Good Sense Quotes - Page 12

• It is an unquestionable truth, that the body of the people in every country desire sincerely its prosperity. But it is equally unquestionable that they do not possess the discernment and stability necessary for systematic government. To deny that they are frequently led into the grossest of errors, by misinformation and passion, would be a flattery which their own good sense must despise.

  Alexander Hamilton

  Country, Passion, Errors

  Alexander Hamilton, John Church Hamilton (1850). “The Works of Alexander Hamilton: Miscellanies, 1774-1789: A full vindication; The farmer refuted; Quebec bill; Resolutions in Congress; Letters from Phocion; New-York Legislature, etc”, p.447

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• My confidence is that there will for a long time be virtue and good sense enough in our countrymen to correct abuses.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Long, Abuse, Virtue

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies from the papers of T. Jefferson”

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• Is it not the glory of the people of America, that whilst they have paid a decent regard to the opinions of former times and other nations, they have not suffered a blind veneration for antiquity, for custom, or for names, to overrule the suggestions of their own good sense, the knowledge of their own situation, and the lessons of their own experience? To this manly spirit, posterity will be indebted for the possession, and the world for the example of the numerous innovations displayed on the American theatre, in favor of private rights and public happiness.

  James Madison

  Rights, Names, America

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, Quentin P. Taylor, John Jay (1998). “The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers”, p.57, Rowman & Littlefield

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• I have a good sense of my body in a bathing suit around people who appreciate what I'm doing, like a contest. Then I'm proud. On television I am proud. But on a beach most people are not experts. The general public doesn't know how to look. How proud can you be when they don't even know what they're looking at?

  Arnold Schwarzenegger

  Sports, Beach, Bodybuilding

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• Ambition without principle never was long under the guidance of good sense.

  Alexander Hamilton

  Ambition, Long, Principles

  Alexander Hamilton (1850). “The Works of Alexander Hamilton: Correspondence [contin.] 1795-1804; 1777; 1791. Letters of H. G. 1789. Address to public creditors. 1790. Vindication of funding system. 1791”, p.423

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• Above all things I hope the education of the common people will be attended to; convinced that on their good sense we may rely with most security for the preservation of a due degree of liberty.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Thank You, Education, Teacher

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.93, Rowman & Littlefield

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• I feel like I have a lot more freedom to make these decisions to kind of sit back and enjoy the fruits of my labor. I have a really good sense of who I am now and what I am capable of and because of that, I have the confidence to go after things like a 7-day 545-mile bike ride and know I can do it.

  Cristina Goyanes

  Who I Am, Decision, Age

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• Pedants make a great rout about criticism, as if it were a science of great depth, and required much pains and knowledge--criticism however is only the result of good sense, taste and judgment--three qualities that indeed seldom are found together, and extremely seldom in a pedant, which most critics are.

  Horace Walpole

  Pain, Criticism, Quality

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• To believe straight away is foolishness, to believe after having seen clearly is good sense. That is the Buddhist policy in belief; not to believe stupidly, or to rely only on people, textbooks, conjecture, reasoning, or whatever the majority believes, but rather to believe what we see clearly for ourselves to be the case. This is how it is in Buddhism.

  Buddhadasa

  Buddhist, Believe, Buddhism

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• The sure way of judging whether our first thoughts are judicious, is to sleep on them. If they appear of the same force the next morning as they did over night, and if good nature ratifies what good sense approves, we may be pretty sure we are in the right.

  Horace Walpole

  Morning, Sleep, Night

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• Have as much good nature as good sense since they generally are companions.

  William Wycherley

  Goodness, Companion, Good Nature

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• I learned a lot of different things from different schools. MIT is a very good place…. It has developed for itself a spirit, so that every member of the whole place thinks that it’s the most wonderful place in the world—it’s the center, somehow, of scientific and technological development in the United States, if not the world … and while you don’t get a good sense of proportion there, you do get an excellent sense of being with it and in it, and having motivation and desire to keep on

  Richard P. Feynman

  Motivation, Learning, School

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• My expectation would be that if we can begin discussions soon, shortly after the Iranian elections, we should have a fairly good sense by the end of the year as to whether they are moving in the right direction.

