Joseph Priestley Quotes

The more elaborate our means of our common sense is, the less the common sense it becomes. ~ Joseph Priestley

How glorious, then, is the prospect, the reverse of all the past, which is now opening upon us, and upon the world. Government, we may now expect to see, not only in theory and in books but in actual practice, calculated for the general good, and taking no more upon it than the general good requires, leaving all men the enjoyment of as many of their natural rights as possible, and no more interfering with matters of religion, with men's notions concerning God, and a future state, than with philosophy, or medicine. ~ Joseph Priestley

This is unfortunately a world in which things find it difficult, frequently impossible, to live up to their names. ~ Joseph Priestley

We find upon all occasions, the early Christian writers speak of the Father as superior to the Son, and in general they give him the title of God , as distinguished from the Son; and sometimes they expressly call him, exclusively of the Son, the only true God ; a phraseology which does not at all accord with the idea of the perfect equality of all the persons in the Trinity. But it might well be expected, that the advances to the present doctrine of the Trinity should be gradual and slow. It was, indeed, some centuries before it was completely formed. ~ Joseph Priestley

From the fame opinion of a soul distinct from the body came the practice of praying, first for the dead, and then to them with a long train of other absurd opinions, and superstitious practices. ~ Joseph Priestley

Most of the early Christian writers thought the text "I and my Father are one," was to be understood of an unity or harmony of disposition only. Thus Tertullian observes, that the expression is unum , one thing, not one person; and he explains it to mean unity, likeness, conjunction, and of the love that the Father bore to the Son. Origen says, "let him consider that text, 'all that believed were of one heart and of one soul,' and then he will understand this, 'I and my Father are one. ~ Joseph Priestley

We should like to have some towering geniuses, to reveal us to ourselves in color and fire, but of course they would have to fit into the pattern of our society and be able to take orders from sound administrative types. ~ Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804

Many a man is praised for his reserve and so-called shyness when he is simply too proud to risk making a fool of himself. ~ Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804

Will is nothing more than a particular case of the general doctrine of association of ideas, and therefore a perfectly mechanical thing. ~ Joseph Priestley

When we say there is a GOD, we mean that there is an intelligent designing cause of what we see in the world around us, and a being who was himself uncaused. ~ Joseph Priestley

[The doctrine of air] I was led into in consequence of inhabiting a house adjoining to a public brewery, where I at first amused myself with making experiments on the fixed air [carbon dioxide] which I found ready made in the process of fermentation . When I removed from that house I was under the necessity of making the fixed air for myself; and one experiment leading to another, as I have distinctly and faithfully noted in my various publications on the subject, I by degrees contrived a convenient apparatus for the purpose, but of the cheapest kind. ~ Joseph Priestley

What I have known with respect to myself, has tended much to lessen both my admiration, and my contempt, of others. ~ Joseph Priestley

Could we have entered into the mind of Sir Isaac Newton, and have traced all the steps by which he produced his great works, we might see nothing very extraordinary in the process. ~ Joseph Priestley

Had Mr. Gibbon lived in France, Spain, or Italy, he might with the fame reason have ranked the doctrine of transubstantiation, and the worship of saints and angels among the essentials of Christianity, as the doctrines of the trinity and of the atonement. ~ Joseph Priestley

Only about seventy years ago was chemistry, like a grain of seed from a ripe fruit, separated from the other physical sciences. With Black, Cavendish and Priestley, its new era began. Medicine, pharmacy, and the useful arts, had prepared the soil upon which this seed was to germinate and to flourish. ~ Justus Von Liebig

The feeling of it to my lungs was not sensibly different from that of common air; but I fancied that my breast felt peculiarly light and easy for some time afterwards. Who can tell but that, in time, this pure air may become a fashionable article in luxury. Hitherto only two mice and myself have had the privilege of breathing it. ~ Joseph Priestley

On August 26 the Assembly responded by conferring French citizenship upon Joseph Priestley, Jeremy Bentham, William Wilberforce, Anacharsis Cloots, Johann Pestalozzi, Thaddeus Kosciusko, Friedrich Schiller, George Washington, Thomas Paine, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton. ~ Will Durant

The wisdom of one generation will be folly in the next. ~ Joseph Priestley

Every man, when he comes to be sensible of his natural rights, and to feel his own importance, will consider himself as fully equal to any other person whatever. ~ Joseph Priestley

Too many christians have been chargeable with ... confounding the Logos of Plato with that of John , and making of it a second person in the trinity, than which no two things can be more different. ~ Joseph Priestley

