A Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen, Volume 5

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Robert Chambers
Blackie, 1854 - Scotland
 

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Page 121 - I was assailed by one cry of reproach, disapprobation, and even detestation ; English, Scotch, and Irish, Whig and Tory, churchman and sectary, freethinker, and religionist, patriot and courtier, united in their rage against the man who had presumed to shed a generous tear for the fate of Charles I. and the earl of Strafford...
Page 116 - That no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavours to establish: and even in that case there is a mutual destruction of arguments, and the superior only gives us an assurance suitable to that degree of force, which remains, after deducting the inferior.
Page 107 - ... with a present impression, than we can hinder ourselves from thinking, as long as we are awake, or seeing the surrounding bodies, when we turn our eyes towards them in broad sunshine.
Page 110 - Never literary attempt was more unfortunate than my Treatise of Human Nature. It fell dead-born from the press, without reaching such distinction, as even to excite a murmur among the zealots.
Page 269 - To thee all Angels cry aloud : the Heavens, and all the Powers therein. To thee Cherubin, and Seraphin : continually do cry, Holy, Holy, Holy : Lord God of Sabaoth ; Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty : of thy Glory.
Page 103 - I passed through the ordinary course of education with success, and was seized very early with a passion for literature, which has been the ruling passion of my life, and the great source of my enjoyments.
Page 104 - I went over to France, with a view of prosecuting my studies in a country retreat; and I there laid that plan of life, which I have steadily and successfully pursued. I resolved to make a very rigid frugality supply my deficiency of fortune, to maintain unimpaired my independency, and to regard every object as contemptible, except the improvement of my talents in literature.
Page 118 - Though it be too obvious to escape observation that different ideas are connected together; I do not find that any philosopher has attempted to enumerate or class all the principles of association; a subject, however, that seems worthy of curiosity. To me, there appear to be only three principles of connexion among ideas, namely, Resemblance, Contiguity in time or place, and Cause or Effect.
Page 114 - His face was broad and fat, his mouth wide, and without any other expression than that of imbecility. His eyes vacant and spiritless, and the corpulence of his whole person was far better fitted to communicate the idea of a turtle-eating alderman than of a refined philosopher.
Page 4 - The Imperial Dictionary ; English, Technological, and Scientific; adapted to the present state of Literature, Science, and Art ; on the basis of Webster's English Dictionary...

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