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Principles Quotes

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Principles Quotes

“It is true that of far the greater part of things, we must content ourselves with such knowledge as description may exhibit, or analogy supply; but it is true likewise, that these ideas are always incomplete, and that at least, till we have compared them with realities, we do not know them to be just. As we see more, we become possessed of more certainties, and consequently gain more principles of reasoning, and found a wider base of analogy.”

Knows May Ideas Reality Found Principles Knowledge Greater Gains Certainty Reasoning Description Possessed Incomplete Exhibits Analogies

Book:The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.: Lives of the poets

Source: The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL. D.: Lives of the poets

“Sacred Scripture, since it has no science above itself, can dispute with one who denies its principles only if the opponent admits some at least of the truths obtained through divine revelation; thus we can argue with heretics from texts in Holy Writ, and against those who deny one article of faith we can argue from another. If our opponent believes nothing of divine revelation, there is no longer any means of proving the articles of faith by reasoning, but only of answering his objections - if he has any - against faith.”

Source: On Faith and Reason

“In disquisitions of every kind there are certain primary truths, or first principles, upon which all subsequent reasoning must depend.”

Firsts Kind Certain Principles Depends Primaries Reasoning

Book:The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers

Source: The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers

“The principles of ethics come from our own nature as social, reasoning beings.”

Social Principles Ethics Reasoning

Book:The Expanding Circle: Ethics, Evolution, and Moral Progress

Source: The Expanding Circle: Ethics, Evolution, and Moral Progress

“It must appear impossible, that theism could, from reasoning, have been the primary religion of human race, and have afterwards, by its corruption, given birth to polytheism and to all the various superstitions of the heathen world. Reason, when obvious, prevents these corruptions: When abstruse, it keeps the principles entirely from the knowledge of the vulgar, who are alone liable to corrupt any principle or opinion.”

Source: The Natural History of Religion: Revision of Great Book

“We find sects and parties in most branches of science; and disputes which are carried on from age to age, without being brought to an issue. Sophistry has been more effectually excluded from mathematics and natural philosophy than from other sciences. In mathematics it had no place from the beginning; mathematicians having had the wisdom to define accurately the terms they use, and to lay down, as axioms, the first principles on which their reasoning is grounded. Accordingly, we find no parties among mathematicians, and hardly any disputes.”

Firsts Has Beens Philosophy Use Age Term Natural Party Principles Issues Mathematics Lays Reasoning Branches Mathematician Grounded Disputes Sects Axioms Excluded Sophistry Natural Philosophy

Author:Thomas Reid

“There is no sphere in which a human being can be supposed to act where one mode of reasoning will not, in every given instance, be more reasonable than any other mode. That mode the being is bound by every principle of justice to pursue.”

Humans Given Justice Human Beings Principles Atheism Bounds Pursue Instance Reasoning Reasonable Spheres

Author:William Godwin

“Reasoning is compared to understanding as movement is to rest, or acquisition to possession.... Since movement always proceeds from something immovable, and ends in something at rest, hence it is that human reasoning, in the order of inquiry and discovery, proceeds from certain things absolutely understood--namely, the first principles; and, again, in the order of judgment, returns by analysis to first principles, in the light of which it examines what it has found. Now it is clear that rest and movement are not to be referred to different powers, but to one and the same.”

Firsts Humans Different Ends Reason Light Certain Order Found Understanding Principles Clear Movement Return Judgment Understood Discovery Possession Analysis Reasoning Inquiry Acquisition

Author:Thomas Aquinas

“As a science, logic institutes an analysis of the process of the mind in reasoning, and investigating the principles on which argumentation is conducted; as an art, it furnishes such rules as may be derived from those principles, for guarding against erroneous deductions.”

Mind May Art Process Principles Logic Analysis Reasoning Institute Deductions Investigating Guarding Institutes Argumentation

Author:Richard Whately

“Unless we take care to clear the first principles of knowledge from the incumbrance and delusion of words, we may make infinite reasonings upon them to no purpose. We may deduce consequences, and never be the wiser.”

Firsts May Care Purpose Principles Clear Consequence Infinite Take Care Reasoning Delusion Wiser

Book:Berkeley

Source: Berkeley

“To be a fully functioning moral agent, one cannot passively accept moral principles handed down by fiat. Moral principles require moral reasoning.”

Accepting Moral Principles Agents Reasoning Moral Principles Moral Reasoning

Book:The Science of Good and Evil: Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share, and Follow the Golden Rule

Source: The Science of Good and Evil: Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share, and Follow the Golden Rule