  Barack Obama

  Moving, Should Have, Years

  Joint Press Meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, delivered 18 May 2009

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• One tends to give one's fingers too little credit for their own good sense.

  Elizabeth Zimmermann

  Knitting, Giving, Credit

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• I had neither the good sense nor the good feeling to know that this was all my fault, and that if I had been easier with Joe, Joe would have been easier with me. I felt impatient of him and out of temper with him; in which condition he heaped coals of fire on my head.

  Charles Dickens

  Fire, Feelings, Words Of Wisdom

  Charles Dickens (1861). “Great Expectations”, p.79

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• The Secretary, working in the Dismal Swamp betimes next morning, was informed that a youth waited in the hall who gave the name of Sloppy. The footman who communicated this intelligence made a decent pause before uttering the name, to express that it was forced on his reluctance by the youth in question, and that if the youth had had the good sense and good taste to inherit some other name it would have spared the feelings of him the bearer.

  Charles Dickens

  Funny, Morning, Humorous

  Charles Dickens (1865). “Our Mutual Friend”, p.246

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• I have a good sense of humor. I think everything we do should have whimsy in it.

  Judith Leiber

  Thinking, Should Have, Whimsy

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• Good nonsense is good sense in disguise.

  Josh Billings

  Nonsense, Disguise

  Josh Billings (1972). “Uncle Sam's Uncle Josh: Or, Josh Billings on Practically Everything, Distilled from Josh's Rum and Tansy New England Wit by Donald Day”

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• Father, forgive them,' said Jesus, 'for they know not what they do' -- People of good sense whoever you may be, I will add, do not listen to them, for they know not what they say.

  Eliphas Levi

  Jesus, Father, People

  Eliphas Levi (2000). “The Great Secret or Occultism Unveiled”, p.70, Weiser Books

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• Most People are wretched more by the Fears of what may come, than what they endure at present. ... a manifest Contradiction to good Sense; for who, with the right use of that, wou'd lose the Enjoyment of a present Comfort, to lament a Misfortune only in Supposition; which ten to one never comes to pass.

  Eliza Haywood

  Fear, People, Live In The Moment

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• I look upon paradoxes as the impotent efforts of men who, not having capacity to draw attention and celebrity from good sense, fly to eccentricities to make themselves noted.

  Horace Walpole

  Men, Effort, Style

  Horace Walpole (1848). “Letters Addressed to the Countess of Ossory, from the Year 1769 to 1797: Now First Printed from Original Mss. Edited, with Notes, by R. Vernon Smith”, p.538

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• Our Constitution professedly rests upon the good sense and attachment of the people. This basis, weak as it may appear, has not yet been found to fail.

  John Quincy Adams

  Attachment, People, May

  John Quincy Adams, William Harwood Peden (1946). “The Selected Writings of John and John Quincy Adams”

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• Good sense, good health, good conscience, and good fame,--all these belong to virtue, and all prove that virtue has a title to your love.

  William Cowper

  Titles, Virtue, Fame

  William Cowper, Robert Southey (1854). “The Works: Comprising His Poems, Correspondence and Translations : in Eight Volumes. ¬The poetical works, Vol. 1”, p.119

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• Good sense and good-nature are never separated, though the ignorant world has thought otherwise. Good-nature, by which I mean beneficence and candor, is the product of right reason.

  John Dryden

  Mean, Ignorant, World

  John Dryden (1750). “Select essays on the belles lettres”, p.95

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• It is good sense applied with diligence to what was at first a mere accident, and which by great application grew to be called, by the generality of mankind, a particular genius.

  Samuel Johnson

  Genius, Firsts, Diligence

  Samuel Johnson (1836). “Johnsoniana; or supplement to Boswell; being Anecdotes and sayings of Dr. Johnson, etc”, p.197

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