"Preconception" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... convinced that it was wrong; and he propounded another theory, the one which to- day is universally accepted through the civilized world. But it was years before it could gain anything like adequate or fair consideration, because the preconception in favor of Newton's theory stood in the way of any adequate consideration of the one ...
— Our Unitarian Gospel • Minot Savage
... searching. We must dig for it; we must grope after it. And as he spoke, I made up my mind, in a flash of resolution, to find out the Truth for myself about everything, and never to be deterred from seeking it, and embracing it, and ensuing it when found, by any convention or preconception. Then he went on to say how the Truth would make us Free, and I felt he was right. It would open our eyes, and emancipate us from social and moral slaveries. So I made up my mind, at the same time, that whenever I found the Truth I would ...
— The Woman Who Did • Grant Allen
... multiplicity of materials, in supplying omissions, in searching for papers buried in different masses, and all this besides the exertion of composing and polishing.' He despairs of making his picture vivid or full enough, and of ever realizing his preconception of ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... but at length there was found (in the Bodleian, I think,) an Arabic translation of it. An English mathematician, Halley, knowing not one word of Arabic, determined (without waiting for that Arabic key) to pick the lock of this MS. And he did so. Through strength of preconception, derived equally from his knowledge of the general subject, and from his knowledge of this particular work in its earlier sections, using also to some extent the subtle art of the decipherer, [Footnote: ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... what 'clear and reasoned system' is possible. It is not profitable to tell us that the greatest of all the immense difficulties in the way of a solution of the problem of the union of Greater Britain into a Federation is a difficulty that we make ourselves: 'is the false preconception which we bring to the question, that the problem is insoluble, that no such thing ever was done or ever will be done.' On the contrary, those who are incurably sceptical of federation, owe their scepticism not to a preconception ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 9: The Expansion of England • John Morley
... scrupulous conscientiousness of which chimed with my Puritan education. I left England with a fermentation of art ideas in my brain, in which the influence of Turner and Pyne, the teachings of Wehnert, and the work of the Pre-Raphaelites mingled with the influence of Ruskin, and especially the preconception of art work derived from the descriptions, often strangely ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... powers. Let us examine this statement in some detail, for it will throw much light on our later studies. The thing to get clearly in mind is the idea that when we say "natural" phenomena we mean merely phenomena that have been observed to occur. From a truly scientific stand-point there is no preconception as to what manner of phenomenon may, or may not, occur. All manner of things do occur constantly that would seem improbable were they not matters of familiar knowledge. The simplest facts in regard to gravitation involve difficulties ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams |
