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Thought without language, says Lavelle, would not be a purer thought; it would be no more than the intention to think. And his last book offers a theory of expressiveness which makes of expression not “a faithful image of an already realized interior being, but the very means by which it is realized.”

— Maurice Merleau-Ponty In Praise of Philosophy (1963)

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More quotes by Maurice Merleau-Ponty

Socrates reminds us that it is not the same thing, but almost the opposite, to understand religion and to accept it.

In Praise of Philosophy (1963)

Montaigne [puts] not self-satisfied understanding but a consciousness astonished at itself at the core of human existence.

It is a great good fortune, as Stendhal said, for one “to have his passion as a profession.”

In Praise of Philosophy (1963)

What makes a philosopher is the movement which leads back without ceasing from knowledge to ignorance, from ignorance to knowledge, and a kind of rest in this movement.

In Praise of Philosophy (1963)

The world is nothing but 'world-as-meaning.'

Phenomenology of Perception (1945)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Maurice Merleau-Ponty (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.