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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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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
Thinking
Produces
Consequences
Assuming
Whenever
Consequence
Torpor
Produce
Imbecility
Trouble
Assumes
Government
Deliver

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To conceive that compulsion and punishment are the proper means of reformation is the sentiment of a barbarian.
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The great model of the affection of love in human beings is the sentiment which subsists between parents and children.
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Power is not happiness.
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Books gratify and excite our curiosity in innumerable ways.
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The wise man is satisfied with nothing.
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The first duty of man is to take none of the principles of conduct upon trust to do nothing without a clear and individual conviction that it is right to be done.
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Perseverance is an active principle, and cannot continue to operate but under the influence of desire.
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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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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 must be room for the imagination to exercise its powers we must conceive and apprehend a thousand things which we do not actually witness.
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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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Books are the depositary of everything that is most honourable to man.
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Perfectibility is one of the most unequivocal characteristics of the human species.
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He that loves reading has everything within his reach.
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He that revels in a well-chosen library, has innumerable dishes, and all of admirable flavour.
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He has no right to his life when his duty calls him to resign it. Other men are bound ... to deprive him of life or liberty, if that should appear in any case to be indispensably necessary to prevent a greater evil.
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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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Let us not, in the eagerness of our haste to educate, forget all the ends of education.
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As the true object of education is not to render the pupil the mere copy of his preceptor, it is rather to be rejoiced in, than lamented, that various reading should lead him into new trains of thinking.
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We cannot perform our tasks to the best of our power, unless we think well of our own capacity.
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