Decision quotes — Page 2

Cooper Union Address, February 27, 1860, closing passage. Lincoln is defending Republican opposition to the extension of slavery into federal territories; the line retains that antislavery political context.

Cooper Union Address, February 27, 1860. The sentence appears in Lincoln’s closing argument about opposing slavery’s spread and should not be detached into a context-free command about every disputed duty.

Lyceum Address, January 27, 1838. Lincoln is discussing mob violence, disregard for law and the preservation of republican institutions; the sentence is not a generic prediction about national collapse.

Moral printed after “Hercules and the Wagoner” in the Townsend translation; Hercules first tells the driver to help himself.

Moral printed after “The Lion, the Fox, and the Ass”; the fox changes his conduct after observing the ass’s fate.

Moral printed after “The Monkeys and Their Mother” in the Townsend translation.

Moral printed after “The Oak and the Woodcutters”; the oak laments wedges made from its own branches.

Joseph Jacobs, The Fables of Aesop, “The Shepherd Boy and the Wolf,” Project Gutenberg #28. The wise man of the village gives the moral after the boy’s repeated false cries cause the villagers to ignore his real warning.

Moral printed after “The Widow and the Sheep”; the widow injures the sheep while trying to avoid the shearer’s expense.

The Federalist No. 70, reviewed against the Gideon-edition Wikisource transcription. Hamilton's 'Energy in the executive...' sentence introduces his constitutional case for executive unity, duration, support and competent powers; it remains eighteenth-century institutional argument rather than a timeless empirical rule about government.

An Essay on Criticism, Part III; Pope warns against reckless confidence and poor judgment in critics.

An Essay on Criticism; original capitalization is lightly normalized elsewhere on the site.

Andrew Carnegie, 'Wealth,' North American Review, June 1889 (the first essay later known as The Gospel of Wealth). It is historical philanthropic/economic argument rather than a settled economic finding.

Nicomachean Ethics, Book II; Aristotle explains virtue as something developed through corresponding actions.

Nicomachean Ethics, Book I; the opening argument begins from the idea that action aims at a perceived good.

Politics: A Treatise on Government, Book III, Chapter XVI, William Ellis translation; represented through the 1912 Dent witness / Project Gutenberg #6762. In comparing rule by a person with rule by law, Aristotle says that passion can affect even the best rulers and concludes that law is reason without desire.

How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, discussion of beginning a programme of self-directed use of spare time. The sentence is practical encouragement within Bennett’s period self-improvement argument.

How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, “Dangers to Avoid.” Bennett is warning against becoming enslaved to an over-ambitious personal programme; “attempt less” is adjustment advice, not a general rejection of ambition.

The Human Machine, concluding emphasis on present practice over distant aspiration. The idiom “needs a lot of beating” means the ambition is difficult to surpass, not that it requires violence.

On the Art of Writing, Lecture XII, “On Style,” Project Gutenberg #17470; the phrase concludes Quiller-Couch’s warning against purchased or extraneous ornament.

Essay “On Books and Reading”; Schopenhauer connects literary selection directly with limited time and strength.

Poor Richard’s Almanack.

The Morals of Chess; Founders Online authoritative Franklin Papers text. The wording begins mid-sentence after Franklin’s condition that the game is not being played rigorously; source context is preserved here.

Benjamin Franklin, The Morals of Chess, rule 3 in the reviewed public-domain Wikisource transcription. 'No false move should ever be made...' appears in Franklin's etiquette for fair play and functions as an ethical analogy about honesty in competition, not game-theory or behavioral-science evidence.

The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855. The line appears in a short verse warning against pride-driven spending on dress.

The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855. “Pennyworth” refers to an apparent bargain and the warning is about false economy.

The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855. Father Abraham uses the maxim while warning auction buyers against purchases made only because they seem cheap.

The Future of the American Negro, Chapter VIII; Project Gutenberg #26507. The sentence appears in Washington’s closing policy discussion immediately after his summary of dangers and immediately before his qualification that he may also be in some degree right.

The Future of the American Negro, Chapter VIII; Project Gutenberg #26507. This short excerpt appears in Washington’s closing policy discussion, where he distinguishes ordinary political cooperation from cases involving a question of right or wrong and advises standing by principle in those cases.

Great Expectations (1861), global Chapter XVII / Volume I Chapter XVII in the Chapman & Hall three-volume first book edition. Pip tells Biddy that the simpler life he might have led at the forge was “much to be regretted,” then admits that his ambitions make that lost alternative impossible to restore. Verified against the scan-backed Wikisource Chapter XVII transcription and cross-checked with Project Gutenberg #1400. This remains Pip’s retrospective fictional narration and dialogue, not Dickens autobiography.

