We should never know how to adjust means to ends, or to employ our natural powers in the production of any effect. There would be an end at once of all action, as well as of the chief part of speculation.
DAVID HUMEIt is, therefore, a just political maxim, that every man must be supposed a knave.
More David Hume Quotes
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Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty.
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It is possible for the same thing both to be and not to be.
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But the greatest part of mankind float between vice and virtue.
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Beauty in things exists in the mind which contemplates them
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If subjects must never resist, it follows that every prince, without any effort, policy, or violence, is at once rendered absolute and uncontrollable.
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He is happy whose circumstances suit his temper, but he is more excellent who can suit his temper to his circumstance.
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A wise man apportions his beliefs to the evidence.
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Tis not unreasonable for me to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.
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It is an absurdity to believe that the Deity has human passions, and one of the lowest of human passions, a restless appetite for applause
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Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.
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I weigh the one miracle against the other and according to the superiority which I discover, I pronounce my decision.
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Men’s views of things are the result of their understanding alone. Their conduct is regulated by their understanding, their temper, and their passions.
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I may venture to affirm of the rest of mankind, that they are nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement.
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As every inquiry which regards religion is of the utmost importance, there are two questions in particular which challenge our attention, to wit, that concerning its foundation in reason, and that concerning it origin in human nature.
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no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavors to establish.
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Where am I, or what? From what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return?
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Be a philosopher; but, amidst all your philosophy, be still a man.
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The fact that different cultures have different practices no more refutes [moral] objectivism than the fact that water flows in different directions in different places refutes the law of gravity.
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The feelings of our heart, the agitation of our passions, the vehemence of our affections, dissipate all its conclusions, and reduce the profound philosopher to a mere plebeian.
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Liberty of any kind is never lost all at once
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It is, therefore, a just political maxim, that every man must be supposed a knave.
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Epicurus’s old questions are still unanswered: Is he (God) willing to prevent evil, but not able? then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? then whence evil?
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A purpose, an intention, a design, strikes everywhere even the careless, the most stupid thinker.
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Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.
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All sentiment is right; because sentiment has a reference to nothing beyond itself, and is always real, wherever a man is conscious of it.
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There is nothing to be learnt from a Professor, which is not to be met with in Books.
DAVID HUME