Mary Astell Quotes

English - Writer November 12, 1666 - May 11, 1731

Truth is strong, and sometime or other will prevail.

Mary Astell

If all men are born free, how is it that all women are born slaves?

Mary Astell

The design of Rhetoric is to remove those Prejudices that lie in the way of Truth, to Reduce the Passions to the Government of Reasons; to place our Subject in a Right Light, and excite our Hearers to a due consideration of it.

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

None of God's Creatures absolutely consider'd are in their own Nature Contemptible; the meanest Fly, the poorest Insect has its Use and Vertue.

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

Every one knows, that the mind will not be kept from contemplating what it loves in the midst of crowds and business. Hence come those frequent absences, so observable in conversation; for whilst the body is confined to present company, the mind is flown to that which it delights in.

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

The Steps to Folly as well as Sin are gradual, and almost imperceptible, and when we are once on the Decline, we go down without taking notice on't.

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