Q0424

“My propositions serve as elucidations in this way: anyone who understands me…” — Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus 6.54)

Verified English quotation. Primary source: Tractatus 6.54. Theme: limits.

English

My propositions serve as elucidations in this way: anyone who understands me eventually recognizes them as nonsensical.
Thinker Ludwig Wittgenstein
School Analytic Philosophy
Source Tractatus 6.54
Theme Limits
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source and attribution

The archive attributes this English wording to Tractatus 6.54 and files it under Analytic Philosophy. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

About Ludwig Wittgenstein

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951), born in Vienna to a wealthy industrial family, studied engineering then logic with Russell at Cambridge. The Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921) aimed to draw limits to sense; he then left academic philosophy for years as a teacher and architect’s assistant.

How to read this passage

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Stuart Mill), limits is framed through Analytic Philosophy and Utilitarianism. Some passages define limits; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through limits.

Concepts in this quote

Limits
Limits appears in this archive as a live philosophical concern—not a slogan. These verified English passages show how thinkers treat limits as a problem of judgment, practice, or explanation.

How to cite this quotation

APA: Ludwig Wittgenstein. (n.d.). My propositions serve as elucidations in this way: anyone who understands me eventually recognizes them as nonsensical. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0424

MLA: Ludwig Wittgenstein. “My propositions serve as elucidations in this way:….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0424.

Chicago: Ludwig Wittgenstein. “My propositions serve as elucidations in this way:….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0424.

Frequently asked questions

What is the source of the quotation “My propositions serve as elucidations in this way:…”?

The passage is attributed to Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus 6.54. The archive attributes this English wording to Tractatus 6.54 and files it under Analytic Philosophy. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

What does Ludwig Wittgenstein mean by limits?

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Stuart Mill), limits is framed through Analytic Philosophy and Utilitarianism. Some passages define limits; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through limits.

Explore Ludwig Wittgenstein on limits

Same thinker

More from Ludwig Wittgenstein

  1. Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.
  2. My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally recognizes them as nonsensical…He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly.
  3. What we do is to bring words back from their metaphysical to their everyday use.
  4. The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
  5. We feel that even if all possible scientific questions are answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all.

All quotations by Ludwig Wittgenstein

Same theme

More on limits

  1. It is through wonder that people both now begin and first began to philosophize.
  2. A person's character is their destiny.
  3. What is opposed brings together; from what differs comes the finest harmony.
  4. Death is nothing to us: for what has been dissolved has no sensation, and what has no sensation is nothing to us.
  5. Pleasure is the beginning and end of the happy life — not the pleasures of profligates, but freedom from pain in the body and from disturbance in the soul.

Browse the limits theme