“ There is nothing that human imagination can figure brilliant and enviable that human genius and skill do not aspire to realize. William Godwin
“ To diminish the cases in which the assistance of others is felt absolutely necessary is the only genuine road to independence. William Godwin
“ It has an unhappy effect upon the human understanding and temper, for a man to be compelled in his gravest investigation of an argument, to consider, not what is true, but what is convenient. William Godwin
“ Above all we should not forget that government is an evil, a usurpation upon the private judgement and individual conscience of mankind. William Godwin
“ Love conquers all difficulties, surmounts all obstacles, and effects what to any other power would be impossible. William Godwin
“ I was brought up in great tenderness, and though my mind was proud to independence, I was never led to much independence of feeling. William Godwin
“ The love of independence and dislike of unjust treatment is the source of a thousand virtues. William Godwin
“ There must be room for the imagination to exercise its powers we must conceive and apprehend a thousand things which we do not actually witness. William Godwin
“ The most desirable state of mankind is that which maintains general security with the smallest encroachment upon individual independence. William Godwin
“ There can be no passion, and by consequence no love, where there is not imagination. William Godwin
“ In the two novels I have published, it was my fortune at different times, and from different persons, to hear the most unqualified censure long before it was possible for me to hear the voice of the p… William Godwin
“ Extraordinary circumstances often bring along with them extraordinary strength. No man knows, till the experiment, what he is capable of effecting. William Godwin
“ Learning is the ally, not the adversary of genius... he who reads in a proper spirit, can scarcely read too much. William Godwin
“ It is questionless desirable in all ordinary cases, wherever positive law is established, to restrain ourselves within the letter of that law and to allow the criminal all the benefit, if benefit to h… William Godwin
“ While my mother lived, I always felt to a certain degree as if I had somebody who was my superior and who exercised a mysterious protection over me. I belonged to something - I hung to something - the… William Godwin
“ I believe in this being, not because I have any proper or direct knowledge of His existence, but I am at a loss to account for the existence and arrangement of the visible universe, and, being left in… William Godwin
“ I was famous in our college for calm and impassionate discussion; for one whole summer, I rose at five and went to bed at midnight, that I might have sufficient time for theology and metaphysics. William Godwin
“ It is necessary for him who would endure existence with patience that he should conceive himself to be something - that he should be persuaded he is not a cipher in the muster-roll of man. William Godwin
