David Hume Quotes About Reflection

Quotes about: Reflection

• Eloquence, at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection, but addresses itself entirely to the desires and affections, captivating the willing hearers, and subduing their understanding.

  David Hume

  Reflection, Understanding, Desire

  "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding". Book by David Hume. Section 10: "Of Miracles", Part 2, 1758.

• Tis evident that all reasonings concerning matter of fact are founded on the relation of cause and effect, and that we can never infer the existence of one object from another, unless they be connected together, either mediately or immediately... Here is a billiard ball lying on the table, and another ball moving toward it with rapidity. They strike; and the ball which was formerly at rest now acquires a motion. This is as perfect an instance of the relation of cause and effect as any which we know, either by sensation or reflection.

  David Hume

  Lying, Moving, Reflection

• But in many orders of beauty, particularly those of the finer arts, it is requisite to employ much reasoning, in order to feel the proper sentiment; and a false relish may frequently be corrected by argument and reflection. There are just grounds to conclude, that moral beauty partakes of this latter species, and demands the assistance of our intellectual faculties, in order to give it a suitable influence on the human mind.

  David Hume

  Art, Reflection, Order

  David Hume, J. B. Schneewind (1983). “An Enquiry Concerning The Principles of Morals”, p.15, Hackett Publishing

• If we confine ourselves to a general and distant reflection on the ills of human life, that can have no effect to prepare us for them. If by close and intense meditation we render them present and intimate to us, that is the true secret for poisoning all our pleasures, and rendering us perpetually miserable.

  David Hume

  Life, Death, Reflection

  David Hume (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of David Hume (Illustrated)”, p.683, Delphi Classics

• Heroism, or military glory, is much admired by the generality of mankind. They consider it as the most sublime kind of merit. Menof cool reflection are not so sanguine in their praises of it.

  David Hume

  Military, Reflection, Sublime

  David Hume (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of David Hume (Illustrated)”, p.521, Delphi Classics

• It seems certain, that though a man, in a flush of humour, after intense reflection on the many contradictions and imperfections of human reason, may entirely renounce all belief and opinion, it is impossible for him to persevere in this total scepticism, or make it appear in his conduct for a few hours.

  David Hume

  Men, Reflection, Imperfection

  David Hume, Peter Millican (2008). “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding”, p.153, Oxford University Press

• The mention of one apartment in a building naturally introduces an enquiry or discourse concerning the others: and if we think ofa wound, we can scarcely forbear reflecting on the pain which follows it.

  David Hume

  Pain, Thinking, Reflection

  David Hume, Eric Steinberg (1992). “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding; [with] A Letter from a Gentleman to His Friend in Edinburgh; [and] An Abstract of a Treatise of Human Nature”, p.14, Hackett Publishing

• There is, indeed a more mitigated scepticism or academical philosophy, which may be both durable and useful, and which may, in part, be the result of this Pyrrhonism, or excessive scepticism, when its undistinguished doubts are corrected by common sense and reflection.

  David Hume

  Philosophy, Reflection, Common Sense

  David Hume, Eric Steinberg (1993). “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding ; [with] A Letter from a Gentleman to His Friend in Edinburgh ; [and] An Abstract of a Treatise of Human Nature”, p.111, Hackett Publishing

• Eloquence, when at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection; but addressing itself entirely to the fancy or the affections, captivates the willing hearers, and subdues their understanding. Happily, this pitch it seldom attains. But what a Tully or a Demosthenes could scarcely effect over a Roman or Athenian audience, every Capuchin, every itinerant or stationary teacher can perform over the generality of mankind, and in a higher degree, by touching such gross and vulgar passions.

  David Hume

  Teacher, Passion, Reflection

  David Hume (2012). “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding”, p.127, tredition

• There is an universal tendency among mankind to conceive all beings like themselves, and to transfer to every object, those qualities, with which they are familiarly acquainted, and of which they are intimately conscious. We find human faces in the moon, armies in the clouds; and by a natural propensity, if not corrected by experience and reflection, ascribe malice or good-will to every thing, that hurts or pleases us.

  David Hume

  Hurt, Army, Moon

  David Hume (1957). “The Natural History of Religion”, p.29, Stanford University Press

• Eloquence, when in its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection.

  David Hume

  Reflection, Littles, Rooms

  David Hume (1826). “The Philosophical Works: Including All the Essays, and Exhibiting the More Important Alterations and Corrections in the Successive Ed. Publ. by the Author”, p.137

• If the contemplation, even of inanimate beauty, is so delightful; if it ravishes the senses, even when the fair form is foreign tous: What must be the effects of moral beauty? And what influence must it have, when it embellishes our own mind, and is the result of our own reflection and industry?

  David Hume

  Beauty, Reflection, Mind

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