Great Expectations (1861), global Chapter XL / Volume III Chapter I in the Chapman & Hall three-volume first book edition. Mr. Jaggers tells Pip “Take nothing on its looks; take everything on evidence. There’s no better rule” while insisting that he has stayed to the strict line of fact about Pip’s benefactor. Verified against the scan-backed Wikisource Volume III Chapter I transcription and cross-checked with Project Gutenberg #1400. This remains fictional legal dialogue and character method rather than a modern legal or scientific standard.

The Simple Life, Chapter II, Mary Louise Hendee translation, Project Gutenberg #23092; the phrase appears in Wagner’s argument for returning attention to essentials.

The Professor, early first-person narration by the fictional William Crimsworth. The novel was published posthumously in 1857; the line is character narration, not Brontë autobiography.

Villette; excerpt from Lucy Snowe’s reflection on how to advance toward a more independent position. This is fictional first-person narration, and the excerpt is not presented as Brontë speaking autobiographically.

Cato on Old Age, Shuckburgh translation.

Cato on Old Age, in Cicero’s answer to the complaint that age reduces physical strength.

De Officiis, Book I, section 47; Cicero discusses how kindness already received creates a stronger duty of requital.

De Officiis, Book II, section 33, Project Gutenberg #47001. Cicero’s larger argument says public confidence depends on practical wisdom joined with justice; intelligence alone is not presented as sufficient for trust.

The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book II connects moral recognition with the courage required for action.

The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book IV contrasts careful speech with earnest conduct.

The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book XV contrasts inward self-examination with dependence on others.

The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book XV distinguishes ordinary faults from the refusal to reform them.

Moll Flanders, Project Gutenberg #370. The fictional first-person narrator uses weather metaphor while recalling an early relationship crisis and the family’s growing hostility toward her.

Robinson Crusoe, represented by Project Gutenberg #38705. Crusoe says this while reflecting on what he interprets as secret intimations of Providence; the sentence is fictional first-person religious reflection, not evidence for supernatural guidance.

A Room with a View, Chapter XIV, Project Gutenberg #2641. The frozen catalog wording is a clause extract from the narrator’s longer sentence: “Life is easy to chronicle, but bewildering to practice, and we welcome ‘nerves’ or any other shibboleth that will cloak our personal desire.” The passage concerns Lucy Honeychurch’s self-deception in fiction, not modern psychological evidence.

Enchiridion, chapter 35, George Long translation; the following sentence distinguishes right action from fear of wrong criticism.

Crime and Punishment, Part I, Chapter I, printed page 2 / Wikisource scan leaf 34, Constance Garnett translation in the scan-backed 1917 Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction / P. F. Collier & Son edition, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #2554. Raskolnikov thinks “Taking a new step, uttering a new word is what they fear most” while walking toward the pawnbroker during his contemplated “rehearsal”; the line remains morally compromised fictional interior monologue rather than generic motivational advice.

Daniel Deronda; spoken by Mordecai during his argument about Jewish national renewal, action, memory and a future Judea. The specific speaker and political-religious context are essential.

The Life of Reason; the line appears in Santayana’s analysis of ideas, activity, and sustained direction.

The Invisible Man, Chapter IX, “Mr. Thomas Marvel,” Project Gutenberg #5230. Griffin tells Thomas Marvel that “An invisible man is a man of power” while coercing the frightened stranger into becoming his helper; Chapter X begins immediately after this exchange. The line remains fictional character speech within Wells’s critique of Griffin’s power fantasy rather than a general endorsement of domination.

Daisy Miller: A Study, Project Gutenberg #208. Daisy speaks to Winterbourne in Rome; the line is fictional dialogue shaped by the novella’s conflict over convention, reputation and autonomy.

The Portrait of a Lady, Volume I, Project Gutenberg #2833. Isabel says this to Caspar Goodwood while resisting his proposal and his argument that marriage would make her more independent.

Bartleby, the Scrivener, Project Gutenberg #11231. Bartleby speaks this line when the lawyer asks him to help examine copied documents; it is fictional character dialogue, not a general prescription to refuse work or obligations.

As a Man Thinketh, chapter “Effect of Thought on Circumstances.”

The Mastery of Destiny, “Training of the Will,” rule four; Wikisource 1909 text. It is practical self-discipline advice in Allen’s period framework.

