Benjamin Jowett Quotes & Sayings

#1. All translation is a compromise - the effort to be literal and the effort to be idiomatic.

#2. We cannot seek or attain health, wealth, learning, justice, or kindness in general. Action is always specific, concrete, individualized, unique.

Benjamin Jowett

#3. Atheism or similar charges was not unusual among intellectuals, nor condemned by the masses. The prize-winning plays of Aristophanes were not merely atheist, but made fun of the gods and their prophets and oracles.

Benjamin Jowett

#4. It is most important in this world to be pushing, but it is fatal to seem so.

Benjamin Jowett

#5. Logic is neither a science nor an art, but a dodge.

Benjamin Jowett

#6. There is a great deal of hard lying in the world; especially among people whose characters are above suspicion.

Benjamin Jowett

#7. Give the clergy your sympathy; don't give them anything else.

Benjamin Jowett

#8. We can't search or attain well being, wealth, studying, justice or kindness usually. Action is all the time particular, concrete, individualized, distinctive.

Benjamin Jowett

#9. Research! A mere excuse for idleness; it has never achieved, and will never achieve any results of the slightest value.

Benjamin Jowett

#10. Plato's dialogues bear at least some similarities to the classical plays.

Benjamin Jowett

#11. Precautions are always blamed. When successful they are said to be unnecessary.

Benjamin Jowett

#12. You've got to be success minded. You've got to feel that things are coming your way when you're out selling; otherwise, you won't be able to sell anything.

Benjamin Jowett

#13. To teach a man how he may learn to grow independently, and for himself, is perhaps the greatest service that one man can do another.

Benjamin Jowett

#14. Doubt comes in at the window when inquiry is denied at the door.

Benjamin Jowett

#15. You must believe in God, in spite of what the clergy say.

Benjamin Jowett

#16. Nowhere probably is there more true feeling, and nowhere worse taste, than in a churchyard.

Benjamin Jowett

#17. There is a serious defect in the thinking of someone who wants - more than anything else - to become rich. As long as they don't have the money, it'll seem like a worthwhile goal. Once they do, they'll understand how important other things are - and have always been.

Benjamin Jowett

#18. Young men make great mistakes in life; for one thing, they idealize love too much.

Benjamin Jowett

#19. If you don't find a God by five o'clock this afternoon you must leave the college.

Benjamin Jowett

#20. The achievements which society rewards are won at the cost of diminution of personality.

Benjamin Jowett

#21. My dear child, you must believe in God despite what the clergy tells you.

Benjamin Jowett

#22. Grace is an energy; not a mere sentiment; not a mere thought of the Almighty; not even a word of the Almighty. It is as real an energy as the energy of electricity. It is a divine energy; it is the energy of the divine affection rolling in plenteousness toward the shores of human need.

Benjamin Jowett

#23. Jowett, in his day, did probably more than any other single man to let some fresh air into the exhausted atmosphere of the [Oxford] common rooms, and to widen the intellectual horizons of the place.

Benjamin Jowett