Quotes from William Godwin

In contemplation and reverie, one thought introduces another perpetually; and it is by similarity, or the hooking of one upon the other, that the process of thinking is carried on.

In the summer of 1791, I gave up my concern in the 'New Annual Register,' the historical part of which I had written for seven years, and abdicated, I hope forever, the task of performing a literary labour, the nature of which should be dictated by anything but the promptings of my own mind.

Revolutions are the produce of passion, not of sober and tranquil reason.

With respect to my religious sentiments, I have the firmest assurance and tranquillity. I have faithfully endeavoured to improve the faculties and opportunities God has given me, and I am perfectly easy about the consequences.

If there be such a thing as truth, it must infallibly be struck out by the collision of mind with mind.

There is nothing that human imagination can figure brilliant and enviable that human genius and skill do not aspire to realize.

There can be no passion, and by consequence no love, where there is not imagination.

We covet experience; we have a secret desire to learn, not from cold prohibition, but from trial, whether those things, which are not without a semblance of good, are really so ill as they are described to us.

When we look on the roses and gaiety of youth, the mournful idea of mortality is altogether alien to our thoughts. We have heard of it as a speculation and a tale, but nothing but experience can bring it home to us.

The lessons of their early youth regulated the conduct of their riper years.

But the watchful care of the parent is endless. The youth is never free from the danger of grating interference.

No one can display or can cultivate a fervent zeal in the mere repetition of a form.

Man is a being of a mixed nature; and, as there is no integrity without its flaws, so is there no man so knavish but that in some things he may be trusted.

How different a creature is man in society and man in solitude!

Love conquers all difficulties, surmounts all obstacles, and effects what to any other power would be impossible.

Give energy, and mental exertion will always have attraction enough.

It is of no consequence whether a man of genius have learned either art or science before twenty-five: all that is necessary, or even desirable, is that his powers should be unfolded, his emulation roused, and his habits conducted into a right channel.

Without imagination, there can be no genuine ardor in any pursuit or for any acquisition, and without imagination, there can be no genuine morality, no profound feeling of other men's sorrow, no ardent and persevering anxiety for their interests.

Occupation - pressing occupation that will not be said nay - is a sovereign remedy for grief.

Duty is that mode of action which constitutes the best application of the capacity of the individual to the general advantage.

Revolution is engendered by an indignation with tyranny, yet is itself pregnant with tyranny.

Enthusiasm is always an interesting spectacle. When it expresses itself with an honest and artless eloquence, it is difficult to listen to it and not, in some degree, to catch the flame.

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.

How are the faculties of man to be best developed and his happiness secured? The state of a king is not favorable to this, nor the state of the noble and rich men of the earth. All this is artificial life, the inventions of vanity and grasping ambition, by which we have spoiled the man of nature and of pure, simple, and undistorted impulses.