Top 300 David Hume Quotes (2024 Update)
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101. “Truth is disputable, not human taste.”

— David Hume

102. “To have recourse to the veracity of the supreme Being, in order to prove the veracity of our senses, is surely making a very unexpected circuit.”

— David Hume

103. “What peculiar privilege has this little agitation of the brain which we call thought, that we must thus make it the model of the whole universe? Our partiality in our own favour does indeed present it on all occasions; but sound philosophy ought carefully to guard against so natural an illusion.”

— David Hume

104. “It is with books as with women, where a certain plainness of manner and of dress is more engaging than that glare of paint and airs and apparel which may dazzle the eye, but reaches not the affections.”

— David Hume

105. “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

106. “Heaven and hell suppose two distinct species of men, the good and the bad. But the greatest part of mankind float betwixt vice and virtue.”

— David Hume

107. “That I am ready to throw all of my books and papers into the fire, and resolve never more to renounce the pleasure of life for the sake of reasoning and philosophy.”

— David Hume

108. “Where ambition can cover its enterprises, even to the person himself, under the appearance of principle, it is the most incurable and inflexible of passions.”

— David Hume

109. “That the sun shines tomorrow is a judgement that is as true as the contrary judgement.”

— David Hume

110. “The sweetest path of life leads through the avenues of learning, and whoever can open up the way for another, ought, so far, to be esteemed a benefactor to mankind.”

— David Hume

111. “It is on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to the most free and most popular.”

— David Hume

112. “Kitsch is: a species of beauty, which, as it is florid and superficial, pleases at first; but soon palls upon the taste, and is rejected with disdain, at least rated at much lower value.”

— David Hume

113. “History is the discovering of the principles of human nature.”

— David Hume

114. “I do not have enough faith to believe there is no god.”

— David Hume

115. “The first ideas of religion arose, not from contemplation of the works of nature, but from a concern with regard to the events of life.”

— David Hume

116. “Weakness, fear, melancholy, together with ignorance, are the true sources of superstition. Hope, pride, presumption, a warm indignation, together with ignorance, are the true sources of enthusiasm.”

— David Hume

117. “Nothing can be more real, or concern us more, than our own sentiments of pleasure and uneasiness; and if these be favourable to virtue and unfavourable to vice, no more can be requisite to the regulation of our conduct and behavior.”

— David Hume

118. “A delicacy of taste is favorable to love and friendship, by confining our choice to few people, and making us indifferent to the company and conversation of the greater part of men.”

— David Hume

119. “When suicide is out of fashion we conclude that none but madmen destroy themselves; and all the efforts of courage appear chimerical to dastardly minds... Nevertheless, how many instances are there, well attested, of men, in every other respect perfectly discreet, who, without remorse, rage, or despair, have quitted life for no other reason than because it was a burden to them, and have died with more composure than they lived?”

— David Hume

120. “Among the arts of conversation no one pleases more than mutual deference or civility, which leads us to resign our own inclinations to those of our companions, and to curb and conceal that presumption and arrogance so natural to the human mind.”

— David Hume

121. “Almost every one has a predominant inclination, to which his other desires and affections submit, and which governs him, though perhaps with some intervals, though the whole course of his life.”

— David Hume

122. “It is well known, that, in all questions submitted to the understanding, prejudice is destructive of sound judgment, and perverts all operations of the intellectual faculties: it is no less contrary to good taste; nor has it less influence to corrupt our sentiment of beauty. It belongs to good sense to check its influence in both cases.”

— David Hume

123. “Hume argued powerfully that human reason is fundamentally similar to that of the other animals, founded on instinct rather than quasi-divine insight into things.”

— David Hume

124. “But to proceed in this reconciling project with regard to the question of liberty and necessity; the most contentious question of metaphysics, the most contentious science...”

— David Hume

125. “No human testimony can have such force as to prove a miracle, and make it a just foundation for any such system of religion.”

— David Hume

126. “Though experience be our only guide in reasoning concerning matters of fact; it must be acknowledged, that this guide is not altogether infallible, but in some cases is apt to lead us into errors.”

— David Hume

127. “The richest genius, like the most fertile soil, when uncultivated, shoots up into the rankest weeds.”

— David Hume

128. “There is nothing to be learnt from a Professor, which is not to be met with in Books.”

— David Hume

129. “A man posing for a painting.”

— David Hume

130. “For the purposes of life and conduct, and society, a little good sense is surely better than all this genius, and a little good humour than this extreme sensibility.”

— David Hume

131. “Human happiness seems to consist in three ingredients: action, pleasure and indolence.”

— David Hume

132. “If the religious spirit be ever mentioned in any historical narration, we are sure to meet afterwards with a detail of the miseries which attend it. And no period of time can be happier or more prosperous, than those in which it is never regarded or heard of.”

— David Hume

133. “When men are most sure and arrogant they are commonly most mistaken, giving views to passion without that proper deliberation which alone can secure them from the grossest absurdities.”

— David Hume

134. “It is harder to avoid censure than to gain applause.”

— David Hume

135. “God is an ever-present spirit guiding all that happens to a wise and holy end.”

— David Hume

136. “These ideas are, perhaps, too far stretched; but still it must be acknowledged, that, by representing the Deity as so intelligible and comprehensible, and so similar to a human mind, we are guilty of the grossest and most narrow partiality, and make ourselves the model of the whole universe.”

— David Hume

137. “It is impossible for us to think of any thing, which we have not antecedently felt, either by our external or internal senses.”

— David Hume

138. “Empires may rise and fall; liberty and slavery succeed alternately; ignorance and knowledge give place to each other; but the cherry-tree will still remain in the woods of Greece, Spain, and Italy, and will never be affected by the revolutions of human society.”

— David Hume

139. “The simplest and most obvious cause which can there be assigned for any phenomena, is probably the true one.”

— David Hume

140. “It seems to me, that the only Objects of the abstract Sciences or of Demonstration is Quantity and Number, and that all Attempts to extend this more perfect Species of Knowledge beyond these Bounds are mere Sophistry and Illusion.”

— David Hume

141. “What is easy and obvious is never valued; and even what is in itself difficult, if we come to knowledge of it without difficulty, and without and stretch of thought or judgment, is but little regarded.”

— David Hume

142. “No conclusions can be more agreeable to scepticism than such as make discoveries concerning the weakness and narrow limits of human reason and capacity.”

— David Hume

143. “What praise is implied in the simple epithet useful! What reproach in the contrary.”

— David Hume

144. “He insists that if we knew that God was all-good, we could account for the appearance of evil. However, we have to reason backward from our experience, which reflects a mixture of good and evil in the world. Philo contends that from what we experience, it is more likely that whatever being or force runs the world is morally neutral.”

— David Hume

145. “Weakness, fear, melancholy, together with ignorance, are, therefore, the true sources of Superstition.”

— David Hume

146. “We choose our favourite author as we do our friend, from a conformity of humour and disposition. Mirth or passion, sentiment or reflection; whichever of these most predominates in our temper, it gives us a peculiar sympathy with the writer who resembles us.”

— David Hume

147. “The more instances we examine, and the more care we employ, the more assurance shall we acquire, that the enumeration, which we form from the whole, is complete and entire.”

— David Hume

148. “It is still open for me, as well as you, to regulate my behavior, by my experience of past events.”

— David Hume

149. “In all societies people depend so much on one another that hardly any human action is entirely complete in itself, or is performed without some reference to the actions of others that are needed if the action is to produce what the agent intends.”

— David Hume

150. “The consequence of a very free commerce between the sexes, and of their living much together, will often terminate in intrigues and gallantry.”

— David Hume