The Most Lively Thought Is

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.

If The Contemplation, Even Of Inanimate Beauty, Is So Delightful; If It Ravishes The Senses, Even When The Fair Form Is Foreign Tous: What Must Be The Effects Of Moral Beauty? And What Influence Must It Have, When It Embellishes Our Own Mind, And Is The Result Of Our Own Reflection And Industry?

The Bigotry Of Theologians Is A Malady Which Seems Almost Incurable.

There Is No Method Of Reasoning More Common, And Yet None More Blameable, Than, In Philosophical Disputes, To Endeavour The Refutation Of Any Hypothesis, By A Pretence Of Its Dangerous Consequences To Religion And Morality. When Any Opinion Leads To Absurdities, It Is Certainly False; But It Is Not Certain That An Opinion Is False, Because It Is Of Dangerous Consequence. Such Topics, Therefore, Ought Entirely To Be Forborne; As Serving Nothing To The Discovery Of Truth, But Only To Make The Person Of An Antagonist Odious.

The Mind Is A Kind Of Theater, Where Several Perceptions Successively Make Their Appearence; Pass, Re-pass, Glide Away, And Mingle In An Infinite Variety Of Postures And Situations.