Recollections of George Dawson and his lectures in Manchester in 1846-7. (Repr., with additions, from the 'Manch. quarterly'). |
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Page 26 - Well knows he who uses to consider, that our faith and knowledge thrives by exercise, as well as our limbs and complexion." Truth is compared in Scripture to a streaming / fountain; if her waters flow not in a perpetual progression, they sicken into a muddy pool of conformity and tradition.
Page 27 - The great truth has finally gone forth to all the ends of the earth," and he prints it in capital letters, " that man shall no more render account to man for his belief, over which he has himself no control. Henceforward, nothing shall prevail upon us to praise or to blame any one for that which he can no more change, than he can the hue of his skin or the height of his stature.
Page 23 - ... as sweet; A Creature not too bright or good For human nature's daily food; For transient sorrows, simple wiles, Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. And now I see with eye serene The very pulse of the machine; A Being breathing thoughtful breath, A Traveller between life and death; The reason firm, the temperate will, Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill; A perfect Woman, nobly planned, To warn, to comfort, and command; And yet a Spirit still, and bright With something of angelic...
Page 26 - Muses,' yet he has gone near to do this in the following observations on the dignity of knowledge. He says, after speaking of rulers and conquerors : ' But the commandment of knowledge is yet higher than the commandment over the will ; for it is a commandment over the reason, belief, and understanding of man, which is the highest part of the mind, and giveth law to the will itself.
Page 27 - We never, in the moral way, applaud or blame either ourselves or others, for what we enjoy or what we suffer, or for having impressions made upon us which we consider as altogether out of our power ; hut only for what we do...
Page 13 - Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.
Page 26 - The light which we have gained, was given us, not to be ever staring on, but by it to discover onward things more remote from our knowledge.
Page 26 - A man may be a heretic in the truth; and if he believe things only because his pastor says so, or the assembly so determines, without knowing other reason, though his belief be true, yet the very truth he holds becomes his heresy.
Page 13 - To be still searching after what we know not, by what we know, still closing up truth to truth, as we find it (for all her body is homogeneous and proportional), this is the golden rule for making the best harmony, not the forced and outward union of cold, and neutral, and inwardly-divided minds.
Page 26 - Force in matters of opinion can do no good, but is very apt to do hurt; for no man can change his opinion when he will, or be satisfied in his reason that his opinion is false because discountenanced.