Pride and Prejudice, Chapter XI, Project Gutenberg #1342. Fitzwilliam Darcy says this to Elizabeth Bennet during their discussion of faults; Elizabeth immediately identifies the position as implacable resentment, so the novel itself does not leave the maxim unchallenged.

Democracy and Education (1916), Chapter XI, “Experience and Thinking.” Dewey describes experience as a relation between doing and undergoing consequences, then immediately qualifies the active-passive formulation by saying that valuable experience includes cognition insofar as relationships and continuities are perceived. Verified against Project Gutenberg #852 and the scan-backed Wikisource Chapter XI transcription. The sentence is not a denial that cognition matters and is not presented as modern neuroscientific evidence.

Democracy and Education (1916), Chapter XXII, “The Individual and the World.” Dewey defines the educational sense of freedom through the personal part played by thinking in learning—intellectual initiative, independent observation, invention, foresight and adaptation—while also arguing that this mental freedom requires room for exploration and movement. Verified against Project Gutenberg #852 and the scan-backed Wikisource Chapter XXII transcription. This is historical educational philosophy, not a modern clinical or legal definition of autonomy.

How We Think (1910), Chapter VIII, “Judgment: The Interpretation of Facts,” section 1, printed page 106, Project Gutenberg #37423. Dewey says the thinker must choose among candidate meanings for a perplexing situation and therefore accepts risk; the prudent thinker selects warily and remains answerable to later confirmation or frustration. This is part of Dewey’s historical educational/logical account of reflective judgment, not a modern decision-science finding.

How We Think (1910), Chapter VIII, “Judgment: The Interpretation of Facts,” section 1, printed page 107, Project Gutenberg #37423. Dewey identifies a formed judgment as a decision that closes the issue at hand and may help establish a method for analogous later cases. The statement belongs to his early-twentieth-century theory of reflective judgment rather than current clinical, neuroscientific or experimentally settled cognitive science.

Human Nature and Conduct (1922), Part Four, Section III, “What is Freedom?”, printed page 304, Project Gutenberg #41386. Dewey states “Intelligence is the key to freedom in act” while arguing that effective action depends on consulting conditions and forming plans that enlist their cooperation; the following page stresses study, foresight and adaptation. This is historical philosophical / social-psychological argument rather than current neuroscientific or experimentally settled behavioral evidence.

Considerations on Representative Government (1861), Chapter V, “Of the Proper Functions of Representative Bodies,” Project Gutenberg #5669. This is historical constitutional and administrative theory rather than a current hiring standard.

On Liberty, Chapter III, in Mill’s discussion of individuality and self-directed choice.

On Liberty, Chapter III, “Of Individuality, as One of the Elements of Well-Being”; Project Gutenberg #34901. The sentence follows Mill's list of perception, judgment, discriminative feeling, mental activity and moral preference as faculties exercised through making a choice.

Proverbs 11:14 in the King James Version.

Proverbs 11:3 in the King James Version; the opening clause is quoted here.

Proverbs 16:9 in the King James Version.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Chapter 12; the Queen interrupts the trial with the reversed command.

Eight Cousins; Or, The Aunt-Hill, Chapter 21, Project Gutenberg #38567. Rose chooses Uncle Alec when relatives ask which household she wants to join.

Meditations 10.16; wording varies by translation.

Meditations, Book XII, section 20, George Long translation.

Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, Letter I; represented Cassell & Company 1889 text in Project Gutenberg #3529, preserving Wollstonecraft’s 1796 travel-letter work. After describing the customary maritime rule against sending out a boat, Wollstonecraft says that “men with common minds seldom break through general rules” while criticizing the captain’s reluctance to depart from convention. This is a first-person travel judgment about a particular situation, not a general empirical claim about ordinary people.

“The Ransom of Red Chief,” represented in Project Gutenberg #1595. The first-person narrator introduces the kidnappers’ scheme with comic foreshadowing; the story satirizes their criminal plan rather than endorsing it.

The Art of Money Getting, economy discussion; Project Gutenberg #8581. The sentence follows Barnum’s warning about trying to appear richer than one is.

The Art of Money Getting, “Avoid Debt”; Project Gutenberg #8581. Barnum uses the servant-and-master metaphor while contrasting interest working for versus against the borrower.

Plato, Laws, Book V, the Athenian Stranger giving an extended civic-ethical exhortation to Cleinias and Megillus; Benjamin Jowett English, Gutenberg #1750. This is dialogue speech, not commentary in Jowett’s introduction. The local dramatic voice is the Athenian Stranger, not Socrates or Plato personally.

The Republic, Book IV; the statement summarizes a definition developed within Socrates’ argument about the ordered city.

Proverbs 18:13 in the King James Version.

