The Colours of the Mind

“If I now consider man in his isolated capacity, I find that dogmatic belief is no less indispensable to him in order to live alone than it is to enable him to co-operate with his fellows. If man were forced to demonstrate for himself all the truths of which he makes daily use, his task would never end.” (Alexis de Tocqueville)

“Most truths which travel the world (truths are great travellers) may be regarded as commonplaces, associations of ideas common to a large number of men, none of whom would dare deliberately to disassociate them.” (Remy de Gourmont)

There are two ways of thinking. One can either accept current ideas and associations of ideas, just as they are, or else undertake, on his own account, new associations or, what is rarer, original disassociations. The intelligence capable of such efforts is, more or less, according to the degree, or according to the abundance and variety of its other gifts, a creative intelligence.

(Bilingual Edition)