To different minds, the same world is a hell, and a heaven. ~ Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804

In completing one discovery we never fail to get an imperfect knowledge of others of which we could have no idea before, so that we cannot solve one doubt without creating several new ones. ~ Joseph Priestley

Let us not ... contend about merit , but let us all be intent on forwarding the common enterprize , and equally enjoy any progress we may make towards succeeding in it; and above all, let us acknowledge the guidance of that Great Being, who has put a spirit in man, and whose inspiration giveth him understanding . ~ Joseph Priestley

Lying is a crime the least liable to variation in its definitions. A child will upon the slightest temptation tell an untruth as readily as the truth. That is, as soon as he can suspect that it will be to his advantage; and the dread that he afterward has of telling a lie is acquired principally by his being threatened, punished, and terrified by those who detect him in it, till at length, a number of painful impressions are annexed to the telling of an untruth, and he comes even to shudder at the thought of it. ~ Joseph Priestley

The wild gas, the fixed air is plainly broke loose: but we ought to suspend our judgments until the first effervescence is a little subsided, till the liquor is cleared, and until we see something deeper than the agitation of the troubled and frothy surface.
[Alluding to Joseph Priestley's Observations on Air] ~ Edmund Burke

It is no use speaking in soft, gentle tones if everyone else is shouting. ~ Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804

I have procured air [oxygen] ... between five and six times as good as the best common air that I have ever met with. ~ Joseph Priestley

In all controversies, it is better to wait the decisions of time, which are slow and sure, than to take those of synods, which are often hasty and injudicious ~ Joseph Priestley

As I conceive this doctrine to be a gross misrepresentation of the character and moral government of God, and to affect many other articles in the scheme of Christianity, greatly disfiguring and depraving it; I shall show, ... that it has no countenance whatever in reason, or the Scriptures; and, therefore, that the whole doctrine of atonement, with every modification of it, has been a departure from the primitive and genuine doctrine of Christianity. ~ Joseph Priestley

The mind of man can never be wholly barren. Through our whole lives we are subject to successive impressions; for, either new ideas are continually flowing in, or traces of the old ones are marked deeper. If, therefore, you be not acquiring good principles be assured that you are acquiring bad ones; if you be not forming virtuous habits you are, how insensibly soever to yourselves, forming vicious ones ... ~ Joseph Priestley

Public opinion polls are rather like children in a garden, digging things up all the time to see how they're growing. ~ J.B. Priestley

I would rather quit public life at seventy, and quit it forever, than to retain public life at a sacrifice to my own self-respect. I will not vote for any law which will make fair for me and foul for another. The blacklist is the most cruel form of oppression ever devised by man for the infliction of suffering upon his weaker fellows. ~ Joseph Gurney Cannon

A new invention to poison people ... is not a patentable invention. ~ Joseph Story

You know, they always say, "If you're trying to meet someone, you may never find them. But it's when you're not looking, that's when they find you." I've always heard this in reference to government agents, but I think it applies to dating as well. ~ Joseph Fink

The antiques in the window were especially cute, wrestling with each other and playfully snapping at each other's tails. ~ Joseph Fink

The waterwheel was twice a man's height, wider than a man's two stretched arms. The timbers, braced and bolted with rusty iron were heavy, hand-hewn, swollen with a century of wet. Moss bearded the paddles, which dripped as they rose. The sounds were good. Wooden stutter like children running down a hall at the end of school. Grudging axle thud like the heartbeat of a strong old man. ~ Joseph Hansen

Alice might end up neither good nor bad. She might end up somewhere in between. That would make her very dangerous to know. That girl could be the bane of your life, a blight, a poison on everything you do. Or she might turn out to be the best and strongest friend you'll ever have. Someone who'll make all the difference in the world. I just don't know which way it will go. I can't see it, no matter how hard I try. ~ Joseph Delaney

NO NEUTRALS IN HEAVEN. There were no neutrals in the war in heaven. All took sides either with Christ or with Satan. Every man had his agency there, and men receive rewards here based upon their actions there, just as they will receive rewards hereafter for deeds done in the body. The Negro, evidently, is receiving the reward he merits ~ Joseph Fielding Smith

You may not live through it. And if you do, the you that lived through it will not be the same you that lived before it. In that sense, you will definitely not exist after, and I'm sorry. ~ Joseph Fink, Jeffrey Cranor

