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" Self-deception is so far from impossible that it is one of the most ordinary phenomena with which we are acquainted. Nothing is more usual than for a man to impute his actions to honorable motives when it is nearly demonstrable that they flowed from some corrupt and contemptible force. "

William Godwin

Corrupt

Man

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" Revolutions are the produce of passion, not of sober and tranquil reason. "

" No man knows the value of innocence and integrity but he who has lost them. "

" A world of derived beings, an immense, wide creation, requires an extended scale with various ranks and orders of existence. "

" Woe to the man who is always busy - hurried in a turmoil of engagements, from occupation to occupation, and with no seasons interposed of recollection, contemplation and repose! Such a man must inevitably be gross and vulgar, and hard and indelicate - the sort of man with whom no generous spirit would desire to hold intercourse. "

" It is probable that there is no one thing that it is of eminent importance for a child to learn. "

" Invisible things are the only realities; invisible things alone are the things that shall remain. "

" A just and a brave man acts fearlessly and with explicitness; he does not shun, but court, the scrutiny of mankind; he lives in the face of day, and the whole world confesses the clearness of his spirit and the rectitude of his conduct. "

" We cannot do justice to the deeds of former times if we do not in some degree remove ourselves from the circumstances in which we stand and substitute those by which the real actors were surrounded. "

" Government will not fail to employ education, to strengthen its hands, and perpetuate its institutions. "

" My temper is of a recluse and contemplative cast; had it been otherwise, I should, perhaps, on some former occasions, have entered into the active concerns of the world and not have been connected with it merely as a writer of books. "

" The most desirable state of mankind is that which maintains general security with the smallest encroachment upon individual independence. "

" Give energy, and mental exertion will always have attraction enough. "

" It is questionless desirable in all ordinary cases, wherever positive law is established, to restrain ourselves within the letter of that law and to allow the criminal all the benefit, if benefit to him shall result, of any evasion or escape that the law shall afford him. "

" The evils that arise to us from the structure of the material universe are neither trivial nor few, yet the history of political society sufficiently shows that man is, of all other beings, the most formidable enemy to man. "

" It is necessary for him who would endure existence with patience that he should conceive himself to be something - that he should be persuaded he is not a cipher in the muster-roll of man. "

" As the true object of education is not to render the pupil the mere copy of his preceptor, it is rather to be rejoiced in, than lamented, that various reading should lead him into new trains of thinking. "

" There are so many ways in which the heart of man conceals itself from man! "

" The Italian character in general is full of animation, and the natives enter into the interests and welfare of the stranger before them with a fervor that forbids all doubt of its sincerity and that is truly surprising. "

" Study with desire is real activity; without desire it is but the semblance and mockery of activity. "

" The cause of justice is the cause of humanity. Its advocates should overflow with universal good will. We should love this cause, for it conduces to the general happiness of mankind. "

" Let us not, in the eagerness of our haste to educate, forget all the ends of education. "

William Godwin

Educate

Haste

" Duty is that mode of action which constitutes the best application of the capacity of the individual to the general advantage. "

" He has no right to his life when his duty calls him to resign it. Other men are bound... to deprive him of life or liberty, if that should appear in any case to be indispensably necessary to prevent a greater evil. "

" Innocence is not virtue. Virtue demands the active employment of an ardent mind in the promotion of the general good. No man can be eminently virtuous who is not accustomed to an extensive range of reflection. "

" Harshness and unkindness are relative. The appearance of them may be the fruits of the greatest kindness. "

" The extent of our progress in the cultivation of knowledge is unlimited. "

" I am most peremptorily of opinion against putting children extremely forward. If they desire it themselves, I would not balk them, for I love to attend to these unsophisticated indications. But otherwise, 'festina lente' is my maxim in education. "

" Government, as it was forced upon mankind by their vices, so has it commonly been the creature of their ignorance and mistake. "

" I know not how it is: there are some businesses for which dullness seems to be a qualification. "

" Act up to the magnitude of your destiny. "

William Godwin

Magnitude

Destiny