Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" The lessons of their early youth regulated the conduct of their riper years. "

Related Quotes:

" I was famous in our college for calm and impassionate discussion; for one whole summer, I rose at five and went to bed at midnight, that I might have sufficient time for theology and metaphysics. "

" Sympathy is one of the principles most widely rooted in our nature: we rejoice to see ourselves reflected in another; and, perversely enough, we sometimes have a secret pleasure in seeing the sin which dwells in ourselves existing under a deformed and monstrous aspect in another. "

" In the summer of 1791, I gave up my concern in the 'New Annual Register,' the historical part of which I had written for seven years, and abdicated, I hope forever, the task of performing a literary labour, the nature of which should be dictated by anything but the promptings of my own mind. "

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

" With respect to my religious sentiments, I have the firmest assurance and tranquillity. I have faithfully endeavoured to improve the faculties and opportunities God has given me, and I am perfectly easy about the consequences. "

" How are the faculties of man to be best developed and his happiness secured? The state of a king is not favorable to this, nor the state of the noble and rich men of the earth. All this is artificial life, the inventions of vanity and grasping ambition, by which we have spoiled the man of nature and of pure, simple, and undistorted impulses. "

" It is one of the oldest maxims of moral prudence: Do not, by aspiring to what is impracticable, lose the opportunity of doing the good you can effect! "

" There must be room for the imagination to exercise its powers; we must conceive and apprehend a thousand things which we do not actually witness. "

" The philosophy of the wisest man that ever existed, is mainly derived from the act of introspection. "

" Great changes cannot take place in the minds of generations of men without a corresponding change in their external symbols. There must be a harmony between the inner and the outward condition of human beings, and the progress of the one must keep pace with the progress of the other. "

" If a thing be really good, it can be shown to be such. "

" Soundness of understanding is connected with freedom of enquiry; consequently, opinion should, as far as public security will admit, be exempted from restraint. "

" The real or supposed rights of man are of two kinds, active and passive; the right in certain cases to do as we list; and the right we possess to the forbearance or assistance of other men. "

" Everything in the world is conducted by gradual process. This seems to be the great principle of harmony in the universe. "

" The man who plays his part upon the theatre of life almost always maintains what may be called an artificial character. "

" Everything understood by the term co-operation is in some sense an 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. "

" No one can display or can cultivate a fervent zeal in the mere repetition of a form. "

" Perhaps the majority of human beings never think of standing by themselves, and choosing their own employments, till the sentence has been regularly promulgated to them, 'It is time for you to take care of yourself.' "

" Above all we should not forget that government is an evil, a usurpation upon the private judgement and individual conscience of mankind. "

" The true object of moral and political disquisition is pleasure or happiness. "

" In contemplation and reverie, one thought introduces another perpetually; and it is by similarity, or the hooking of one upon the other, that the process of thinking is carried on. "

" What are gold and jewels and precious utensils? Mere dross and dirt. The human face and the human heart, reciprocations of kindness and love, and all the nameless sympathies of our nature - these are the only objects worth being attached to. "

" Social man regards all those by whom he is surrounded as enemies, or beings who may become such. He is ever on his guard lest his plain speaking should be willfully perverted, or should assume a meaning he never thought of, through the animosity or prejudice of the individual that hears him. "

" Make men wise, and by that very operation you make them free. Civil liberty follows as a consequence of this; no usurped power can stand against the artillery of opinion. "

" Every boy learns more in his hours of play than in his hours of labor. In school, he lays in the materials of thinking, but in his sports, he actually thinks: he whets his faculties, and he opens his eyes. "

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

" Perseverance is an active principle, and cannot continue to operate but under the influence of desire. "

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

" If he who employs coercion against me could mould me to his purposes by argument, no doubt he would. He pretends to punish me because his argument is strong; but he really punishes me because his argument is weak. "