But in this very conception of a universe of spirits we have passed beyond the bounds of a purely rational philosophy.

(If we were merely rational, and not at the same time sensuous beings, the moral law would determine the will in the form of a natural law; since, however, the constant possibility of deviation is given in the sensibility, or, rather, the moral standpoint can only be attained by conquering the sensuous impulses, therefore the moral law speaks to us in the form of an "ought," of an imperative.)

I often wish that some scientific person would investigate the matter in a strictly rational spirit; though it is certainly difficult to see in what directions such investigations could be fruitful.

The laws of morality are not accidental, but are the essentially rational.

Rationality is one and indivisible: if not rational thus indivisibly, the universe must be completely irrational, and no shadings or mixtures or compromises can obtain.

To this the wives sitting in the rose garden replied, "Friend, you know not the wisdom and prudence of wives; for they totally hide it from the men, and for no other end than that they may be loved: for every man who is not spiritually but only naturally rational and moral, is cold towards his wife; and the cold lies concealed in his inmost principles.

Every man (homo) is born corporeal, becomes sensual, afterwards natural, and successively rational; and, if in this case he does not stop in his progress, he becomes spiritual.

I cannot understand what actuated so many persons, supposedly rational, to sign such a ridiculous document.

It is only when a decision has to be taken affecting the more distant purposes of his life that the man enters on a region of definitely rational thought where the dog cannot follow him, in which he uses words, and is more or less conscious of his own logical methods.

The practical world of affairs, in its turn, so supremely rational to the politician, the military man, or the man of conquering business-faculty that he never would vote to change the type of it, is irrational to moral and artistic temperaments; so that whatever demand for rationality we find satisfied by a philosophic hypothesis, we are liable to find some other demand for rationality unsatisfied by the same hypothesis.

The vast Machine, we inhabit, lyes open to him, he seems not unacquainted with the general Laws that govern it; and while with the Transport of a Philosopher he beholds and admires the glorious Work, he is capable of paying at once a more devout and more rational Homage to his Maker.

For me, as (I trust) an orthodox priest of the Church of England, I believe the theology of the National Church of England, as by law established, to be eminently rational as well as scriptural.