quote · Legacy record
Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.…'Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.
Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.…'Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.
Approximate author period: c. 1743 AD · early modern
Meaning not yet available
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Begin with source-checked readings and explanations ↗Attribution & collection notes
- Author or tradition
- David Hume
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin. - Historical period
- Approximate author period: c. 1743 AD · early modern
Approximate author-period anchor from life dates 1711 to 1776; Wikidata Q37160, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q37160 (accessed 2026-10-08). Not a quotation composition date.
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken. - Recorded source
- Contributor-provided quotation collection
Supplied reference C; CSV row 286064; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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