Date: 1793

"The present ruling passion of the human mind is the love of distinction. "

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1793

"The equalisation we are describing is farther indebted for its empire in the mind to the ideas with which it is attended of personal happiness."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1793

"If mind be now in a great degree the ruler of the system, why should it be incapable of extending its empire?"

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1793

"the selfish are not governed solely by sensual gratification or the love of gain, but that the desire of eminence and distinction is in different degrees an universal passion"

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1793

"Reason is the only legislator, and her decrees are irrevocable and uniform."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: w. 1795

We may "exert over our own heart a virtuous despotism, and lead our own Passions in triumph"

— Coleridge, Samuel Taylor (1772-1834)

Date: 1798

"Women have a frame of body more delicate and susceptible of impression than men, and, in proportion as they receive a less intellectual education, are more unreservedly under the empire of feeling."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"Wounded affection, wounded pride, all those principles which hold absolute empire in the purest and loftiest minds, urged her to still further experiments to recover her influence, and to a still more poignant desparation, long after reason would have directed her to desist, and resolutely call ...

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"But a connection more memorable originated about this time, between Mary and a person of her own sex, for whom she contracted a friendship so fervent, as for years to have constituted the ruling passion of her mind."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1817

"Ah! when will the yoke of Custom--Custom, the blind tyrant, of which all the other tyrants make their slave--ah! when will that misery-perpetuating yoke be shaken off?--when, when will Reason be seated on her throne?"

— Bentham, Jeremy (1748-1832)