Quotes about Certainty

If a man can predict his own death and resurrection, and pull it off, I just go with whatever that man says

Men are generally right in what they affirm and wrong in what they deny. What we deny is generally something that lies outside our experience, and about which we can therefore say nothing.

A man may be so bold of his predestination, that he forget his conversation.

Faith is necessary to men; woe to him who believes in nothing!

A faith; this is a necessity for man. Woe to him who believes nothing.

Man can only be certain about the present moment. But is that quite true either? Can he really know the present? Is he in a position to make any judgment about it? Certainly not. For how can a person with no knowledge of the future understand the meaning of the present? If we do not know what future the present is leading us toward, how can we say whether this present is good or bad, whether it deserves our concurrence, or our suspicion, or our hatred?

Too much faith is the worst ally

What does it mean, anyway, to 'retract' what you've said? How can anyone state categorically that a thought he once had is no longer valid? In modern times a thought can be refuted , yes, but not retracted . (p. 179)

A person who is not convinced, enthusiastic, certain and in love, will convince nobody.

God could not have given this promise, except from love and grace; therefore it is quite certain his Word will be fulfilled.

I've always thought an agnostic is an atheist without the courage of his convictions.

Humans may crave absolute certainty; they may aspire to it; they may pretend, as partisans of certain religions do, to have attained it. But the history of science — by far the most successful claim to knowledge accessible to humans — teaches that the most we can hope for is successive improvement in our understanding, learning from our mistakes, an asymptotic approach to the Universe, but with the proviso that absolute certainty will always elude us.