Quote collection
492 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"Falsehood and delusion are allowed in no case whatever; but, as in the exercise of all the virtues, there is an economy of truth. It is a sort of temperance, by which a man speaks truth with measure, that he may speak it the longer."
"A great deal of the furniture of ancient tyranny is torn to rags; the rest is entirely out of fashion."
"Spain: A whale stranded upon the coast of Europe."
"The worthy gentleman who has been snatched from us at the moment of the election, and in the middle of the contest, whilst his desires were as warm and his hopes as eager as ours, has feelingly told us what shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue."
"Continue to instruct the world; and - whilst we carry on a poor unequal conflict with the passions and prejudices of our day, perhaps with no better weapons than other passions and prejudices of our own - convey wisdom to future generations."
"It has all the contortions of the sibyl without the inspiration."
"Over-taxation cost England her colonies of North America."
"The nature of things is, I admit, a sturdy adversary."
"If the people are happy, united, wealthy, and powerful, we presume the rest. We conclude that to be good from whence good is derived."
"Neither the few nor the many have a right to act merely by their will, in any matter connected with duty, trust, engagement, or obligation."
"Prejudice renders a man's virtue his habit, and a series of unconnected arts. Though just prejudice, his duty becomes a part of his nature."
"Old religious factions are volcanoes burnt out."
"A nation is not conquered which is perpetually to be conquered."
"Sallust is indisputably one of the best historians among the Romans, both for the purity of his language and the elegance of his style."
"I do not know how to wish success to those whose Victory is to separate from us a large and noble part of our Empire. Still less do I wish success to injustice, oppression and absurdity."
"Party is a body of men united, for promoting by their joint endeavours the national interest, upon some particular principle in which they are all agreed."
"I cannot stand forward, and give praise or blame to any thing which relates to human actions, and human concerns, on a simple view of the subject as it stands stripped of every relation, in all the nakedness and solitude of metaphysical abstraction. Circumstances (which with some gentlemen pass for nothing) give in reality to every political principle its distinguishing colour, and discriminating effect. The circumstances are what render every civil and political scheme beneficial or noxious to mankind."
"There never was a bad man that had ability for good service."
"I despair of ever receiving the same degree of pleasure from the most exalted performances of genius which I felt in childhood from pieces which my present judgment regards as trifling and contemptible."
"It is an advantage to all narrow wisdom and narrow morals that their maxims have a plausible air; and, on a cursory view, appear equal to first principles. They are light and portable. They are as current as copper coin; and about as valuable."