Men have been obliged to make for themselves a notion of what religion is, long before the science of religions started its methodical comparisons.
Emile DurkheimAlthough our moral conscience is a part of our consciousness, we do not feel ourselves on an equality with it. In this voice which makes itself heard only to give us orders and establish prohibitions, we cannot recognize our own voices; the very tone in which it speaks to us warns us that it expresses something within us that is not of ourselves.
Emile DurkheimThe man whose whole activity is diverted to inner meditation becomes insensible to all his surroundings.
Emile DurkheimReality seems valueless by comparison with the dreams of fevered imaginations; reality is therefore abandoned.
Emile Durkheim