It" is the idea of him or her that resides in us--inspired by the "Something" in them, as Pope has it, "That gives us back the Image of our Mind." Although the perception of It must be excited by some extraordinary perturbation in the looks and personality of the adored, the aura that It broadcasts arises not merely from the singularity of an original, as Walter Benjamin supposed, but also from the fabulous success of its reproducibility in the imaginations of many others, charmed exponentially by the number of its copies. The one-of-kind item must become a type, a replicable role-icon of itself--from "a Charles Hart" or "a Nell Gwyn" to "a Mary Pickford" or "a Douglas Fairbanks"--in order to unleash the Pygmalion effect in the hearts and minds of the fans, making the idea of him or her theirs--as much or more than anything else they might call their own. ~ Joseph Roach

Comfort was the answer to all life's problems. It didn't solve them, but it made them more distant for a bit as they quietly worsened. ~ Joseph Fink

We know that whether something is considered beautiful or ugly is in the eye of the beholder. What's more revealing is that the beholder's determination of what is beautiful and what is ugly is a valuable insight into the soul and psyche of that person. The beauty and the beast are mirrors. It's never actually about the object; it's really about us. Every person, situation, and idea is an interaction between the observer and the observed, and therefore, a potential source of knowledge. Every encounter is an opportunity to learn, not just about the object but about ourselves. Every encounter is therefore an opportunity to evolve. If we pay attention! ~ Joseph Deitch

There was an old bastard named Lenin
Who did two or three million men in.
That's a lot to have done in
But where he did one in
That old bastard Stalin did ten in. ~ Robert Conquest

This civilization is rapidly passing away, however. Let us rejoice or else lament the fact as much as everyone of us likes; but do not let us shut our eyes to it. ~ Joseph Alois Schumpeter

If the veil could be parted and we could see the world of spirit, we would likely discover many among them our ancestors anxiously praying and hoping their day of deliverance would come ... . Their hearts are turned toward their children on who their hopes rely for deliverance from the
prison house. ~ Joseph Fielding Smith

I watched the tears run down her cheeks and start to drip from the end of her chin. One part of me wanted to put my arms round her but I daren't. Do that and I'd never be able to let her go. ~ Joseph Delaney

Mormonism is the pure doctrine of Jesus Christ; of which I myself am not ashamed. ~ Joseph Smith Jr.

Moyers: Then what does love have to do with morality?
Campbell: Violates it ... Insofar as love expresses itself, it is not expressing itself in terms of the socially approved manners of life. That's why it is all so secret. Love has nothing to do with social order. It is a higher spiritual experience than that of socially organized marriage ... Love was a divine visitation, and that's why it was superior to marriage. ~ Joseph Campbell

The doctor's wife ate two apples a day, just to be safe. But her husband kept coming home. ~ Joseph Gordon-Levitt

A majority can do anything. ~ Joseph Gurney Cannon

for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me. ~ Joseph Smith Jr.

Man should not submit to the powers from outside but command them. How to do it is the problem. ~ Joseph Campbell

Reactions come from the mind, responses come from the heart. ~ Joseph Meyering Sr

When I grow up I want to be a little boy. ~ Joseph Heller

Sin may result from activities that begin innocently or that are perfectly legitimate in moderation, but in excess they can cause us to veer from the straight and narrow path to our destruction. ~ Joseph B. Wirthlin

If fortune wishes to make a man estimable, she gives him virtues; if she wishes to make him esteemed, she gives him success. ~ Joseph Joubert

I have all the equipment to be a politician. Total shamelessness. But it's lucky I never ran. In the years from [Joseph] McCarthy to now, I would have either been destroyed or reduced. ~ Peter Biskind

The sovereign people, legislators, and reformers, see in public offices, to speak plainly, only opportunities for pecuniary advancement. And, because it regards them as a source of profit, it decrees the eligibility of citizens. For of what use would this precaution be, if there were nothing to gain by it? No one would think of ordaining that none but astronomers and geographers should be pilots, nor of prohibiting stutterers from acting at the theatre and the opera. The nation was still aping the kings: like them it wished to award the lucrative positions to its friends and flatterers. Unfortunately, and this last feature completes the resemblance, the nation did not control the list of livings; that was in the hands of its agents and representatives. They, on the other hand, took care not to thwart the will of their gracious sovereign. ~ Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

In a culture that worshipped its ancestors, to die without offspring was next of kin to damnation. ~ Joseph Duncan

I wish that everything on earth were just as certain as the meals we had" ... Joby Joseph ~ Joby Joseph