The hankering of the mind is irresistible.

Nothing would be more profitable to us than a right history of mankind.

Morality will perform all this; and Morality is the fruit of Illumination.

Let this circumstance of our constitution therefore be directed to this noble purpose, and then all the objections urged against it by jealous tyranny and affrighted superstition will vanish.

It was the full conviction of this, and of what could be done, if every man were placed in the office for which he was fitted by nature and a proper education, which first suggested to me the plan of Illumination.

In another situation, and in an active station in life, I should have been keenly occupied, and the founding of an order would have never come into my head.