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I know not what to call this, nor will I urge that it is a secret, overruling decree, that hurries us on to be the instruments of our own destruction, even though it be before us, and that we rush upon it with our eyes open.

Daniel Defoe

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Daniel Defoe
Age: 70 †
Born: 1660
Born: September 30
Died: 1731
Died: April 24
Businessperson
Journalist
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Poet
Prosaist
Publicist
Publisher
Writer
London
England
Daniel Foe
Though
Rush
Upon
Urges
Eye
Instruments
Even
Destruction
Open
Overruling
Eyes
Hurries
Secret
Decree
Call
Urge

More quotes by Daniel Defoe

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No man commits evil for the sake of it even the Devil himself has some farther design in sinning, than barely the wicked part of it.
Daniel Defoe
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It is men of desperate fortunes on the one hand, or of aspiring, superior fortunes on the other, who go abroad upon adventures, to rise by enterprise, and make themselves famous in undertakings of a nature out of the common road.
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And which I take notice of here, to put those discontented people in mind of it, who cannot enjoy comfortably what God has given them, because they see and covet something that he has not given them. All our discontents about what we want appeared to me to spring from the want of thankfulness for what we have.
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Thus fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself when apparent to the eyes and we find the burden of anxiety greater, by much, than the evil which we are anxious about.
Daniel Defoe
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Avery fine city the four principal streets are the fairest for breadth, and the finest built that I have ever seen in one city together? In a word,'tis the cleanest and beautifullest, and best built city in Britain, London excepted.
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Justice is always Violence to the Party offending, for every Man is Innocent in his own Eyes.
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Self-destruction is the effect of cowardice in the highest extreme.
Daniel Defoe
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Things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believed.
Daniel Defoe
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Wit, like the Belly, if it be not fed, Will starve the Members, and distract the Head.
Daniel Defoe
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And of all plagues with which mankind are curst, Ecclesiastic tyranny's the worst.
Daniel Defoe
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No shoots, says Friday, no yet, me shoot now, me no kill me stay, give you one more laugh.
Daniel Defoe
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She is always married too soon, who gets a bad husband, and she is never married too late, who gets a good one.
Daniel Defoe
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Today we love what tomorrow we hate, today we seek what tomorrow we shun, today we desire what tomorrow we fear, nay, even tremble at the apprehensions of.
Daniel Defoe
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Not the man in the moon, not the groaning-board, not the speaking of friar Bacon's brazen- head, not the inspiration of mother Shipton, or the miracles of Dr. Faustus, things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believed.
Daniel Defoe
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He look'd a little disorder'd, when he said this, but I did not apprehend any thing from it at that time, believing as it us'd to be said, that they who do those things never talk of them or that they who talk of such things never do them.
Daniel Defoe
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I am giving an account of what was, not of what ought or ought not to be.
Daniel Defoe
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In trouble to be troubled, Is to have your trouble doubled.
Daniel Defoe
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In the course of our lives, the evil which in itself we seek most to shun, and which, when we are fallen into, is the most dreadful to us, is oftentimes the very means or door of our deliverance, by which alone we can be raised again from the affliction we are fallen into.
Daniel Defoe
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It put me upon reflecting how little repining there would be among mankind at any condition of life, if people would rather compare their condition with those that were worse, in order to be thankful, than be always comparing them with those which are better, to assist their murmurings and complaining.
Daniel Defoe
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All the good things of the world are no further good to us than as they are of use and of all we may heap up we enjoy only as much as we can use, and no more.
Daniel Defoe