Your corn is ripe today; mine will be so tomorrow. 'Tis profitable for us both, that I should labour with you today, and that you should aid me tomorrow.
David HumeRead
The corruption of the best things gives rise to the worst.
Interpretation
What this quote means
When the best qualities are corrupted, it can lead to the worst outcomes.
David Humeβs quote suggests that the degradation or corruption of virtuous and valuable qualities can result in negative consequences. This underlines the importance of preserving integrity and goodness, as their loss can give way to detrimental outcomes, reflecting a deeper philosophical understanding of morality and the nature of humanity.
Themes
CorruptionMoralityIntegrityConsequencesVirtue
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about ethics in business, one could say, 'Remember, the corruption of the best things gives rise to the worst.'
More from David Hume
All quotes βEloquence, at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection, but addresses itself entirely to the desires and affections, captivating the willing hearers, and subduing their understanding.
David HumeRead
All that belongs to human understanding, in this deep ignorance and obscurity, is to be sceptical, or at least cautious, and not to admit of any hypothesis whatever, much less of any which is supported by no appearance of probability.
David HumeRead
The great end of all human industry is the attainment of happiness
David HumeRead
There is a very remarkable inclination in human nature to bestow on external objects the same emotions which it observes in itself, and to find every where those ideas which are most present to it.
David HumeRead
To have recourse to the veracity of the supreme Being, in order to prove the veracity of our senses, is surely making a very unexpected circuit.
David HumeRead
Similar quotes
What, all so soon asleep! I wish mine eyes Would, with themselves, shut up my thoughts.
William ShakespeareRead
Those who travel to mountain-tops are half in love with themselves, and half in love with oblivion.
Robert MacfarlaneRead
Materialism is in fact no protection. Those who seek it in that hope (they are not a negligible class) will be disappointed. The thing you fear is impossible. Well and good. Can you therefore cease to fear it? Not here and now. And what then? If you must see ghosts, it is better not to disbelieve in them.
C. S. LewisRead
It is of no use for any of you to try to be soul-winners if you are not bearing fruit in your own lives. How can you serve the Lord with your lips if you do not serve Him with your lives.? How can you preach His gospel with your tongues, when with hands, feet, and heart you are preaching the devilβs gospel, and setting up an antichrist by your practical unholiness?
Charles SpurgeonRead
There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud.
Carl SandburgRead
God cannot alter the past, though historians can.
Samuel ButlerRead