Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
Study with desire is real activity without desire it is but the semblance and mockery of activity.
William Godwin
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
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
Study
Desire
Without
Real
Semblance
Mockery
Activity
More quotes by William Godwin
He that loves reading has everything within his reach.
William Godwin
In cases where every thing is understood, and measured, and reduced to rule, love is out of the question.
William Godwin
He that revels in a well-chosen library, has innumerable dishes, and all of admirable flavour.
William Godwin
Let us not, in the eagerness of our haste to educate, forget all the ends of education.
William Godwin
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.
William Godwin
The execution of any thing considerable implies in the first place previous persevering meditation.
William Godwin
The subtleties of mathematics defecate the grossness of our apprehension, and supply the elements of a sounder and severer logic.
William Godwin
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
Above all we should not forget, that government is an evil, an usurpation upon the private judgment and individual conscience of mankind.
William Godwin
We cannot perform our tasks to the best of our power, unless we think well of our own capacity.
William Godwin
Government can have no more than two legitimate purposes - the suppression of injustice against individuals within the community, and the common defense against external invasion.
William Godwin
To conceive that compulsion and punishment are the proper means of reformation is the sentiment of a barbarian.
William Godwin
There can be no passion, and by consequence no love, where there is not imagination.
William Godwin
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
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
Power is not happiness. Security and peace are more to be desired than a name at which nations tremble.
William Godwin
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.
William Godwin
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
We are so curiously made that one atom put in the wrong place in our original structure will often make us unhappy for life.
William Godwin
It is probable that there is no one thing that it is of eminent importance for a child to learn.
William Godwin