Quote#Politics & Power
Theory consists in referring particular operations to the principles,…
Quote byAdam Ferguson · 1723–1816
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Institutes of Moral Philosophy (1769), Introduction, Section IV, Of Theory, p. 7..
English (original)
Theory consists in referring particular operations to the principles, or general laws, under which they are comprehended; or in referring particular effects to the causes from which they proceed.
— Adam Ferguson
More from Adam Ferguson
Men are to be estimated, not from what they know, but from what they are able to perform.
Mankind have always wandered or settled, agreed or quarrelled, in troops and companies.
We are fond of distinctions; we place ourselves in opposition, and quarrel under the denominations of faction and party, without any material subject of controversy.
The attainments of the parent do not descend in the blood of his children, nor is the progress of man to be considered as a physical mutation of the species.
Love is an affection which carries the attention of the mind beyond itself, and is the sense of a relation to some fellow creature as to its object.
The history of mankind is confined within a limited period, and from every quarter brings an intimation that human affairs have had a beginning.