Adam Ferguson Quotes
Adam Ferguson was an 18th-century Scottish Enlightenment philosopher and historian, often regarded as one of the founders of modern sociology. His 1767 work An Essay on the History of Civil Society offered an early account of social organisation as the unintended outcome of human action, and analysed the conditions of liberty, civic virtue, and the dangers of commercial modernity. The quotes below are attributed to Adam Ferguson, organized by topic.
Adam Ferguson on Freedom
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“Liberty is a right which every individual must be ready to vindicate for himself.”
Adam Ferguson on Politics
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“Mankind, in following the present sense of their minds, in striving to remove inconveniencies, or to gain apparent and contiguous advantages, arrive at ends which even their imagination could not anticipate.”
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“Society is more than a mere convenience; it is the natural element in which our faculties most truly develop.”
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“If nations actually borrow from their neighbours, they probably borrow only what they are nearly in a condition to have invented themselves.”
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“The boasted refinements of polished ages are not divested of danger.”
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“Without the rivalship of nations, and the practice of war, civil society itself could scarcely have found an object, or a form.”
Adam Ferguson on Virtue
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Attributed to Adam Ferguson:
“It is in the nature of man, when properly disciplined, to be sober, frugal, industrious, and honest.”