Quotes from Thomas B. Macaulay

Men are never so likely to settle a question rightly as when they discuss it freely.

The hearts of men are their books; events are their tutors; great actions are their eloquence.

The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners.

Logicians may reason about abstractions. But the great mass of men must have images. The strong tendency of the multitude in all ages and nations to idolatry can be explained on no other principle.

No man in the world acts up to his own standard of right.

No particular man is necessary to the state. We may depend on it that, if we provide the country with popular institutions, those institutions will provide it with great men.

Even the law of gravitation would be brought into dispute were there a pecuniary interest involved.

How it chanced that a man who reasoned on his premises so ably, should assume his premises so foolishly, is one of the great mysteries of human nature.

So true it is, that nature has caprices which art cannot imitate.

To sum up the whole, we should say that the aim of the Platonic philosophy was to exalt man into a god.

In Plato's opinion, man was made for philosophy; in Bacon's opinion, philosophy was made for man.

By poetry we mean the art of employing of words in such a manner as to produce an illusion on the imagination; the art of doing by means of words, what the painter does by means of colors.

We hold that the most wonderful and splendid proof of genius is a great poem produced in a civilized age.

Perhaps no person can be a poet, or can even enjoy poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind.

A Grecian history, perfectly written should be a complete record of the rise and progress of poetry, philosophy, and the arts.

People crushed by law have no hopes but from power. If laws are their enemies, they will be enemies to laws.

The good-humor of a man elated with success often displays itself towards enemies.

And to say that society ought to be governed by the opinion of the wisest and best, though true, is useless. Whose opinion is to decide who are the wisest and best?

We must judge of a form of government by it's general tendency, not by happy accidents

As freedom is the only safeguard of governments, so are order and moderation generally necessary to preserve freedom.

We must judge a government by its general tendencies and not by its happy accidents.

Free trade, one of the greatest blessings which a government can confer on a people, is in almost every country unpopular.

Turn where we may, within, around, the voice of great events is proclaiming to us, Reform, that you may preserve!

Great minds do indeed react on the society which has made them what they are; but they only pay with interest what they have received.