Mary Astell Quotes

46 Sourced Quotes

Your glass will not do you half so much service as a serious reflection on your own minds.

Mary Astell
Hitherto I have courted Truth with a kind of Romantick Passion, in spite of all Difficulties and Discouragements: for knowledge is thought so unnecessary an Accomplishment for a Woman, that few will give themselves the Trouble to assist us in the Attainment of it.

Mary Astell
That Man indeed can never be good at heart, who is full of himself and his own Endowments.

Mary Astell
Women need not take up with mean things, since (if they are not wanting to themselves) they are capable of the best.

Mary Astell
If God had not intended that Women shou'd use their Reason, He wou'd not have given them any, 'for He does nothing in vain.

Mary Astell
Marry for Love, an Heroick Action, which makes a mighty noise in the World, partly because of its rarity, and partly in regard of its extravagancy.

Mary Astell
How can a Man respect his Wife when he has a contemptible Opinion of her and her Sex?

Mary Astell
Every Body has so good an Opinion of their own Understanding as to think their own way the best.

Mary Astell
He who will be just, must be forc'd to acknowledge, that neither Sex are always in the right.

Mary Astell
Whilst our Hearts are violently set upon any thing, there is no convincing us that we shall ever be of another Mind.

Mary Astell
The Relation we bear to the Wisdom of the Father, the Son of His Love, gives us indeed a dignity which otherwise we have no pretence to. It makes us something, something considerable even in God's Eyes.

Mary Astell
Women are not so well united as to form an Insurrection. They are for the most part wise enough to love their Chains, and to discern how becomingly they fit.

Mary Astell
We ought as much as we can to endeavour the Perfecting of our Beings, and that we be as happy as possibly we may.

Mary Astell
.. he who only or chiefly chose for Beauty, will in a little Time find the same Reason for another Choice.

Mary Astell
If none were to Marry, but Men of strict Vertue and Honour, I doubt the World would be but thinly peopled.

Mary Astell
God is His own Design and End, and that there is no other Worthy of Him.

Mary Astell
For my part I think the Learned, and Unlearned Blockhead pretty equal; for 'tis all one to me, whether a Man talk Nonsense, or unintelligible Sense, I am diverted and edified alike by either; the one enjoys himself less, but suffers his Friends to do it more; the other enjoys himself and his own Humour enough, but will let no body else do it in his Company.

Mary Astell
A woman indeed can't properly be said to choose, all that is allowed her, is to refuse or accept what is offered.

Mary Astell
We all agree that its fit to be as Happy as we can, and we need no Instructor to teach us this Knowledge, 'tis born with us, and is inseparable from our Being, but we very much need to be Inform'd what is the true Way to Happiness.

Mary Astell
Tis very great pity that they who are so apt to over-rate themselves in smaller matters, shou'd, where it most concerns them to know, and stand upon their Value, be so insensible of their own worth.

Mary Astell
To all the rest of his Absurdities, (for vice is always unreasonable,) he adds one more, who expects that Vertue from another which he won't practise himself.

Mary Astell
The scum of the People are most Tyrannical when they get the Power, and treat their Betters with the greatest Insolence.

Mary Astell
Why is Slavery so much condemn'd and strove against in one Case, and so highly applauded and held so necessary and so sacred in another?

Mary Astell
We may not commit a lesser Sin under pretence to avoid a greater, but we may, nay we ought to endure the greatest Pain and Grief rather than commit the least Sin.

Mary Astell
For certainly there cannot be a higher pleasure than to think that we love and are beloved by the most amiable and best Being.

Mary Astell
Friendship is a virtue which comprehends all the rest; none being fit for this, who is not adorned with every other virtue.

Mary Astell
It is not the Head but the Heart that is the Seat of Atheism.

Mary Astell
Nor can the Apostle mean that Eve only sinned; or that she only was Deceived, for if Adam sinned willfully and knowingly, he became the greater Transgressor.

Mary Astell
How can you be content to be in the world like tulips in a garden, to make a fine show, and be good for nothing.

Mary Astell
But, alas! what poor Woman is ever taught that she should have a higher Design than to get her a Husband?

Mary Astell