline, it becomes more about the wedding than the marriage. You should be with someone with whom you could elope this weekend and be happy.

The fact the enemies of God must face is that modern civilization has conquered the world, but in doing so has lost its soul. And in losing its soul it will lose the very world it gained. Even our own so-called Liberal culture in these United States which has tried to avoid complete secularization by leaving little zones of individual freedom is in danger of forgetting that these zones were preserved only because religion was in their soul. And as religion fades so will freedom, for only where the spirit of God is, is there liberty.

The philosopher strives to find the liberating word, that is, the word that finally permits us to grasp what up to now has intangibly weighed down upon our consciousness.

More than ever I'm proud to be an American, to live in a country that respects the rights of all to marry whomever they love. The Supreme Court decision gives new meaning to the freedoms we cherish.

We must face the fact that many today are notoriously careless in their living. This attitude finds its way into the church. We have liberty, we have money, we live in comparative luxury. As a result, discipline has disappeared. What would a violin solo sound like if the strings on the musician's instrument were all hanging loose, not stretched tight, not disciplined?

Separation of church and state cannot mean an absolute separation between moral principles and political power.

Since freedom is not a fixed thing that can be grasped and held once for all, but a growth, any particular society, such as our own, always appears partly free and partly unfree. In so far as it favors, in every child, the development of his highest possibilities, it is free, but where it falls short of this it is not.

The influence of the Church does not depend on the Church, it depends on the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit will never lose its influence. He is God and He is influencing society.

[On The Philippines:] ... eighty dialects and languages are spoken; we are a fragmented nation of loyal believers, divided by blood feuds and controlled by the Church.

Hegel was the first to state correctly the relation between freedom and necessity. To him, freedom is the insight into necessity.

Unable to do away with love, the Church found a way to decontaminate it by creating marriage.