quotations about custom
There is no tyrant like custom, and no freedom where its edicts are not resisted.
BOVEE
attributed, Day's Collacon
Custom, madam, is the law of fools, but it shall never govern me.
JOHN VANBRUGH
The Provoked Husband
Custom meets us at the cradle and leaves us only at the tomb.
ROBERT G. INGERSOLL
Individuality
How many unjust and wicked things are sanctioned by custom.
TERENCE
attributed, Day's Collacon
Custom calls me to 't:
What custom wills, in all things should we do't,
The dust on antique time would lie unswept,
And mountainous error be too highly heap't
For truth to o'erpeer.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Coriolanus
When a custom is actually proved to exist, the next enquiry is into the legality of it; for if it is not a good custom it ought to be no longer used.
WILLIAM BLACKSTONE
Commentaries on the Laws of England
Custom is the first check on tyranny; that fixed routine of social life at which modern innovations chafe, and by which modern improvement is impeded, is the primitive check on base power.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
When Fashion hath once Established, what Folly or craft began, Custom makes it Sacred, and 'twill be thought impudence or madness, to contradict or question it.
JOHN LOCKE
First Treatise of Government
I cannot draw a distinction as to what length of time will render a practice legal.
C. J. DALLAS
Butt v. Conant, 1828
Everything depends on our customs and on the climates we live in. What is considered a crime here is often a virtue a few hundred leagues away; and the virtues of another hemisphere might, quite conversely, be regarded as crimes among us. There is no atrocity that hasn't been deified, no virtue that hasn't been stigmatized.
MARQUIS DE SADE
Philosophy in the Boudoir
Custom, though never so ancient, without truth, is but an old error.
CYPRIAN
attributed, Day's Collacon
Men do more things from custom than from reason.
FABARIA
attributed, Day's Collacon
No barbarian can bear to see one of his nation deviate from the old barbarous customs and usages of their tribe. Very commonly all the tribe would expect a punishment from the gods if any one of them refrained from what was old, or began what was new.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat,
Of habits devil, is angel yet in this,
That to the use of actions fair and good
He likewise gives a frock or livery,
That aptly is put on.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Hamlet
The customs of the world are so many conventional follies.
EDGAR ALLAN POE
"The Spectacles"
Cast away the bondage and the fear of rotten custom.
HARTLEY COLERIDGE
Sonnets
Custom will reconcile people to any atrocity; and fashion will drive them to acquire any custom.
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
preface, Killing For Sport
Nice customs curtsy to great kings.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Henry V
The deadliest foe to love is custom.
EDWARD BULWER-LYTTON
Devereux
What custom hath endeared
We part with sadly, though we prize it not.
JOANNA BAILLIE
Basil