Date: 1709, 1714

"'Tis the same with Understandings as with Eyes: To such a certain Size and Make just so much Light is necessary, and no more. Whatever is beyond, brings Darkness and Confusion."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"And I am persuaded, that had Reason herself been to judg of her own Interest, she wou'd have thought she receiv'd more Advantage in the main from that easy and familiar way, than from the usual stiff Adherence to a particular Opinion."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"Nor is it a wonder that Men are generally such faint Reasoners, and care so little to argue strictly on any trivial Subject in Company; when they dare so little exert their Reason in greater Matters, and are forc'd to argue lamely, where they have need of the greatest Activity and Strength. The ...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"'Tis hard, that in the Plan or Description of this Clock-work, no Wheel or Ballance shou'd be allow'd on the side of the better and more enlarg'd Affections; that nothing shou'd be understood to be done in Kindness or Generosity; nothing in pure good-Nature or Friendship , or thro any social or ...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"They wou'd new frame the Human Heart; and have a mighty Fancy to reduce all its Motions, Ballances and Weights, to that one Principle and Foundation of a cool and deliberate Selfishness."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"But according to refin'd Sense, the only well-advis'd Persons, as to this World, are errant Knaves; and they alone are thought to serve themselves, who serve their Passions, and indulge their loosest Appetites and Desires."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"The Forgers of such Morals have been amply endow'd: and the World has paid roundly for its Philosophy; since the original plain Principles of Humanity, and the simple honest Precepts of Peace and mutual Love, have, by a sort of spiritual Chymists, been so sublimated, as to become the highest Cor...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"For this is the Effect, and this the Beauty of their Art; 'in vocal Measures of Syllables, and Sounds, to express the Harmony and Numbers of an inward kind; and represent the Beautys of a human Soul, by proper Foils, and Contrarietys, which serve as Graces in this Limning, and render this Musick...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"We may imagine what we please of a substantial solid Part of Beauty: but were the Subject to be well criticiz'd, we shou'd find, perhaps, that what we most admir'd, even in the Turn of outward Features, was but a mysterious Expression, and a kind of shadow of something inward in the Temper."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"They who overlook the main Springs of Action, and despise the Thought of Numbers and Proportion in a Life at large, will in the mean Particulars of it, be no less taken up, and engag'd; as either in the Study of common Arts, or in the Care and Culture of mere mechanick Beautys. The Models of Hou...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)