Quote Origin: No One Chooses Evil Because It Is Evil; One Only Mistakes It for Happiness, The Good One Seeks

Mary Shelley? Mary Wollstonecraft? Wednesday Addams? Epictetus? George Stanhope? Gustav Friedrich Wiggers? Question for Quote Investigator: Usually, a person does not perform an evil act simply because it is evil. Instead, the motivation is more complex. The person is pursuing their own deeply flawed vision of good. Often, the person is pursuing their own happiness …

Quote Origin: I Don’t Care Who Writes a Nation’s Laws . . . If I Can Write Its Economic Textbooks

Paul Samuelson? Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun? Percy Bysshe Shelley? Mary Shelley? Sylvia Nasar? Question for Quote Investigator: The cultural impact of economic thought has been enormous. Apparently, a famous economist once said something like this: I don’t care who writes a nation’s laws if I can write its economic textbooks. Would you please help me …

Seek Happiness in Tranquility and Avoid Ambition

Mary Shelley? Victor Frankenstein? Scott Galloway? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: English author Mary Shelley penned the famous science fiction novel “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus”. The overweening ambition of the main character, scientist Victor Frankenstein, caused him to create a monster. He learned bitterly that his passion for success and fame was destructive. Apparently, …

Nothing Contributes So Much To Tranquillize the Mind As a Steady Purpose,—a Point On Which the Soul May Fix Its Intellectual Eye

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley? Robert Walton? Victor Frankenstein? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: Finding a goal or purpose to strive for in life is wonderfully helpful; uncertainty and anxiety are replaced by mental tranquility. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley who authored the groundbreaking science fiction novel “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus” once made this point. Would you please help …