Quotes by William Godwin

Perseverance is an active principle, and cannot continue to operate but under the influence of desire.
– William Godwin
Revolutions are the produce of passion, not of sober and tranquil reason.
– William Godwin
The philosophy of the wisest man that ever existed, is mainly derived from the act of introspection.
– William Godwin
There must be room for the imagination to exercise its powers; we must conceive and apprehend a thousand things which we do not actually witness.
– William Godwin
To him it is an ocean, unfathomable, and without a shore.
– William Godwin
There can be no passion, and by consequence no love, where there is not imagination.
– William Godwin
The cause of justice is the cause of humanity. Its advocates should overflow with universal good will. We should love this cause, for it conduces to the general happiness of mankind.
– William Godwin
My thoughts will be taken up with the future or the past, with what is to come or what has been. Of the present there is necessarily no image.
– William Godwin
Let us not, in the eagerness of our haste to educate, forget all the ends of education.
– William Godwin
Learning is the ally, not the adversary of genius... he who reads in a proper spirit, can scarcely read too much.
– William Godwin
Government will not fail to employ education, to strengthen its hands, and perpetuate its institutions.
– William Godwin
As the true object of education is not to render the pupil the mere copy of his preceptor, it is rather to be rejoiced in, than lamented, that various reading should lead him into new trains of thinking.
– William Godwin
Above all we should not forget that government is an evil, a usurpation upon the private judgement and individual conscience of mankind.
– William Godwin