It is as if there were in the human consciousness a sense of reality, a feeling of objective presence, a perception of what we may call something there, more deep and more general than any of the special and particular senses by which the current psychology supposes existent realities to be originally revealed.
William JamesThe unrest which keeps the never stopping clock of metaphysics going is the thought that the nonexistence of this world is just as possible as its existence.
William JamesKnowledge about life is one thing; effective occupation of a place in life, with its dynamic currents passing through your being, is another.
William JamesMost people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being.
William JamesThere is a stream, a succession of states, or waves, or fields (or whatever you please to call them), of knowledge, of feeling, of desire, of deliberation, etc., that constantly pass and repass, and that constitute our inner life.
William James