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Atheism Is A System Which Can Communicate Neither Warmth Nor Illumination, Except From Those Fagots Which Your Mistaken Zeal Has Lighted Up For Its Destruction.

-Charles Caleb Colton

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Atheism Is A System

Charles Caleb Colton

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Atheism Is A System Which Can Communicate Neither Warmth Nor Illumination, Except From Those Fagots Which Your Mistaken Zeal Has Lighted Up For Its Destruction.

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We Own Almost All Our Knowledge Not To Those Who Have Agreed But To Those Who Have Differed.

It Is Best, If Possible, To Deceive No One; For He That ... Begins By Deceiving Others, Will End ... By Deceiving Himself.

Deceiving Others

When We Feel A Strong Desire To Thrust Our Advice Upon Others, It Is Usually Because We Suspect Their Weakness; But We Ought Rather To Suspect Our Own.

The Hand That Unnerved Belshazzar Derived Its Most Horrifying Influence From The Want Of A Body, And Death Itself Is Not Formidable In What We Do Know Of It, But In What We Do Not.

There Is This Paradox In Pride - It Makes Some Men Ridiculous, But Prevents Others From Becoming So.

A Wise Man May Be Duped As Well As A Fool; But The Fool Publishes The Triumph Of His Deceiver; The Wise Man Is Silent, And Denies That Triumph To An Enemy Which He Would Hardly Concede To A Friend; A Triumph That Proclaims His Own Defeat.

It Is Not Every Man That Can Afford To Wear A Shabby Coat; And Worldly Wisdom Dictates To Her Disciples The Propriety Of Dressing Somewhat Beyond Their Means, But Of Living Somewhat Within Them,--for Every One, Sees How We Dress, But None See How We Live, Except We Choose To Let Them. But The Truly Great Are, By Universal Suffrage, Exempted From These Trammels, An May Live Or Dress As They Please.

Gaming Is The Child Of Avarice, But The Parent Of Prodigality.

There Is No Quality Of The Mind, Or Of The Body, That So Instantaneously And Irresistibly Captivates, As Wit. An Elegant Writer Has Observed That Wit May Do Very Well For A Mistress, But That He Should Prefer Reason For A Wife. He That Deserts The Latter, And Gives Himself Up Entirely To The Guidance Of The Former, Will Certainly Fall Into Many Pitfalls And Quagmires, Like Him Who Walks By Flashes Of Lightning, Rather Than The Steady Beams Of The Sun.

It Is Doubtful Whether Mankind Are Most Indebted To Those Who Like Bacon And Butler Dig The Gold From The Mine Of Literature, Or To Those Who, Like Paley, Purify It, Stamp It, Fix Its Real Value, And Give It Currency And Utility

That Writer Does The Most Who Gives His Reader The Most Knowledge And Takes From Him The Least Time.

Nothing More Completely Baffles One Who Is Full Of Trick And Duplicity Than Straigthforward And Simple Integrity In Another. A Knave Would Rather Quarrel With A Brother Knave Than With A Fool, But He Would Rather Avoid A Quarrel With One Honest Man Than With Both. He Can Combat A Fool By Management And Address, And He Can Conquer A Knave By Temptations. But The Honest Man Is Neither To Be Bamboozled Nor Bribed.

If We Trace The History Of Most Revolutions, We Shall Find That The First Inroads Upon The Laws Have Been Made By The Governors, As Often As By The Governed.

He That Swells In Prosperity Will Be Sure To Shrink In Adversity.

Constant Success Shows Us But One Side Of The World; Adversity Brings Out The Reverse Of The Picture.

Congratulations

The Whole Family Of Pride And Ignorance Are Incestuous, And Mutually Beget Each Other

The Art Of Declamation Has Been Sinking In Value From The Moment That Speakers Were Foolish Enough To Publish, And Hearers Wise Enough To Read.

Alas! How Has The Social Spirit Of Christianity Been Perverted By Fools At One Time, And By Knaves And Bigots At Another; By The Self-tormentors Of The Cell, And The All-tormentors Of The Conclave!

We Shall At All Times Chance Upon Men Of Recondite Acquirements, But Whose Qualifications, From The Incommunicative And Inactive Habits Of Their Owners, Are As Utterly Useless To Others As Though The Possessors Had Them Not.

Make No Enemies; He Is Insignificant Indeed That Can Do Thee No Harm.

