“No man ought to be so absurd as to make a purchase without looking at the title deeds; if he is, he must take the consequence of his own negligence.”
Goodtitle v. Morgan (1787), 1 T. R. 762.
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William Henry Ashurst (judge) 12
English judge 1725–1807Related quotes
4 Burr. Part IV., 2379.
Dissenting in Millar v Taylor (1769)

Speech on Religious Intolerance as presented at the Pittsburgh Opera House (14 October 1879).
Context: They say the religion of your fathers is good enough. Why should a father object to your inventing a better plow than he had? They say to me, do you know more than all the theologians dead? Being a perfectly modest man I say I think I do. Now we have come to the conclusion that every man has a right to think. Would God give a bird wings and make it a crime to fly? Would he give me brains and make it a crime to think? Any God that would damn one of his children for the expression of his honest thought wouldn't make a decent thief. When I read a book and don't believe it, I ought to say so. I will do so and take the consequences like a man.

The Principles of Success in Literature (1865)
Context: A man must be himself convinced if he is to convince others. The prophet must be his own disciple, or he will make none. Enthusiasm is contagious: belief creates belief. There is no influence issuing from unbelief or from languid acquiescence. This is peculiarly noticeable in Art, because Art depends on sympathy for its influence, and unless the artist has felt the emotions he depicts we remain unmoved: in proportion to the depth of his feeling is our sympathetic response; in proportion to the shallowness or falsehood of his presentation is our coldness or indifference.

25 May 1830
Table Talk (1821–1834)


“If a man cannot make his point to keen boys in ten minutes, he ought to be shot!”
The Scouter (November 1928); Reprinted in Footsteps of the Founder (1987)