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The philosophy of the wisest man that ever existed, is mainly derived from the act of introspection.

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
Ever
Men
Introspection
Derived
Wisest
Mainly
Existed
Philosophy

More quotes by 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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It is absurd to expect the inclinations and wishes of two human beings to coincide, through any long period of time. To oblige them to act and live together is to subject them to some inevitable potion of thwarting, bickering, and unhappiness.
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If there be such a thing as truth, it must infallibly be struck out by the collision of mind with mind.
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The most desirable mode of education, is that which is careful that all the acquisitions of the pupil shall be preceded and accompanied by desire . . . The boy, like the man, studies because he desires it. He proceeds upon a plan of is own invention, or by which, by adopting, he has made his own. Everything bespeaks independence and inequality.
William Godwin
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Power is not happiness. Security and peace are more to be desired than a name at which nations tremble.
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There can be no passion, and by consequence no love, where there is not imagination.
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God himself has no right to be a tyrant.
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Our judgment will always suspect those weapons that can be used with equal prospect of success on both sides.
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Revolution is engendered by an indignation with tyranny, yet is itself pregnant with tyranny.... An attempt to scrutinize men's thoughts and punish their opinions is of all kinds of despotism the most odious: yet this is peculiarly character of a period of revolution.... There is no period more at war with the existence of liberty.
William Godwin
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All education is despotism. It is perhaps impossible for the young to be conducted without introducing in many cases the tyranny implicit in obedience. Go there do that read write rise lie down - will perhaps forever be the language addressed to youth by age.
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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.
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He that loves reading has everything within his reach.
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Invisible things are the only realities invisible things alone are the things that shall remain.
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The real or supposed rights of man are of two kinds, active and passive the right in certain cases to do as we list and the right we possess to the forbearance or assistance of other men. The first of these a just philosophy will probably induce us universally to explode.
William Godwin
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The wise man is satisfied with nothing.
William Godwin
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What can be more clear and sound in explanation, than the love of a parent to his child?
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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Whenever government assumes to deliver us from the trouble of thinking for ourselves, the only consequences it produces are those of torpor and imbecility.
William Godwin
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Justice is the sum of all moral duty.
William Godwin
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My mind was bursting with depression and anguish. I muttered imprecations and murmuring as I passed along. I was full of loathing and abhorrence of life, and all that life carries in its train.
William Godwin