“If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. Once begun upon this downward path, you never know where you are to stop. Many a man has dated his ruin from some murder or other that perhaps he thought little of at the time.”

"A Second Paper on Murder Considered as One of the Fine Arts" (1839). Source: Thomas de Quincy. On Murder (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2006), 84

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next…" by Thomas De Quincey?
Thomas De Quincey photo
Thomas De Quincey 13
English author 1785–1859

Related quotes

Ani DiFranco photo
Tryon Edwards photo
Abraham Lincoln photo
Wilhelm Reich photo

“The great man, at one time, also was a very little man, but he developed one important ability: he learned to see where he was small in his thinking, and actions.”

Listen, Little Man! (1948)
Context: You are different from the really great man in only one thing: The great man, at one time, also was a very little man, but he developed one important ability: he learned to see where he was small in his thinking, and actions. Under the pressure of some task which was dear to him he learned better and better to sense the threat that comes from his smallness and pettiness. The great man, then, knows when and in what he is a little man.

Dr. Seuss photo

“Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas… perhaps… means a little bit more!”

Variant: "Maybe Christmas...", he thought, "... Doesn't come from a store."
"Maybe Christmas... perhaps... means a little bit more!"
Source: How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1957)

Louis-ferdinand Céline photo
Halldór Laxness photo
Bertrand Russell photo

“No man is liberated from fear who dare not see his place in the world as it is; no man can achieve the greatness of which he is capable until he has allowed himself to see his own littleness.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Dreams and Facts (1919)
1910s

Abraham Lincoln photo

Related topics