Richard Whately

Every instance of a man's suffering the penalty of the law is an instance of the failure of that penalty in effecting…

— Richard Whately

One way in which fools succeed where wise men fail is that through ignorance of the danger they sometimes go coolly about…

— Richard Whately

Man is naturally more desirous of a quiet and approving, than of a vigilant and tender conscience--more desirous of security than of…

— Richard Whately

The love of admiration leads to fraud, much more than the love of commendation; but, on the other hand, the latter is…

— Richard Whately

It is generally true that all that is required to make men unmindful of what they owe God for any blessing is…

— Richard Whately

It is a remarkable circumstance in reference to cunning persons that they are often deficient not only in comprehensive, far-sighted wisdom, but…

— Richard Whately

It is also important to guard against mistaking for good-nature what is properly good-humor,--a cheerful flow of spirits and easy temper not…

— Richard Whately

The censure of frequent and long parentheses has led writers into the preposterous expedient of leaving out the marks by which they…

— Richard Whately

Nothing but the right can ever be expedient, since that can never be true expediency which would sacrifice a great good to…

— Richard Whately

It is quite possible, and not uncommon, to read most laboriously, even so as to get by heart the words of a…

— Richard Whately

Of metaphors, those generally conduce most to energy or vivacity of style which illustrate an intellectual by a sensible object.

— Richard Whately

Reason can no more influence the will, and operate as a motive, than the eyes which show a man his road can…

— Richard Whately

Geologists complain that when they want specimens of the common rocks of a country, they receive curious spars; just so, historians give…

— Richard Whately

As hardly anything can accidentally touch the soft clay without stamping its mark on it, so hardly any reading can interest a…

— Richard Whately

Falsehood is difficult to be maintained. When the materials of a building are solid blocks of stone, very rude architecture will suffice;…

— Richard Whately

Of Rhetoric various definitions have been given by different writers; who, however, seem not so much to have disagreed in their conceptions…

— Richard Whately

Ethical maxims are bandied about as a sort of current coin of discourse, and, being never melted down for use, those that…

— Richard Whately

The happiest lot for a man, as far as birth is concerned, is that it should be such as to give him…

— Richard Whately

An instinct is a blind tendency to some mode of action, independent of any consideration, on the part of the agent, of…

— Richard Whately

The heathen mythology not only was not true, but was not even supported as true; it not only deserved no faith, but…

— Richard Whately

Anger requires that the offender should not only be made to grieve in his turn, but to grieve for that particular wrong…

— Richard Whately

The Eastern monarch who proclaimed a reward to him who should discover a new pleasure, would have deserved well of mankind had…

— Richard Whately

Superstition is not, as has been defined, an excess of religious feeling, but a misdirection of it, an exhausting of it on…

— Richard Whately

Falsehood, like poison, will generally be rejected when administered alone; but when blended with wholesome ingredients may be swallowed unperceived.

— Richard Whately

Of all hostile feelings, envy is perhaps the hardest to be subdued, because hardly any one owns it even to himself, but…

— Richard Whately

The more secure we feel against our liability to any error to which, in fact, we are liable, the greater must be…

— Richard Whately

When men have become heartily wearied of licentious anarchy, their eagerness has been proportionately great to embrace the opposite extreme of rigorous…

— Richard Whately

Men first make up their minds (and the smaller the mind the sooner made up), and then seek for the reasons; and…

— Richard Whately

As one may bring himself to believe almost anything he is inclined to believe, it makes all the difference whether we begin…

— Richard Whately

As the telescope is not a substitute for, but an aid to, our sight, so revelation is not designed to supersede the…

— Richard Whately

Fancy, when once brought into religion, knows not where to stop. It is like one of those fiends in old stories which…

— Richard Whately

Trust, therefore, for the overcoming of a difficulty, not to long-continued study after you have once become bewildered, but to repeated trials…

— Richard Whately

Sophistry, like poison, is at once detected and nauseated, when presented to us in a concentrated form; but a fallacy which, when…

— Richard Whately

To follow imperfect, uncertain, or corrupted traditions, in order to avoid erring in our own judgment, is but to exchange one danger…

— Richard Whately

In our judgment of human transactions, the law of optics is reversed; we see the most indistinctly the objects which are close…

— Richard Whately

Christianity, contrasted with the Jewish system of emblems, is truth in the sense of reality, as substance is opposed to shadows, and,…

— Richard Whately

It is not that pearls fetch a high price because men have dived for them; but on the contrary, men have dived…

— Richard Whately

No one complains of the rules of Grammar as fettering Language; because it is understood that correct use is not founded on…

— Richard Whately

Habits are formed, not at one stroke, but gradually and insensibly; so that, unless vigilant care be employed, a great change may…

— Richard Whately