Jacques Maritain Quotes on Truth
Jacques Maritain, a leading figure in the twentieth-century revival of Thomism, held a robustly realist conception of truth, and the quotes gathered here express it. For Maritain truth is the conformity of the mind to reality: things are both the cause and the measure of the truth of our intelligence, just as God's intelligence is the measure of the truth of things. He applied this conviction even to political philosophy, insisting that it is neither rightist nor leftist but must simply be true. Maritain also paired truth with love as the proper instruments of moral and spiritual renewal, and warned that truth must never be subordinated to mere effectiveness. His motto, distinguish in order to unite, marked here as attributed, captures his method of careful analysis in the service of synthesis. These passages present truth as objective, demanding, and indispensable.
Quotes
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Attributed to Jacques Maritain:
“Distinguish in order to unite.”
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Attributed to Jacques Maritain:
“The thirst for poetry is one of the most spiritual thirsts in the human being.”
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Attributed to Jacques Maritain:
“The philosopher is the friend of being.”
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“If it is correct to say that there will always be rightist temperaments and leftist temperaments, it is nevertheless also correct to say that political philosophy is neither rightist nor leftist; it must simply be true .”
The Twilight of Civilization (1939). London: Sheed & Ward, 1946, p. 41. -
“Whereas the intelligence of God is both the cause and the measure of the truth of things, things are both the cause and the measure of the truth of our intelligence.”
Theonas: Conversations of a Sage(1921) [Sheed & Ward, 1933] | p. 9. -
“To redeem creation the saint wages war on the entire fabric of creation, with the bare weapons of truth and love.”
The Range of Reason(1952) [New York: Charles Scribner's Sons] | p. 109. -
“The day when efficacy would prevail over truth will never come for the Church, for then the gates of hell would have prevailed against her.”
The Peasant of the Garonne(1968) | p. 94.