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When men are most sure and arrogant they are commonly most mistaken, giving views to passion without that proper deliberation which alone can secure them from the grossest absurdities.

David Hume

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David Hume
Age: 65 †
Born: 1711
Born: April 26
Died: 1776
Died: August 25
Economist
Essayist
Historian
Librarian
Philosopher
Writer
Edinburgh
Scotland
David Home
Hume
Alone
Absurdity
Passion
Mistaken
Sure
Arrogant
Without
Arrogance
Giving
Proper
Grossest
Men
Secure
Absurdities
Humility
Deliberation
Views
Commonly

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The supposition that the future resembles the past, is not founded on arguments of any kind, but is derived entirely from habit.
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I know with certainty, that [an honest man] is not to put his hand into the fire, and hold it there, till it be consumed: And thisevent, I think I can foretell with the same assurance, as that, if he throw himself out at the window, and meet with no obstruction, he will not remain a moment suspended in the air.
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Character is the result of a system of stereotyped principals.
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A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature and as a firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined.
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Courage, of all national qualities, is the most precarious because it is exerted only at intervals, and by a few in every nation whereas industry, knowledge, civility, may be of constant and universal use, and for several ages, may become habitual to the whole people.
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Every disastrous accident alarms us, and sets us on enquiries concerning the principles whence it arose: Apprehensions spring up with regard to futurity: And the mind, sunk into diffidence, terror, and melancholy, has recourse to every method of appeasing those secret intelligent powers, on whom our fortune is supposed entirely to depend.
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Everything is sold to skill and labor and where nature furnishes the materials, they are still rude and unfinished, till industry, ever active and intelligent, refines them from their brute state, and fits them for human use and convenience.
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It is seldom, that liberty of any kind is lost all at once. Slavery has so frightful an aspect to men accustomed to freedom, that it must steal upon them by degrees, and must disguise itself in a thousand shapes, in order to be received.
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.. that a rule, which, in speculation, may seem the most advantageous to society, may yet be found, in practice, totally pernicious and destructive.
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I cannot but bless the memory of Julius Caesar, for the great esteem he expressed for fat men and his aversion to lean ones.
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Fine writing, according to Mr. Addison, consists of sentiments which are natural without being obvious.
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Never literary attempt was more unfortunate than my Treatise of Human Nature. It fell dead-born from the press.
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For the purposes of life and conduct, and society, a little good sense is surely better than all this genius, and a little good humour than this extreme sensibility.
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There is a very remarkable inclination in human nature to bestow on external objects the same emotions which it observes in itself, and to find every where those ideas which are most present to it.
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But to proceed in this reconciling project with regard to the question of liberty and necessity the most contentious question of metaphysics, the most contentious science.
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What praise is implied in the simple epithet useful! What reproach in the contrary.
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That the sun shines tomorrow is a judgement that is as true as the contrary judgement.
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Does a man of sense run after every silly tale of hobgoblins or fairies, and canvass particularly the evidence? I never knew anyone, that examined and deliberated about nonsense who did not believe it before the end of his enquiries.
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It is not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.
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While Newton seemed to draw off the veil from some of the mysteries of nature, he showed at the same time the imperfections of the mechanical philosophy and thereby restored her ultimate secrets to that obscurity, in which they ever did and ever will remain.
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