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Thou little thinkest what a little foolery governs the world.

John Selden

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John Selden
Age: 69 †
Born: 1584
Born: December 16
Died: 1654
Died: November 30
Jurist
Politician
Writer
Atheism
Littles
Little
World
Foolery
Governs
Thou

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Idolatry is in a man's own thought, not in the opinion of another.
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The clergy would have us believe them against our own reason, as the woman would have her husband against his own eyes.
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Abundance consists not alone in material possession, but in an uncovetous spirit.
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The House of Commons is called the Lower House, in twenty Acts of Parliament but what are twenty Acts of Parliament amongst Friends?
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The law against witches does not prove there be any but it punishes the malice of those people that use such means to take away men's lives.
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Prayer should be short, without giving God Almighty reasons why he should grant this, or that he knows best what is good for us.
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Commonly we say a judgment falls upon a man for something in him we cannot abide.
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Take a straw and throw it up into the air, you may see by that which way the wind is.
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All things are God's already we can give him no right, by consecrating any, that he had not before, only we set it apart to his service - just as a gardener brings his master a basket of apricots, and presents them his lord thanks him, and perhaps gives him something for his pains, and yet the apricots were as much his lord's before as now.
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We pick out a text here and there to make it serve our turn whereas , if we take it all together, and considered what went before and what followed after, we should find it meant no such thing.
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Humility is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet every body is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.
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While you are upon earth, enjoy the good things that are here (to that end were they given), and be not melancholy, and wish yourself in heaven.
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Men say they are of the same religion, for quietness' sake but if the matter were well examined, you would scarce find three anywhere of the same religion on all points.
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Pleasure is nothing else but the intermission of pain.
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Ignorance of the law excuses no man not that all men know the law, but because 'tis an excuse every man will plead, and no man can tell how to refute him.
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Scrutamini scripturas (Let us look at the scriptures). These two words have undone the world.
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He that hath a scrupulous conscience is like a horse that is not well weighed he starts at every bird that flies out of the hedge.
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Nothing is text but what is spoken of in the Bible and meant there for person and place the rest is application which a discreet man may do well but it is his scripture, not the Holy Ghost's. First, in your sermons use your logic, and then your rhetoric rhetoric without logic is like a tree with leaves and blossoms, but no root.
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In a troubled state we must do as in foul weather upon a river, not think to cut directly through, for the boat may be filled with water but rise and fall as the waves do, and give way as much as we conveniently can.
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