William James Quote: The gods we stand by are the gods...

The gods we stand by are the gods we need and can use, the gods whose demands on us are reinforcements of our demands on ourselves and on one another.

— William James

Source: The Varieties of Religious Experiences - 1902

one stand demands reinforcements gods

Select Quotes by William James

Time itself comes in drops.

— William James

Source: A Pluralistic Universe

Consciousness… does not appear to itself chopped up in bits. Such words as “chain” or ‘train’ do not describe it fitly as it presents itself in the first instance. It is nothing jointed; it flows. A”river” or a “stream” are the metaphors by which it is most naturally described. In talking of it hereafter, let us call it the stream of thought, of consciousness, or of subjective life.
Source of the expression “stream of consciousness”.

— William James

Source: The Principles of Psychology - 1890

The bottom of being is left logically opaque to us, as something which we simply come upon and find, and about which if we wish to act we should pause and wonder as little as possible.

— William James

Source: The Sentiment of Rationality - 1882