Worldly Wisdom Dictates To Her Disciples The Propriety Of Dressing Somewhat Beyond Their Means, But Of Living Somewhat Within Them.

Many Books Owe Their Success To The Good Memories Of Their Authors And The Bad Memories Of Their Readers.

It Is Seldom That Statesmen Have The Option Of Choosing Between A Good And An Evil.

"lawyers Are": The Only Civil Delinquents Whose Judges Must Of Necessity Be Chosen From (amongst) Themselves.

Wealth After All Is A Relative Thing Since He That Has Little And Wants Less Is Richer Than He That Has Much And Wants More.

Greatest Wealth

Fortune, Like Other Females, Prefers A Lover To A Master, And Submits With Impatience To Control; But He That Wooes Her With Opportunity And Importunity Will Seldom Court Her In Vain.

Subtlety Will Sometimes Give Safety, No Less Than Strength; And Minuteness Has Sometimes Escaped, Where Magnitude Would Have Been Crushed. The Little Animal That Kills The Boa Is Formidable Chiefly From Its Insignificance, Which Is Incompressible By The Folds Of Its Antagonist.

The Science Of Mathematics Performs More Than It Promises, But The Science Of Metaphysics Promises More Than It Performs.

Injuries Accompanied With Insults Are Never Forgiven: All Men, On These Occasions, Are Good Haters, And Lay Out Their Revenge At Compound Interest.

The Highest Knowledge Can Be Nothing More Than The Shortest And Clearest Road To Truth; All The Rest Is Pretension, Not Performance, Mere Verbiage And Grandiloquence, From Which We Can Learn Nothing.

If We Steal Thoughts From The Moderns, It Will Be Cried Down As Plagiarism; If From The Ancients, It Will Be Cried Up As Erudition.

Those That Know The Least Of Others Think The Highest Of Themselves.

If You Are Under Obligations To Many, It Is Prudent To Postpone The Recompensing Of One, Until It Be In Your Power To Remunerate All; Otherwise You Will Make More Enemies By What You Give, Than By What You Withhold.

Religion Has Treated Knowledge Sometimes As An Enemy, Sometimes As A Hostage; Often As A Captive And More Often As A Child; But Knowledge Has Become Of Age, And Religion Must Either Renounce Her Acquaintance, Or Introduce Her As A Companion And Respect Her As A Friend.

God Is On The Side Of Virtue; For Whoever Dreads Punishment Suffers It, And Whoever Deserves It, Dreads It .

The French Have A Saying That Whatever Excellence A Man May Exhibit In A Public Station He Is Very Apt To Be Ridiculous In A Private One.

To Be A Mere Verbal Critic Is What No Man Of Genius Would Be If He Could; But To Be A Critic Of True Taste And Feeling Is What No Man Without Genius Could Be If He Would.

Shakespeare, Butler And Bacon Have Rendered It Extremely Difficult For All Who Come After Them To Be Sublime, Witty Or Profound.

Some Reputed Saints That Have Been Canonized Ought To Have Been Cannonaded.

Hannibal Knew Better How To Conquer Than How To Profit By The Conquest; And Napoleon Was More Skilful In Taking Positions Than In Maintaining Them. As To Reverses, No General Cart Presume To Say That He May Not Be Defeated; But He Can, And Ought To Say, That He Will Not Be Surprised.

Posthumous Fame Is A Plant Of Tardy Growth, For Our Body Must Be The Seed Of It; Or We May Liken It To A Torch, Which Nothing But The Last Spark Of Life Can Light Up; Or We May Compare It To The Trumpet Of The Archangel, For It Is Blown Over The Dead; But Unlike That Awful Blast, It Is Of Earth, Not Of Heaven, And Can Neither Rouse Nor Raise Us.

To Despise Our Own Species Is The Price We Must Often Pay For Knowledge Of It.

The Gamester, If He Die A Martyr To His Profession, Is Doubly Ruined. He Adds His Soul To Every Other Loss, And By The Act Of Suicide, Renounces Earth To Forfeit Heaven.

This World Cannot Explain Its Own Difficulties Without The Assistance Of Another.

Folly Disgusts Us Less By Her Ignorance Than Pedantry By Her Learning.

We Often Pretend To Fear What We Really Despise, And More Often Despise What We Really Fear.

