David Hume quotes

On mind

“The life of man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster.”

“Morals excite passions, and produce or prevent actions. Reason of itself is utterly impotent in this particular. The rules of morality, therefore, are not conclusions of our reason.”

“The sense of justice and injustice is not deriv'd from nature, but arises artificially... from education, and human conventions.”

“Though experience be our only guide in reasoning concerning matters of fact; it must be acknowledged, that this guide is not altogether infallible, but in some cases is apt to lead us into errors.”

“During such calm sunshine of the mind, these spectres of false divinity never make their appearance.”

On truth

“Truth springs from argument amongst friends.”

“That the sun will not rise to-morrow is no less intelligible a proposition, and implies no contradiction, than the affirmation, that it will rise.”

“I say, then, that belief is nothing but a more vivid, lively, forcible, firm, steady conception of an object, than what the imagination alone is ever able to attain”

On action

“As to the Approbation or Esteem of those Blockheads who call themselves the Public, & whom a Bookseller, a Lord, a Priest, or a Party can guide, I do most heartily despise it.”

“Here am I who have written on all sorts of subjects calculated to excite hostility, moral, political, and religious, and yet I have no enemies — except, indeed, all the Whigs, all the Tories, and all the Christians.”

“From the comparison of theism and idolatry, we may form some other observations, which will also confirm the vulgar observation that the corruption of the best things gives rise to the worst.”

On anger

“Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.”

“Grief and disappointment give rise to anger, anger to envy, envy to malice, and malice to grief again, till the whole circle be completed.”

On freedom

“By liberty, then, we can only mean a power of acting or not acting, according to the determinations of the will.”

“Hypothetical liberty is allowed to everyone who is not a prisoner and in chains”

On beauty

“Beauty is no quality in things themselves: it exists merely in the mind which contemplates them.”

On reason

“A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.”

On discipline

“Nature may certainly produce whatever can arise from habit: Nay, habit is nothing but one of the principles of nature, and derives all its force from that origin.”

On contentment

“'Tis only from the selfishness and confin'd generosity of men, along with the scanty provision nature has made for his wants, that justice derives its origin.”

On friendship

“This avidity alone, of acquiring goods and possessions for ourselves and our nearest friends, is insatiable, perpetual, universal, and directly destructive of society.”

On presence

“In vain, therefore, should we pretend to determine any single event, or infer any cause or effect, without the assistance of observation and experience.”

On kindness

“What would become of history, had we not a dependence on the veracity of the historian, according to the experience, what we have had of mankind?”

On joy

“He is happy, whose circumstances suit his temper; but he is more excellent, who can suit his temper to any circumstances.”