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Above all we should not forget, that government is an evil, an usurpation upon the private judgment and individual conscience of mankind.

William Godwin

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William Godwin
Age: 80 †
Born: 1756
Born: March 3
Died: 1836
Died: April 7
Journalist
Novelist
Philosopher
Political Philosopher
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Wisbech
Cambridgeshire
Individual
Judgement
Government
Private
Conscience
Judgment
Mankind
Forget
Upon
Usurpation
Evil
Anarchist

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Everything that is usually understood by the term co-operation is, in some degree, an evil.
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Man is the only creature we know, that, when the term of his natural life is ended, leaves the memory of himself behind him.
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There is no sphere in which a human being can be supposed to act where one mode of reasoning will not, in every given instance, be more reasonable than any other mode. That mode the being is bound by every principle of justice to pursue.
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If ever there was a book calculated to make a man in love with its author, this appears to me to be the book.
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Learning is the ally, not the adversary of genius... he who reads in a proper spirit, can scarcely read too much.
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In a well-written book we are presented with the maturest reflections, or the happiest flights of a mind of uncommon excellence. It is impossible that we can be much accustomed to such companions without attaining some resemblance to them.
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The lessons of their early youth regulated the conduct of their riper years.
William Godwin
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My thoughts will be taken up with the future or the past, with what is to come or what has been. Of the present there is necessarily no image.
William Godwin
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The proper method for hastening the decay of error is by teaching every man to think for himself.
William Godwin
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But the watchful care of the parent is endless. The youth is never free from the danger of grating interference.
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Obey this may be right but beware of reverence.... Government is nothing but regulated force force is its appropriate claim upon your attention. It is the business of individuals to persuade the tendency of concentrated strength, is only to give consistency and permanence to an influence more compendious than persuasion.
William Godwin
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The virtue of a human being is the application of his capacity to the general good.
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The wise man is satisfied with nothing.
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The cause of justice is the cause of humanity. Its advocates should overflow with universal good will. We should love this cause, for it conduces to the general happiness of mankind.
William Godwin
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He that loves reading has everything within his reach.
William Godwin
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Make men wise, and by that very operation you make them free. Civil liberty follows as a consequence of this no usurped power can stand against the artillery of opinion.
William Godwin
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Government will not fail to employ education, to strengthen its hands and perpetuate its institutions.
William Godwin
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The proper method for hastening the decay of error, is not, by brute force, or by regulation which is one of the classes of force, to endeavour to reduce men to intellectual uniformity but on the contrary by teaching every man to think for himself.
William Godwin
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God himself has no right to be a tyrant.
William Godwin
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Hereditary wealth is in reality a premium paid to idleness.
William Godwin