...extent to which our moral lives are governed by habit. Not only did he write, rather disturbingly, "Habit is thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most precious conservative agent." He also asserted: No matter how full a reservoir of maxims one may possess, and no matter how good...

...that name, as "the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most precious conservative agent. ... It also prevents the hardest and most repulsive walks of life...being deserted by those brought up to tread therein." With this observation, James links the intricate psychology of habit to larger mechanisms of organization...

...bundle of habits" in which James takes such comfort. In his famous hymn to habit he calls it society's "most precious conservative agent. It alone is what keeps us all within the bounds of ordinance. ... It is well for the world that in most of us, by the age of thirty, the character has set like plaster,...

...narratives and characterizations, interspersed, as before, with James's more or less scientific statements. "Habit is thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most precious conservative agent." 72 The same multiplicity of forms exists in this section on habit as it did in the other section we...

...us all within the bounds of ordinance, and saves the children of fortune from the envious uprising of the poor. It alone prevents the hardest and most...deserted by those brought up to tread therein. It keeps the fisherman and the deck-hand at sea through the winter; it holds the miner in his darkness,...

...perhaps most clearly indicated by his casual remarks, like his statement that it is only habit that "saves the children of fortune from the envious uprisings of the poor" (The Principles of Psychology, 125). 23. Talks to Teachers, 162, 161. 24. Otto, "On a Certain Blindness,"...

...on habit can scarcely be improved and still seems fresh and relevant to contemporary, modern times. Habit is thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its...deserted by those brought up to tread therein. It keeps the fisherman and the deck-hand at sea through the winter; it holds the miner in his darkness...

...as possible. ERIC HOFFER (1902-83), US philosopher. The Passionate State of Mind, aph. 264 (1955). 5 z," WILLIAM JAMES (1842-1910), US psychologist, philosopher. Principles of Psychology, vol. 1 , ch. A (1...

...implications" because "our organs grow to the way in which they have been exercised . . ." Habit was "thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most...of fortune from the envious uprisings of the poor." Only habit "prevents the hardest and most repulsive walks of life from being deserted by those up to...

...various processes of conditioning. James thus gives great importance to habits in human life. He says, "Habit is thus the enormous flywheel of society, its...what keeps us all within the bounds of ordinance, and save the children of fortune from the envious uprisings of the poor." "The great thing, then, in all...