British statesman (1848-1930)
To him who is not a specialist, a comprehension of the broad outlines of the universe as it presents itself to the scientific imagination is the thing most worth striving to attain.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
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Lord Rector's Address, delivered at St. Andrews University, December 10, 1887
Add belief to belief, and you will set up strains and stresses within your system of knowledge which will compel it to move towards some new position of equilibrium. Sometimes, no doubt, the process is more violent and catastrophic than this metaphor naturally suggests. Then occurs in the moral world the analogue of the earthquake, the lava flood, and the tidal wave, which shatter mountains and sweep cities to destruction. Men's outlook on the universe suffers sudden revolution: the obvious becomes incredible, and the incredible obvious; whole societies lose their balance, and stately systems are tumbled in the dust.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
Beauty is an ill-defined attribute of certain members of an ill-defined class; and for the class itself there is no very convenient name. We might describe its members as "objects of aesthetic interest" always bearing in mind that this description (as I use it) applies to objects of the most varying degrees of excellence—to the small as well as the great, the trifling as well as the sublime: to conjuring and dancing; to literature, art, and natural beauty.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
For what does historical interest require? Not merely "brute fact," but brute fact about beings who are more than animals, who look before and after, who dream about the past and hope about the future, who plan and strive and suffer for ends of their own invention; for ideals which reach far beyond the appetites and fears which rule the lives of their brother beasts. Such beings have a "natural history," but it is not with this that we are concerned. The history which concerns us is the history of self-conscious personalities, and of communities which are (in a sense) self-conscious also. Can the contemplative values which this possesses, especially in its most comprehensive shape, be regarded as independent of our world-outlook? Surely not.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
There are for all men moments when the need for some general point of view becomes insistent; when neither labor, nor care, nor pleasure, nor idleness, nor habit will stop a man from asking how he is to regard the universe of reality, how he is to think of it as a whole, how he is to think of his own relation to it.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
Man inherits the capacity for loyalty, but not the use to which he shall put it. The persons and causes (if any) to which he shall devote himself are suggested to him, often, indeed, imposed upon him, by education and environment. Nevertheless, they are his by choice, not by hereditary compulsion. And his choice may be bad. He may unselfishly devote himself to what is petty or vile, as he may to what is generous and noble.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
There are, no doubt, sceptics in religion who treat skepticism as a luxury which can be safely enjoyed only by the few. Religion they think good for morals; morals they think good for society; society they think good for themselves.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
What at first was the delight of nations declines by slow but inevitable gradation into the luxury, or the business, or even the vanity of a few. What once spoke in accents understood by all is now painfully spelt out by a small band of scholars. What was once read for pleasure is now read for curiosity. It becomes "an interesting illustration of the taste of a bygone age," a "remarkable proof of such and such a theory of aesthetics."
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Essays and Addresses
Materialism has never been the prevailing creed among lovers of beauty.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
In the meanwhile we must, I fear, suffer under a system of beliefs which is far short of rational perfection. But we need not acquiesce, and we should not be contented. Whether this state of affairs will ever be cured by the sudden flash of some great philosophic discovery is another matter.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
It is, no doubt, better for us to apply appropriate remedies to our diseases than to put our whole trust in the healing powers of nature. But it is better to put our trust in the healing powers of nature than to poison ourselves straight off by swallowing the contents of the first phial presented to us by any self-constituted physician.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Essays and Addresses
The vanity of human wishes and the brevity of human life are immemorial themes of lamentation; nor do they become less lamentable when we extend our view from the individual to the race.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
We are, no doubt, accustomed to connect the notion of value rather with things believed in, than with the beliefs of which they are the subjects. A fine symphony, an heroic deed, a good dinner, an assured livelihood, have admitted values. But what values can we attribute to beliefs and judgments, except in so far as they are aids and instruments for obtaining valuable objects?
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
Everything that happened, good or bad, would subtract something from the lessening store of useful energy, till a time arrived when nothing could happen any more, and the universe, frozen into eternal repose, would for ever be as if it were not.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
In the first place, history is not concerned to express beauty. I do not deny that a great historian, in narrating some heroic incident, may rival the epic and the saga. He may tell a tale which would be fascinating even if it were false. But such cases are exceptional, and ought to be exceptional. Directly it appears that the governing preoccupation of an historian is to be picturesque, his narrative becomes intolerable.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
As, therefore, nature knows nothing of good intentions, rewarding and punishing not motives but actions; as things are what they are, describe them as we may, and their consequences will be what they will be.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Essays and Addresses
I disowned, as you remember, any intention of providing you with a philosophical system—not because I despise philosophical systems or those who labor to construct them, but in part because I have none to recommend, and in part because it seems to me doubtful whether at our present stage of development a satisfactory system is possible.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
It is only the thinnest surface layer of law and custom, belief and sentiment, which can either be successfully subjected to destructive treatment, or become the nucleus of any new growth—a fact which explains the apparent paradox that so many of our most famous advances in political wisdom are nothing more than the formal recognition of our political impotence.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Essays and Addresses
Patient genius is constantly detecting order in apparent chaos ... and when this happens, by all means rearrange your map of the universe accordingly. But do not argue that chaos is therefore non-existent.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism
Scientific curiosity hungers for a knowledge of causes; causes which are physical, and, if possible, measurable.
ARTHUR BALFOUR
Theism and Humanism