Sometimes The Greatest Adversities Turn Out To Be The Greatest Blessings.

He That Dies A Martyr Proves That He Was Not A Knave, But By No Means That He Was Not A Fool.

The Greatest Genius Is Never So Great As When It Is Chastised And Subdued By The Highest Reason.

There Is This Of Good In Real Evils; They Deliver Us, While They Last, From The Petty Despotism Of All That Were Imaginary.

There Are Two Things Which Ought To Teach Us To Think But Meanly Of Human Glory; The Very Best Have Had Their Calumniators, The Very Worst Their Panegyrists.

If You Cannot Avoid A Quarrel With A Blackguard, Let Your Lawyer Manage It, Rather Than Yourself. No Man Sweeps His Own Chimney, But Employs A Chimney-sweeper, Who Has No Objection To Dirty Work, Because It Is His Trade.

An Honest Man Will Continue To Be So Though Surrounded On All Sides By Rogues.

If Kings Would Only Determine Not To Extend Their Dominions Until They Had Filled Them With Happiness, They Would Find The Smallest Territories Too Large, But The Longest Life Too Short For The Full Accomplishment Of So Grand And So Noble An Ambition.

Mystery Magnifies Danger, As A Fog The Sun, The Hand That Warned Belshazzar Derived Its Horrifying Effect From The Want Of A Body.

We Should Choose Our Books As We Would Our Companions, For Their Sterling And Intrinsic Merit.

We Are More Inclined To Hate One Another For Points On Which We Differ, Than To Love One Another For Points On Which We Agree. The Reason Perhaps Is This: When We Find Others That Agree With Us, We Seldom Trouble Ourselves To Confirm That Agreement; But When We Chance On Those Who Differ From Us, We Are Zealous Both To Convince And To Convert Them. Our Pride Is Hurt By The Failure, And Disappointed Pride Engenders Hatred.

Some Well-meaning Christians Tremble For Their Salvation, Because They Have Never Gone Through That Valley Of Tears And Of Sorrow, Which They Have Been Taught To Consider As An Ordeal That Must Be Passed Through Before They Can Arrive At Regeneration. To Satisfy Such Minds, It May Be Observed, That The Slightest Sorrow For Sin Is Sufficient, If It Produce Amendment, And That The Greatest Is Insufficient, If It Do Not.

Our Minds Are As Different As Our Faces. We Are All Traveling To One Destination: Happiness, But Few Are Going By The Same Road.

Criticism Discloses That Which It Would Fain Conceal, But Conceals That Which It Professes To Disclose; It Is Therefore, Read By The Discerning, Not To Discover The Merits Of An Author, But The Motives Of His Critic.

Power. Like The Diamond, Dazzles The Beholder, And Also The Wearer; It Dignifies Meanness; It Magnifies Littleness; To What Is Contemptible, It Gives Authority; To What Is Low, Exaltation. To Acquire It, Appears Not More Difficult Than To Be Dispossessed Of It When Acquired, Since It Enables The Holder To Shift His Own Errors On Dependents, And To Take Their Merits To Himself. But The Miracle Of Losing It Vanishes, When We Reflect That We Are As Liable To Fall As To Rise, By The Treachery Of Others; And That To Say "i Am" Is Language That Has Been Appropriated Exclusively To God!

The Pride Of Ancestry Is A Superstructure Of The Most Imposing Height, But Resting On The Most Flimsy Foundation. It Is Ridiculous Enough To Observe The Hauteur With Which The Old Nobility Look Down On The New. The Reason Of This Puzzled Me A Little, Until I Began To Reflect That Most Titles Are Respectable Only Because They Are Old; If New, They Would Be Despised, Because All Those Who Now Admire The Grandeur Of The Stream Would See Nothing But The Impurity Of The Source.

With The Offspring Of Genius, The Law Of Parturition Is Reversed; The Throes Are In The Conception, The Pleasure In The Birth.

In Life We Shall Find Many Men That Are Great, And Some That Are Good, But Very Few Men That Are Both Great And Good.

It Is Not Until We Have Passed Through The Furnace That We Are Made To Know How Much Dross There Is In Our Composition.

It Is Astonishing How Much More People Are Interested In Lengthening Life Than Improving It.

Purity Lives And Derives Its Life Solely From The Spirit Of God.

False Reasoners Are Often Best Confuted By Giving Them The Full Swing Of Their Own Absurdities.

