“The light of humane minds is perspicuous words, but by exact definitions first snuffed, and purged from ambiguity, reason is the pace.”

The understanding is by the flame of the passions never enlightened, but dazzled.

Look not at the greatness of the evil past, but the greatness of the good to follow.

Men are moved by appetites and aversions.

True’ and ‘false’ are attributes of speech, not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither ‘truth’ nor ‘falsehood.

Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man, the same consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal.

I often observe the absurdity of dreams, but never dream of the absurdity of my waking thoughts.

Leisure is the mother of Philosophy.

If men are naturally in a state of war, why do they always carry arms and why do they have keys to lock their doors?

In the very shadows of doubt a thread of reason (so to speak) begins, by whose guidance we shall escape to the clearest light.

The Power of a Man is his present means, to obtain some future apparent Good.

The condition of man . . . is a condition of war of everyone against everyone.

As a draft-animal is yoked in a wagon, even so the spirit is yoked in this body.

Fear of things invisible is the natural seed of that which every one in himself calleth religion.

Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.

Power simply is no more, but the excess of the power of one above that of another.

For it can never be that war shall preserve life, and peace destroy it.

Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.

Yet what greater defeat could we suffer than to come to resemble the forces we oppose in their disrespect for human dignity?

Women’s rights are human rights.

We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom.

Violence against women and girls is one of the most serious human rights issues.

Books break the shackles of time, proof that humans can work magic.

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.

We’re all human, aren’t we? Every human life is worth the same, and worth saving.