Certainty Quotes

If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.
Henry David Thoreau

Life, Good, Design

For my part I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of the stars makes me dream.
Vincent Van Gogh

Nothing, Dream, Stars

Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.
Vaclav Havel

Hope, Same, Sense

Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.
Voltaire

Doubt, Pleasant, Condition

Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.
Bertrand Russell

Knowledge, Ignorance, Philosophy

Moral certainty, clear standards, and a commitment to spiritual ideals will set you apart in a world that searches for meaning.
Mitt Romney

Spiritual, Moral, Meaning

A woman's guess is much more accurate than a man's certainty.
Rudyard Kipling

Woman, Guess, Accurate

The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers.
Erich Fromm

Meaning, Search, Condition

Jealousy lives upon doubts. It becomes madness or ceases entirely as soon as we pass from doubt to certainty.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Jealousy, Doubt, Lives

To teach how to live without certainty and yet without being paralysed by hesitation is perhaps the chief thing that philosophy, in our age, can do for those who study it.
Bertrand Russell

Age, Live, Philosophy

The demand for certainty is one which is natural to man, but is nevertheless an intellectual vice.
Bertrand Russell

Natural, Demand, Vice

One must verify or expel his doubts, and convert them into the certainty of Yes or NO.
Thomas Carlyle

Yes, Doubts, Convert

If we must not act save on a certainty, we ought not to act on religion, for it is not certain. But how many things we do on an uncertainty, sea voyages, battles!
Blaise Pascal

Religion, Sea, Act

We can say with certainty - or 90% probability - that the new industries that are about to be born will have nothing to do with information.
Peter Drucker

Nothing, Born, Industries

No great deed is done by falterers who ask for certainty.
George Eliot

Great, Done, Ask

Although our intellect always longs for clarity and certainty, our nature often finds uncertainty fascinating.
Karl Von Clausewitz

Nature, Often, Clarity

When prayer removes distrust and doubt and enters the field of mental certainty, it becomes faith; and the universe is built on faith.
Ernest Holmes

Faith, Doubt, Prayer

The unique and supreme voluptuousness of love lies in the certainty of committing evil. And men and women know from birth that in evil is found all sensual delight.
Charles Baudelaire

Love, Women, Men

Adventure upon all the tickets in the lottery, and you lose for certain; and the greater the number of your tickets the nearer your approach to this certainty.
Adam Smith

Lose, Adventure, Number

Beauty is desired in order that it may be befouled; not for its own sake, but for the joy brought by the certainty of profaning it.
Tom Stoppard

Beauty, May, Joy

Doubt is to certainty as neurosis is to psychosis. The neurotic is in doubt and has fears about persons and things; the psychotic has convictions and makes claims about them. In short, the neurotic has problems, the psychotic has solutions.
Thomas Szasz

Doubt, Short, Problems

From principles is derived probability, but truth or certainty is obtained only from facts.
Tom Stoppard

Truth, Facts, Principles

Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.
Vaclav Havel

Hope, Sense, Makes

I'm not resigned, but I'm realistic too. The statistics in my case are very poor. Not many people come through esophageal cancer and live to talk about it, or not for long. And the other wager is, the part of the wager, it's a certainty you'll have a terrible time and you may wish you were dying because it's an awful process.
Christopher Hitchens

Time, Live, Long

Inquiry is fatal to certainty.
Will Durant

A liberal knows that the only certainty in this life is change but believes that the change can be directed toward a constructive end.
Henry A. Wallace

Life, Change, End

If I am fool, it is, at least, a doubting one; and I envy no one the certainty of his self-approved wisdom.
George Byron

Wisdom, Fool, Envy

The only certainty is that nothing is certain.
Pliny the Elder

Certitude is not the test of certainty. We have been cocksure of many things that were not so.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Test, Certitude

Benjamin Franklin said there were only two things certain in life: death and taxes. But I'd like to add a third certainty: trash. And while some in this room might want to discuss reducing taxes, I want to talk about reducing trash.
Ruth Ann Minner

Life, Death, Two

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James Russell Lowell

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