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What proposition is there respecting human nature which is absolutely and universally true? We know of only one,--and that is not only true, but identical,--that men always act from self-interest.

Thomas B. Macaulay

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Thomas B. Macaulay
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We must judge a government by its general tendencies and not by its happy accidents.
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Was none who would be foremost To lead such dire attack But those behind cried Forward! And those before cried Back!
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Generalization is necessary to the advancement of knowledge but particularity is indispensable to the creations of the imagination.
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The opinion of the great body of the reading public is very materially influenced even by the unsupported assertions of those who assume a right to criticize.
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In employing fiction to make truth clear and goodness attractive, we are only following the example which every Christian ought to propose to himself.
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A kind of semi-Solomon, half-knowing everything, from the cedar to the hyssop.
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There were gentlemen and there were seamen in the navy of Charles the Second. But the seamen were not gentlemen and the gentlemen were not seamen.
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Man is so inconsistent a creature that it is impossible to reason from his beliefs to his conduct, or from one part of his belief to another.
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The Church is the handmaid of tyranny and the steady enemy of liberty.
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The real object of the drama is the exhibition of human character.
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[I can] scarcely write upon mathematics or mathematicians. Oh for words to express my abomination of the science.
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Those who seem to load the public taste are, in general, merely outrunning it in the direction which it is spontaneously pursuing.
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To sum up the whole, we should say that the aim of the Platonic philosophy was to exalt man into a god.
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We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality.
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In perseverance, in self command, in forethought, in all virtues which conduce to success in life, the Scots have never been surpassed.
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The impenetrable stupidity of Prince George (son-in-law of James II) served his turn. It was his habit, when any news was told him, to exclaim, Est il possible?-Is it possible?
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Thus, then, stands the case. It is good, that authors should be remunerated and the least exceptionable way of remunerating them is by a monopoly. Yet monopoly is an evil. For the sake of the good we must submit to the evil but the evil ought not to last a day longer than is necessary for the purpose of securing the good.
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In the plays of Shakespeare man appears as he is, made up of a crowd of passions which contend for the mastery over him, and govern him in turn.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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Both in individuals and in masses violent excitement is always followed by remission, and often by reaction. We are all inclined to depreciate whatever we have overpraised, and, on the other hand, to show undue indulgence where we have shown undue rigor.
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Grief, which disposes gentle natures to retirement, to inaction, and to meditation, only makes restless spirits more restless.
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