David Hume

“Heaven and hell suppose two distinct species of men, the good and the bad. But the greatest part of mankind float betwixt vice and virtue.”

“Beauty, whether moral or natural, is felt, more properly than perceived.”

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

“A man acquainted with history may, in some respect, be said to have lived from the beginning of the world, and to have been making continual additions to his stock of knowledge in every century.”

“There is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men, of such unquestioned good sense, education and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves.”

“Nothing endears so much a friend as sorrow for his death. The pleasure of his company has not so powerful an influence.”

“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.”

“The corruption of the best things gives rise to the worst.”

“A propensity to hope and joy is real riches; one to fear and sorrow real poverty.”

“Scholastic learning and polemical divinity retarded the growth of all true knowledge.”

“A purpose, an intention, a design, strikes everywhere even the careless, the most stupid thinker.”

“Beauty in things exists in the mind which contemplates them.”