Joseph Dietzgen

Quotes

• “One who knows little may explain that little with more ease and efficacy than one who has his head stuffed full of the prescribed bunch of official wisdom.”
• “Logic aims to instruct the human mind as to its own nature and processes; it will lay bare the interior working of our mind for our guidance. The object of the study of logic is thought, its nature, and its proper classification.”
• “Much of what I have to say for my case may sound wonderful, because it runs counter to the popular prejudice, but the only witness required to prove the truth of my statements is the clear brain of my pupil, who has only to examine his own experience without preconceived notions, in order to find proofs on every hand.”
• “It is a peculiarity of thought that it never stays with itself, but always digresses to other things.”
• “But it is not alone the harmony of music which has such a power over the mind. The harmony of colors, every art and science, has the same power. Even the most common craft, and the most prosaic of all prose, the chase after the dollar, may take possession of a man’s soul and prostrate him in adoration before its idol.”
• “Anything which may take possession of one’s soul shares its sublimity with all other things, and is for this reason at the same time something ordinary. Without such a dialectic clarification of our consciousness all adoration is idol worship.”

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Key dates

Born

9 December 1828

Died

15 April 1888

via Wikidata · CC0

Wikidata facts

Instance of

human

Given name

Joseph

Gender

male

Citizenship

Kingdom of Prussia

Place of death

Chicago

Occupation

philosopher

Political party

Social Democratic Party of Germany

Languages spoken

German

Religion

atheism

Image

Josef Dietzgen (cropped).jpg

via Wikidata · CC0