Ought Quotes - Page 25

• In employing fiction to make truth clear and goodness attractive, we are only following the example which every Christian ought to propose to himself.

  Thomas B. Macaulay

  Christian, Fiction, Example

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• A love of the republic in a democracy is a love of the democracy, as the latter is that of equality. A love of the democracy is likewise that of frugality. Since every individual ought here to enjoy the same happiness, and the same advantages, they should consequently taste the same pleasures and form the same hopes, which cannot be expected but from a general frugality.

  Baron de Montesquieu

  Democracy, Republic, Taste

  Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu (2015). “The Spirit of Laws”, p.64, Library of Alexandria

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• Human laws made to direct the will ought to give precepts, and not counsels.

  Baron de Montesquieu

  Law, Giving, Made

  Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu (2015). “The Spirit of Laws”, p.569, Library of Alexandria

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• Some have said that it is not the business of private men to meddle with government--a bold and dishonest saying, which is fit to come from no mouth but that of a tyrant or a slave. To say that private men have nothing to do with government is to say that private men have nothing to do with their own happiness or misery; that people ought not to concern themselves whether they be naked or clothed, fed or starved, deceived or instructed, protected or destroyed.

  Cato the Younger

  Men, Tyrants, People

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• It is not because we have been free, but because we have a right to be free, that we ought to demand freedom. Justice and liberty have neither birth nor race, youth nor age.

  James Mackintosh

  Freedom, Responsibility, Rights

  Sir James Mackintosh (1835). “History of the Revolution in England in 1688: Comprising a View of the Reign of James II. from His Accession, to the Enterprise of the Prince of Orange”, p.24

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• A young fellow ought to be wiser than he should seem to be; and an old fellow ought to seem wise whether he really be so or not.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Wise, Wisdom, Maturity

  Lord Philip Dormer Stanhope Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope Earl of Chesterfield (1855). “The Works of Lord Chesterfield: Including His Letters to His Son, Etc : to which is Prefixed, an Original Life of the Author”, p.469

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• You will find that reason, which always ought to direct mankind, seldom does; but that passions and weaknesses commonly usurp itsseat, and rule in its stead.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Passion, Weakness, Doe

  Lord Philip Dormer Stanhope Chesterfield, Eugenia Stanhope (1827). “Letters Written by the Earl of Chesterfield to His Son”, p.135

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• Were you to converse with a king, you ought to be as easy and unembarrassed as with your own valet-de chambre; but yet every look,word, and action should imply the utmost respect.... You must wait till you are spoken to; you must receive, not give, the subject of conversation, and you must even take care that the given subject of such conversation do not lead you into any impropriety.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Kings, Giving, Waiting

  Lord Chesterfield (1998). “Lord Chesterfield's Letters”, p.268, OUP Oxford

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• One of the greatest difficulties in civil war is, that more art is required to know what should be concealed from our friends, than what ought to be done against our enemies.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Friends, Art, War

  Lord Philip Dormer Stanhope Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope Earl of Chesterfield (1855). “The Works of Lord Chesterfield: Including His Letters to His Son, Etc : to which is Prefixed, an Original Life of the Author”, p.628

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• I could wish there were a treaty made between the French and the English theatres, in which both parties should make considerableconcessions. The English ought to give up their notorious violations of the unities, and all their massacres, racks, dead bodies, and mangled carcasses, which they so frequently exhibit upon their stage. The French should engage to have more action, and less declamation, and not to cram and to crowd things together to almost a degree of impossibility from a too scrupulous adherence to the unities.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Giving Up, Party, Unity

  Lord Chesterfield (1998). “Lord Chesterfield's Letters”, p.248, Oxford Paperbacks

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• There is a certain jargon, which, in French, I should call un Persiflage d'Affaires, that a foreign Minister ought to be perfectlymaster of, and may be used very advantageously at great entertainments, in mixed companies, and in all occasions where he must speak, and should say nothing. Well turned and well spoken, it seems to mean something, though in truth it means nothing. It is a kind of political badinage, which prevents or removes a thousand difficulties, to which a foreign Minister is exposed in mixed conversations.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Mean, Political, Jargon

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• We are hardly ever grateful for a fine clock or watch when it goes right, and we pay attention to it only when it falters, for then we are caught by surprise. It ought to be the other way about.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Gratitude, Grateful, Watches

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• Political freedom is, or ought to be, the best guaranty for the safety and continuance of spiritual, mental, and civil freedom. It is the combination of numbers to secure the liberty to each one.

  Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

  Spiritual, Numbers, Safety

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• Historians ought to be precise, faithful, and unprejudiced; and neither interest nor fear, hatred nor affection, should make them swerve from the way of truth.

  Miguel de Cervantes

  Hatred, Faithful, Way

  Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1809). “Don Quixote”, p.62

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• The poet may say or sing, not as things were, but as they ought to have been; but the historian must pen them, not as they ought to have been, but as they really were.

  Miguel de Cervantes

  Poetry, May, Historian

  Miguel de CERVANTES SAAVEDRA (1819). “Don Quixote de la Mancha”, p.30

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• Our continual desire for praise ought to convince us of our mortality, if nothing else will.

  Josh Billings

  Convince Us, Desire, Praise

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• Order in a house ought to be like the machinery in opera, whose effect produces great pleasure, but whose ends must be hid.

  Suzanne Curchod

  Order, House, Opera

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• Reason ought not, like vanity, to adorn herself with ancient parchments, and the display of a genealogical tree; more dignified in her proceedings, and proud of her immortal nature, she ought to derive everything from herself.

  Suzanne Curchod

  Vanity, Tree, Proud

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• I have never felt any inward assurance of genius, or any presentiment of glory or of happiness. I have never seen myself in imagination great or famous, or even a husband, a father, an influential citizen. This indifference to the future, this absolute self-distrust, are, no doubt, to be taken as signs. What dreams I have are all vague and indefinite; I ought not to live, for I am now scarcely capable of living.

  Henri Frederic Amiel

  Dream, Husband, Father

  Entry for May 03, 1849, "The Journal Intime of Henri-Frédéric Amiel", Book by Henri-Frédéric Amiel, translated by Mary Augusta Ward, 1882.

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• I hate England and its hopelessness. I hate [Arnold] Bennett's resignation. Tragedy ought really to be a great big kick at misery.

  D. H. Lawrence

  Hate, Tragedy, Literature

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• Men are so inclined to content themselves with what is commonest; the spirit and the senses so easily grow dead to the impressions of the beautiful and perfect, that every one should study, by all methods, to nourish in his mind the faculty of feeling these things. ...For this reason, one ought every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture, and, if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Beautiful, Song, Men

  Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre bk. 5, ch. 1 (1795 - 1796)

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• We are neither obstinately nor wilfully to oppose evils, nor truckle under them for want of courage, but that we are naturally to give way to them, according to their condition and our own, we ought to grant free passage to diseases; and I find they stay less with me who let them alone. And I have lost those which are reputed the most tenacious and obstinate of their own defervescence, without any help or art, and contrary to their rules. Let us a little permit nature to take her own way; she better understands her own affairs than we.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Art, Giving, Evil

  Michel de Montaigne (1856). “The Works of Michael de Montaigne: Comprising His Essays, Letters, and Journey Through Germany and Italy”, p.531

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• A young man ought to cross his own rules, to awake his vigor, and to keep it from growing faint and rusty. And there is no course of life so weak and sottish as that which is carried on by rule and discipline.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Men, Discipline, Vigor

  Michel de Montaigne (1872). “All the Essays of Michael Seigneur de Montaigne”, p.865

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• In the first place, the government ought not to be invested with power to control the affections, any more than the consciences of citizens. A man has at least as good a right to choose his wife, as he has to choose his religion. His taste may not suit his neighbors; but so long as his deportment is correct, they have no right to interfere with his concerns.

  Lydia M. Child

  Men, Long, Wife

  "An Appeal on Behalf of That Class of Americans Called Africans". Book by Lydia Maria Child, Chapter VIII, utc.iath.virginia.edu. 1833.

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• Rules of property ought to be generally known, and not to be left upon loose notes, which rather serve to confound principles, than to confirm them.

  William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield

  Principles, Notes, Property

  "Goodtitle v. Duke of Chandos" (1760), 2 Burr. Part IV., p. 1076 in "The Dictionary of Legal Quotations" by James William Norton-Kyshe, (pp. 210-212), 1904.

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