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An instinct is a blind tendency to some mode of action, independent of any consideration, on the part of the agent, of the end to which the action leads.

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
Agents
Leads
Instinct
Blind
Mode
Independent
Agent
Action
Tendency
Ends
Consideration
Part
Tendencies

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Of all hostile feelings, envy is perhaps the hardest to be subdued, because hardly any one owns it even to himself, but looks out for one pretext after another to justify his hostility.
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Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of truth.
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Never argue at the dinner table, for the one who is not hungry gets the best of the argument.
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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.
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It is the neglect of timely repair that makes rebuilding necessary.
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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.
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He only is exempt from failures who makes no efforts.
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It may be worth noticing as a curious circumstance, when persons past forty before they were at all acquainted form together a very close intimacy of friendship. For grafts of old wood to take, there must be a wonderful congeniality between the trees.
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All frauds, like the wall daubed with untempered mortar ... always tend to the decay of what they are devised to support.
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Galileo probably would have escaped persecution if his discoveries could have been disproved.
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To follow imperfect, uncertain, or corrupted traditions, in order to avoid erring in our own judgment, is but to exchange one danger for another.
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Woman is like the reed which bends to every breeze, but breaks not in the tempest.
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That is suitable to a man, in point of ornamental expense, not which he can afford to have, but which he can afford to lose.
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It is generally true that all that is required to make men unmindful of what they owe to God for any blessing, is, that they should receive that blessing often and regularly.
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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.
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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.
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Happiness is no laughing matter.
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Lose an hour in the morning, and you will spend all day looking for it.
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When a man says he wants to work, what he means is that he wants wages.
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Some men's reputation seems like seed-wheat, which thrives best when brought from a distance.
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