Quote

As, in Sense, that which is really within us, is (as I have said before) only Motion, caused by the action of external objects, but in appearance to the Sight, Light and Color to the Ear, Sound to the Nostril, Odor, &c.

Thomas Hobbes

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Thomas Hobbes
Age: 91 †
Born: 1588
Born: April 5
Died: 1679
Died: December 4
Economist
Historian
Mathematician
Philosopher
Political Scientist
Politician
Translator
Westport
Wiltshire
Hobbes
Thomas Hobbsted
Thomas Hobbes of Malflutry
Action
Appearance
Light
Ears
Really
Sight
Objects
Nostril
Color
Odor
Within
Caused
Sound
External
Sense
Motion

More quotes by Thomas Hobbes

Image
Those men that are so remissly governed that they dare take up arms to defend or introduce an opinion, are still in war, and their condition not peace, but only a cessation of arms for fear of one another, and they live as it were in the precincts of battle continually.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
Every man may think his own cause just till it be heard and judged.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
When a man tells me God hath spoken in a dream, I know he dreamt that God spoke to him.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
Understanding is by the flame of the passions never enlightened, but dazzled.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
I think, therefore matter is capable of thinking.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
The oath adds nothing to the obligation. For a covenant, if lawful, binds in the sight of God, without the oath, as much as with it if unlawful, bindeth not at all, though it be confirmed with an oath.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
The law is more easily understood by few than many words. For all words are subject to ambiguity, and therefore multiplication of words in the body of the law is multiplication of ambiguity. Besides, it seems to imply (by too much diligence) that whosoever can evade the words is without the compass of the law.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
He that is taken and put into prison or chains is not conquered, though overcome for he is still an enemy.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
The passions of men are commonly more potent than their reason.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
Understanding is nothing else than conception caused by speech.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
Felicity is a continual progress of the desire from one object to another, the attaining of the former being still but the way to the latter.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
So easy are men to be drawn to believe any thing, from such men as have gotten credit with them and can with gentleness and dexterity take hold of their fear and ignorance.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
The value or worth of a man is, as of all other things, his price that is to say, so much as would be given for the use of his power.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
For it is with the mysteries of our religion, as with wholesome pills for the sick, which swallowed whole, have the virtue to cure but chewed, are for the most part cast up again without effect.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
And therefore in geometry (which is the only science that it hath pleased God hitherto to bestow on mankind), men begin at settling the significations of their words which settling of significations, they call definitions, and place them in the beginning of their reckoning.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
The source of every crime, is some defect of the understanding or some error in reasoning or some sudden force of the passions. Defect in the understanding is ignorance in reasoning, erroneous opinion.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
Moral philosophy is nothing else but the science of what is good, and evil, in the conversation, and society of mankind. Good, and evil, are names that signify our appetites, and aversions which in different tempers, customs, and doctrines of men, are different.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
In sum, all actions and habits are to be esteemed good or evil by their causes and usefulness in reference to the commonwealth, and not by their mediocrity, nor by their being commended. For several men praise several customs, and, contrarily, what one calls vice, another calls virtue, as their present affections lead them.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
If this superstitious fear of Spirits were taken away, and with it, Prognostiques from Dreams, false Prophecies, and many other things depending thereon, by which, crafty ambitious persons abuse the simple people, men would be much more fitted then they are for civill Obedience.
Thomas Hobbes
Image
True and False are attributes of speech, not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither Truth nor Falsehood.
Thomas Hobbes