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In our judgment of human transactions, the law of optics is reversed, we see most dimly the objects which are close around us.
Richard Whately
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Richard Whately
Age: 76 †
Born: 1787
Born: February 1
Died: 1863
Died: October 8
Economist
Philosopher
Priest
Theologian
London
England
Objects
Law
Around
Optics
Human
Dimly
Humans
Reversed
Transactions
Judgment
Close
More quotes by Richard Whately
Curiosity is as much the parent of attention, as attention is of memory.
Richard Whately
When men have become heartily wearied of licentious anarchy, their eagerness has been proportionately great to embrace the opposite extreme of rigorous despotism.
Richard Whately
Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of truth.
Richard Whately
It is also important to guard against mistaking for good-nature what is properly good-humor,--a cheerful flow of spirits and easy temper not readily annoyed, which is compatible with great selfishness.
Richard Whately
The more secure we feel against our liability to any error to which, in fact, we are liable, the greater must be our danger of falling into it.
Richard Whately
The Eastern monarch who proclaimed a reward to him who should discover a new pleasure, would have deserved well of mankind had he stipulated that it should be blameless.
Richard Whately
The love of admiration leads to fraud, much more than the love of commendation but, on the other hand, the latter is much more likely to spoil our: good actions by the substitution of an inferior motive.
Richard Whately
Better too much form than too little.
Richard Whately
Ethical maxims are bandied about as a sort of current coin of discourse, and, being never melted down for use, those that are of base metal are never detected.
Richard Whately
The word of knowledge, strictly employed, implies three things: truth, proof, and conviction.
Richard Whately
Woman is like the reed which bends to every breeze, but breaks not in the tempest.
Richard Whately
Galileo probably would have escaped persecution if his discoveries could have been disproved.
Richard Whately
As the flower is before the fruit, so is faith before good works.
Richard Whately
A fanatic, either, religious or political, is the subject of strong delusions.
Richard Whately
There is no right faith in believing what is true, unless we believe it because it is true.
Richard Whately
Eloquence is relative. One can no more pronounce on the eloquence of any composition than the wholesomeness of a medicine, without knowing for whom it is intended.
Richard Whately
All gaming, since it implies a desire to profit at the expense of another, involves a breach of the tenth commandment.
Richard Whately
Of metaphors, those generally conduce most to energy or vivacity of style which illustrate an intellectual by a sensible object.
Richard Whately
No one complains of the rules of Grammar as fettering Language because it is understood that correct use is not founded on Grammar, but Grammar on correct use. A just system of Logic or of Rhetoric is analogous, in this respect, to Grammar.
Richard Whately
The best security against revolution is in constant correction of abuses and the introduction of needed improvements. It is the neglect of timely repair that makes rebuilding necessary.
Richard Whately
