Quote

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

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

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
Able
Maxims
Much
Temper
Would
Bear
Bears
Imagine
Consult
Teach
Contemporaries
Times
Maxim
Tell
Pernicious

More quotes by William Godwin

Image
Books are the depositary of everything that is most honourable to man.
William Godwin
Image
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.
William Godwin
Image
Let us not, in the eagerness of our haste to educate, forget all the ends of education.
William Godwin
Image
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.
William Godwin
Image
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
Image
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.
William Godwin
Image
Learning is the ally, not the adversary of genius... he who reads in a proper spirit, can scarcely read too much.
William Godwin
Image
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
Image
What indeed is life, unless so far as it is enjoyed? It does not merit the name.
William Godwin
Image
We cannot perform our tasks to the best of our power, unless we think well of our own capacity.
William Godwin
Image
Every man has a certain sphere of discretion which he has a right to expect shall not be infringed by his neighbours. This right flows from the very nature of man.
William Godwin
Image
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
Image
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
Image
Power is not happiness. Security and peace are more to be desired than a name at which nations tremble.
William Godwin
Image
Perfectibility is one of the most unequivocal characteristics of the human species.
William Godwin
Image
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.
William Godwin
Image
To conceive that compulsion and punishment are the proper means of reformation is the sentiment of a barbarian.
William Godwin
Image
The lessons of their early youth regulated the conduct of their riper years.
William Godwin
Image
He that loves reading has everything within his reach.
William Godwin
Image
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