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The virtue of a human being is the application of his capacity to the general good.
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
Human
Humans
Good
Application
Capacity
General
Virtue
More quotes by William Godwin
Books are the depositary of everything that is most honourable to man.
William Godwin
A celebrated north country apostle, who, after Calvin had damned ninety-nine in a hundred of mankind, had contrived a scheme for damning ninety-nine in a hundred of the followers of Calvin.
William Godwin
Our judgment will always suspect those weapons that can be used with equal prospect of success on both sides.
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 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
Invisible things are the only realities invisible things alone are the things that shall remain.
William Godwin
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.
William Godwin
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
What can be more clear and sound in explanation, than the love of a parent to his child?
William Godwin
Perfectibility is one of the most unequivocal characteristics of the human species.
William Godwin
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
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
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
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
Learning is the ally, not the adversary of genius... he who reads in a proper spirit, can scarcely read too much.
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
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
If he who employs coercion against me could mould me to his purposes by argument, no doubt he would. He pretends to punish me because his argument is strong but he really punishes me because his argument is weak.
William Godwin
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
Of Belief Human mathematics, so to speak, like the length of life, are subject to the doctrine of chances.
William Godwin
