English - Writer | March 3, 1756 - April 7, 1836
Great changes cannot take place in the minds of generations of men without a corresponding change in their external symbols. There must be a harmony between the inner and the outward condition of human beings, and the progress of the one must keep pace with the progress of the other.
William Godwin
ChangeGreatMenProgressPlace
It is questionless desirable in all ordinary cases, wherever positive law is established, to restrain ourselves within the letter of that law and to allow the criminal all the benefit, if benefit to him shall result, of any evasion or escape that the law shall afford him.
PositiveLawResultEscapeWithin
Law is made for man and not man for the law. Wherever we can be sure that the most valuable interests of a nation require that we should decide one way, that way we ought to decide.
ManLawWayNationDecideWherever
Men who do not contend in earnest can have little warmth and fervor in what they undertake, and are more than half prepared to betray the cause, in the vindication of which they have engaged their services.
MenMoreLittleWarmthHalfEngaged
It is the misfortune of those who are concerned in conducting human affairs that, however pure and capacious their own conceptions may be, they must accommodate themselves to the circumstances with which they are environed and use the instruments that are within their reach.
ReachCircumstancesHumanWithinOwn
Since it is one of the great attributes of our species to be susceptible of improvement and capable of experiencing the most beneficial changes, for this reason what are vulgarly called 'venerable establishments' will often range themselves in opposition to the best interests of the community.
CommunityGreatImprovementBest
There is nothing that human imagination can figure brilliant and enviable that human genius and skill do not aspire to realize.
ImaginationGeniusSkillNothing
It is necessary for him who would endure existence with patience that he should conceive himself to be something - that he should be persuaded he is not a cipher in the muster-roll of man.
PatienceManEndureHimExistence
To diminish the cases in which the assistance of others is felt absolutely necessary is the only genuine road to independence.
RoadIndependenceGenuineOthers
The value of a man is in his intrinsic qualities: in that of which power cannot strip him and which adverse fortune cannot take away. That for which he is indebted to circumstances is mere trapping and tinsel.
PowerManValueCircumstancesHim
Was ever a great discovery prosecuted or an important benefit conferred upon the human race by him who was incapable of standing and thinking and feeling alone?
AloneGreatThinkingDiscoveryRace
Everything in the world is conducted by gradual process. This seems to be the great principle of harmony in the universe.
GreatWorldProcessUniverseHarmony
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