Date: 1831

"In this sense a numerous school is, to a degree that can scarcely be adequately described, the slaughter-house of mind."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

Teaching in a crowded school is "like the undertaking, related by Livy, of Accius Navius, the augur, to cut a whetstone with a razor ... the sharpness of human faculties, is so blunted and destroyed"

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"Self-respect to be nourished in the mind of the pupil, is one of the most valuable results of a well conducted education."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"The sublimest poet that ever sung, was peradventure, while a stripling, unconscious of the treasures which formed a part of the fabric of his mind, and unsuspicious of the high destiny that in the sequel awaited him."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"There are conceptions of the mind, that come forth like the coruscations of lightning."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"There are a multitude of causes that will produce a miscarriage of this sort, where the richest soil, impregnated with the choicest seeds of learning and observation, shall entirely fail to present us with such a crop as might rationally have been anticipated"

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"They attempt many things, sketch out plans, which, if properly filled up, might illustrate the literature of a nation, and extend the empire of the human mind, but which yet they desert as soon as begun, affording us the promise of a beautiful day, that, ere it is noon, is enveloped in darkest t...

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"They skim away from one flower in the parterre of literature to another, like the bee, without, like the bee, gathering sweetness from each, to increase the public stock, and enrich the magazine of thought."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"It is therefore in this way that a preceptor, by undertaking to enlighten the mind of his pupil, enlightens his own."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1831

"Familiar as [Shakespeare] was with the evanescent touches of mind en dishabille, and in its innermost feelings, he could not sustain the tone of a character, penetrated with a divine enthusiasm, or fervently devoted to a generous cause, though this is truly within the compass of our nature."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)