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If admiration were not generally deemed the exclusive property of the rich, and contempt the constant lackey of poverty, the love of gain would cease to be an universal problem.

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
Poverty
Contempt
Rich
Gain
Problem
Cease
Would
Generally
Lackey
Love
Gains
Lackeys
Property
Deemed
Constant
Exclusive
Universal
Admiration

More quotes by William Godwin

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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.
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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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Books gratify and excite our curiosity in innumerable ways.
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Revolutions are the produce of passion, not of sober and tranquil reason.
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Literature, taken in all its bearings, forms the grand line of demarcation between the human and the animal kingdoms.
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 lessons of their early youth regulated the conduct of their riper years.
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Self-respect to be nourished in the mind of the pupil, is one of the most valuable results of a well conducted education.
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The virtue of a human being is the application of his capacity to the general good.
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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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Perseverance is an active principle, and cannot continue to operate but under the influence of desire.
William Godwin
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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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Invisible things are the only realities invisible things alone are the things that shall remain.
William Godwin
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Duty is that mode of action on the part of the individual which constitutes the best possible application of his capacity to the general benefit.
William Godwin
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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.
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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No maxim can be more pernicious than that which would teach us to consult the temper of the times, and to tell only so much as we imagine our contemporaries will be able to bear.
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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Let us not, in the eagerness of our haste to educate, forget all the ends of education.
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.
William Godwin