American Calvinist Philosopher

Famous quotes containing the words american, calvinist and/or philosopher:

    Every American poet feels that the whole responsibility for contemporary poetry has fallen upon his shoulders, that he is a literary aristocracy of one.
    —W.H. (Wystan Hugh)

    Mr. Treat is described as a Calvinist of the strictest kind, not one of those who, by giving up or explaining away, become like a porcupine disarmed of its quills, but a consistent Calvinist, who can dart his quills at a distance and courageously defend himself.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    It seems to me that your doctor [Tronchin] is more of a philosopher than a physician. As for me, I much prefer a doctor who is an optimist and who gives me remedies that will improve my health. Philosophical consolations are, after all, useless against real ailments. I know only two kinds of sickness—physical and moral: all the others are purely in the imagination.
    Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)