King James Version, Proverbs 3:5. This is explicitly religious wisdom literature; this collection keeps its theological trust context visible instead of converting it into generic self-help advice.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, maxim 5, in Darius Lyman’s 1856 English rendering; maxim order can vary across editions.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, maxim 14, in Darius Lyman’s 1856 English rendering; maxim order can vary across editions.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, maxim 2, in Darius Lyman’s 1856 English rendering; maxim order can vary across editions.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, maxim 8, in Darius Lyman’s 1856 English rendering; maxim order can vary across editions.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, saying 156, D. Lyman Jr. translation (1856).

Gitanjali, poem 4, in Tagore’s own prose translations from Bengali; Project Gutenberg #7164. The omitted continuation explicitly attributes the strength to act to the divine addressee, so the line remains religious rather than generic productivity advice.

Rasselas, Chapter XXI; spoken by Imlac while challenging the assumption that apparently wise people deliberately chose the condition they inhabit.

Rasselas, Chapter XXX; Imlac argues that studying history helps people understand the sources of present benefits and harms.

The Idler, No. 90; Johnson is discussing gesture and public speaking, not asserting that every inherited custom should remain untouched.

Character, Chapter I, “Influence of Character,” Project Gutenberg #2541. The sentence follows Smiles’s claim that character is formed through minute circumstances and daily discipline, emphasizing that even apparently trivial acts carry consequences.

Character, Chapter I, “Influence of Character,” Project Gutenberg #2541. The sentence closes Smiles’s paragraph on truthfulness as veracity, rectitude and practical reliableness, explaining why dependable words and actions earn general confidence.

The Life of George Stephenson and of his Son Robert Stephenson, Chapter XI, “Chat Moss—Construction of the Railway”; represented 1868 revised edition, Project Gutenberg #46229. Smiles records Stephenson’s first-person recollection of the directors’ crisis over Chat Moss in quoted speech.

“A White Heron,” represented in Project Gutenberg #74980. The narrator asks this after Sylvia refuses to reveal the heron’s nesting place to a likable young hunter; the question preserves the story’s tension between human attachment, loyalty to nature and irreversible choice.

On the Shortness of Life, Chapter I; John W. Basore translation, concluding Seneca’s opening comparison between life and wealth under a good guardian.

The Art of War, Chapter III “Attack by Stratagem,” section 17, Lionel Giles translation (1910), printed page 24 / scan leaf 80 in the original Giles edition on Wikisource, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #17405. “He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight” is the first of five listed military essentials for victory; it remains battlefield-strategy judgment rather than a context-free maxim about every disagreement.

The Art of War, Chapter III “Attack by Stratagem,” section 18, Lionel Giles translation (1910), beginning on printed page 24 / scan leaf 80 and continuing onto printed page 25 / scan leaf 81 in the original Giles edition on Wikisource, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #17405. The enemy/self-knowledge sentence closes Chapter III’s discussion of conditions for victory and remains translation-mediated military strategy rather than a modern psychological or self-help claim.

The Art of War, Chapter I 'Laying Plans,' section 18, Lionel Giles translation (1910), original scan leaf 62. 'All warfare is based on deception' begins Giles's section 18 before the examples of seeming unable, inactive, near or far. This remains translation-mediated ancient military strategy, not generic business, relationship or current operational advice.

The Art of War, Chapter XI 'The Nine Situations,' section 19, Lionel Giles translation (1910), original scan leaf 178 / printed page 122. 'Rapidity is the essence of war' introduces the instruction to exploit unreadiness, unexpected routes and unguarded positions; it remains historical battlefield strategy, not current operational guidance.

The Art of War, Chapter II “Waging War,” section 19, Lionel Giles translation (1910), printed page 16 / scan leaf 72 in Giles’s original full edition on Wikisource, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #17405. “In war, then, let your great object be victory, not lengthy campaigns” is the chapter’s concluding strategic principle immediately before the statement about the commander and the people’s fate. It remains ancient battlefield/statecraft argument, not current military operational advice or a context-free productivity maxim.

The Art of War, Chapter II “Waging War,” section 6, Lionel Giles translation (1910), printed page 12 / scan leaf 68 in Giles’s original full edition on Wikisource, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #17405. “There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare” closes the opening argument about weapons, strength, treasure and state resources being exhausted by a protracted campaign. It remains ancient military-strategy argument in translation, not a generic business, relationship or current geopolitical rule.

Dhammapada 158, Chapter XII “Self,” Max Müller translation; the sequence emphasizes governing one’s own conduct before attempting to guide others.