Quote collection
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"Beating is the worst, and therefore the last means to be us'd in the correction of children, and that only in the cases of extremity, after all gently ways have been try'd, and proved unsuccessful; which, if well observ'd, there will very seldom be any need of blows."
"The senses at first let in particular Ideas, and furnish the yet empty Cabinet: And the Mind by degrees growing familiar with some of them, they are lodged in the Memory, and Names got to them."
"There is not so contemptible a plant or animal that does not confound the most enlarged understanding."
"This is to think, that men are so foolish, that they take care to avoid what mischiefs may be done them by pole-cats, or foxes; but are content, nay, think it safety, to be devoured by lions."
"He that makes use of another's fancy or necessity to sell ribbons or cloth dearer to him than to another man at the same time, cheats him."
"All rising to great place is by a winding stair; and if there be factions, it is good to side a man's self whilst he is in the rising, and to balance himself when he is placed."
"Who hath a prospect of the different state of perfect happiness or misery that attends all men after this life, depending on their behavior, the measures of good and evil that govern his choice are mightily changed."
"Crooked things may be as stiff and unflexible as streight: and Men may be as positive and peremptory in Error as in Truth."
"In the discharge of thy place set before thee the best examples; for imitation is a globe of precepts."
"Thus parents, by humouring and cockering them when little, corrupt the principles of nature in their children, and wonder afterwards to taste the bitter waters, when they themselves have poison'd the fountain."
"Since nothing appears to me to give Children so much becoming Confidence and Behavior, and so raise them to the conversation of those above their Age, as Dancing. I think they should be taught to dance as soon as they are capable of learning it."
"God is the place of spirits, as spaces are the places of bodies."
"Virtue is everywhere that which is thought praiseworthy; and nothing else but that which has the allowance of public esteem is called virtue."
"If we trace the progress of our minds, and with attention observe how it repeats, adds together, and unites its simple ideas received from sensation or reflection, it will lead us farther than at first, perhaps, we should have imagined."
"Though the familiar use of things about us take off our wonder, yet it cures not our ignorance."
"General observations drawn from particulars are the jewels of knowledge, comprehending great store in a little room; but they are therefore to be made with the greater care and caution, lest, if we take counterfeit for true, our loss and shame be the greater when our stock comes to a severe scrutiny."
"For it will be very difficult to persuade men of sense that he who with dry eyes and satisfaction of mind can deliver his brother to the executioner to be burnt alive, does sincerely and heartily concern himself to save that brother from the flames of hell in the world to come."
"The rising unto place is laborious, and by pains men come to greater pains; and it is sometimes base, and by indignities men come to dignities."
"To ask at what time a man has first any ideas is to ask when he begins to perceive; having ideas and perception being the same thing."
"That which parents should take care of... is to distinguish between the wants of fancy, and those of nature."