Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Every great movement must experience three stages: ridicule, discussion, adoption.
The despotism of custom is everywhere the standing hindrance to human advancement.
The pupil who is never required to do what he cannot do, never does what he can do.
Men might as well be imprisoned, as excluded from the means of earning their bread.
Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives.
Was there ever any domination that did not appear natural to those who possessed it?
The most important thing women have to do is to stir up the zeal of women themselves.
Each undervalues that part of the materials of thought with which he is not familiar.
Is there any moral enormity which might not be justified by imitation of such a Deity?
The worth of the state, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it.
Eloquence is heard; poetry is overheard ... All poetry is of the nature of the soliloquy.
I know tolerably well what Ireland was, but have a very imperfect idea of what Ireland is.
No slave is a slave to the same lengths, and in so full a sense of the word, as a wife is.
As often as a study is cultivated by narrow minds, they will draw from it narrow conclusions.
It is conceivable that religion may be morally useful without being intellectually sustainable.
The peculiarity of the evidence of mathematical truths is that all the argument is on one side.
Both teachers and learners go to sleep at their post as soon as there is no enemy in the field.
All attempts by the State to bias the conclusions of its citizens on disputed subjects, are evil.
Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.
A great statesman is he who knows when to depart from traditions, as well as when to adhere to them.
Next to selfishness the principal cause which makes life unsatisfactory is want of mental cultivation.
It is not because men's desires are strong that they act ill; it is because their consciences are weak.
Almost all rich veins of original and striking speculation have been opened by systematic half-thinkers.
In this age, the man who dares to think for himself and to act independently does a service to his race.
It is only in the backward countries of the world that increased production is still an important object.
Popular opinions, on subjects not palpable to sense, are often true, but seldom or never the whole truth.
The great creative individual . . . is capable of more wisdom and virtue than collective man ever can be.
What distinguishes the majority of men from the few is their inability to act according to their beliefs.
Those only are happy (I thought) who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness.
The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people.
In all intellectual debates, both sides tend to be correct in what they affirm, and wrong in what they deny.
The price paid for intellectual pacification is the sacrifice of the entire moral courage of the human mind.
The study of science teaches young men to think, while study of the classics teaches them to express thought.
The sole evidence it is possible to produce that anything is desirable, is that people do actually desire it.
The feeling of a direct responsibility of the individual to God is almost wholly a creation of Protestantism.
There is an imaginary circle drawn around every human being, over which no government should be able to step.
The philosophy of reasoning, to be complete, ought to comprise the theory of bad as well as of good reasoning.
So natural to mankind is intolerance ... that religious freedom has hardly anywhere been practically realized.
The general tendency of things throughout the world is to render mediocrity the ascendant power among mankind.
It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have lightened the day's toil of any human being.
So true is that unnatural generally means only uncustomary, and that everything which is usual appears natural.
Despotism is a legitimate mode of government in dealing with barbarians, provided the end be their improvement.
What is contrary to women's nature to do, they never will be made to do by simply giving their nature free play.
There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home.
The successful conduct of an industrial enterprise requires two quite distinct qualifications: fidelity and zeal.
In this age, the mere example of nonconformity, the mere refusal to bend the knee to custom, is itself a service.
There is a tolerably general agreement about what a university is not. It is not a place of professional education.
Unquestionably, it is possible to do without happiness; it is done involuntarily by nineteen-twentieths of mankind.
He who lets the world choose his plan of life for him has need of no other faculty than that of ape-like imitation.
Laws and systems of polity always begin by recognizing the relations they find already existing between individuals.