American life is a powerful solvent. It seems to neutralize every intellectual element, however tough and alien it may be, and to fuse it in the native good will, complacency, thoughtlessness, and optimism.
George Santayana
- Life
- 1863-1952
- Occupations
- philosopher, writer, poet
Facts: Wikidata (CC0), as of 2026-07-09
Beauty as we feel it is something indescribable: what it is or what it means can never be said.
George Santayana
Beauty is a pledge of the possible conformity between the soul and nature, and consequently a ground of faith in the supremacy of the good.
George Santayana
Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim.
George Santayana
Happiness is the only sanction of life; where happiness fails, existence remains a mad and lamentable experiment.
George Santayana
I like to walk about amidst the beautiful things that adorn the world; but private wealth I should decline, or any sort of personal possessions, because they would take away my liberty.
George Santayana
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
George Santayana
Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
George Santayana
That life is worth living is the most necessary of assumptions and, were it not assumed, the most impossible of conclusions.
George Santayana
The highest form of vanity is love of fame.
George Santayana
There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval.
George Santayana