With Books, As With Companions, It Is Of More Consequence To Know Which To Avoid, Than Which To Choose; For Good Books Are As Scarce As Good Companions...

There Are Male As Well As Female Gossips.

When The Frustration Of My Helplessness Seemed Greatest, I Discovered God's Grace Was More Than Sufficient. And After My Imprisonment, I Could Look Back And See How God Used My Powerlessness For His Purpose. What He Has Chosen For My Most Significant Witness Was Not My Triumphs Or Victories, But My Defeat.

Knowledge Is Two-fold, And Consists Not Only In An Affirmation Of What Is True, But In The Negation Of That Which Is False.

Idleness Is The Grand Pacific Ocean Of Life, And In That Stagnant Abyss The Most Salutary Things Produce No Good, The Most Noxious No Evil. Vice, Indeed, Abstractedly Considered, May Be, And Often Is Engendered In Idleness; But The Moment It Becomes Efficiently Vice, It Must Quit Its Cradle And Cease To Be Idle.

Duke Chartres Used To Boast That No Man Could Have Less Real Value For Character Than Himself, Yet He Would Gladly Give Twenty Thousand Pounds For A Good One, Because He Could Immediately Make Double That Sum By Means Of It.

In Civil Jurisprudence It Too Often Happens That There Is So Much Law, That There Is No Room For Justice, And That The Claimant Expires Of Wrong In The Midst Of Right, As Mariners Die Of Thirst In The Midst Of Water.

Oppression Cannot Prosper Where None Will Submit To Be Enslaved.

The Seat Of Perfect Contentment Is In The Head; For Every Individual Is Thoroughly Satisfied With His Own Proportion Of Brains.

Too High An Appreciation Of Our Own Talents Is The Chief Cause Why Experience Preaches To Us All In Vain.

Some Read To Think, These Are Rare; Some To Write, These Are Common; And Some Read To Talk, And These Form The Great Majority.

War Is A Game In Which Princes Seldom Win, The People Never.

If You Would Be Known, And Not Know, Vegetate In A Village; If You Would Know, And Not Be Known, Live In A City.

Love Is An Alliance Of Friendship And Animalism; If The Former Predominates It Is Passion Exalted And Refined; If The Latter, Gross And Sensual.

Lost Friendship

We Often Regret We Did Not Do Otherwise, When That Very Otherwise Would, In All Probability, Have Done For Us.

He That Openly Tells, His Friends All That He Thinks Of Them, Must Expect That They Will Secretly Tell His Enemies Much That They Do Not Think Of Him.

As In The Game Of Billiards, The Balls Are Constantly Producing Effects From Mere Chance, Which The Most Skillful Player Could Neither Execute Nor Foresee, But Which, When They Do Happen, Serve Mainly To Teach Him How Much He Has Still To Learn; So It Is In The Most Profound And Complicated Game Of Politics And Diplomacy. In Both Cases, We Can Only Regulate Our Play By What We Have Seen, Rather Than By What We Have Hoped; And By What We Have Experienced, Rather Than By What We Have Expected.

Sloth, If It Has Prevented Many Crimes, Has Also Smothered Many Virtues.

Fashion ... Has Brought Every Thing Into Vogue, By Turns.

The Society Of Dead Authors Has This Advantage Over That Of The Living: They Never Flatter Us To Our Faces, Nor Slander Us Behind Our Backs, Nor Intrude Upon Our Privacy, Nor Quit Their Shelves Until We Take Them Down.

The Head Of Dullness, Unlike The Tail Of The Torpedo, Loses Nothing Of The Benumbing And Lethargizing Influence By Reiterated Discharges.

The Next Thing To Having Wisdom Ourselves, Is To Profit By That Of Others.

It Is Sufficiently Humiliating To Our Nature To Reflect That Our Knowledge Is But As She Rivulet, Our Ignorance As The Sea. On Points Of The Highest Interest, The Moment We Quit The Light Of Revelation We Shall Find That Platonism Itself Is Intimately Connected With Pyrrhonism, And The Deepest Inquiry With The Darkest Doubt.

Attempts At Reform, When They Fail, Strengthen Despotism, As He That Struggles Tightens Those Cords He Does Not Succeed In Breaking.

When You Have Nothing To Say, Say Nothing; A Weak Defense Strengthens Your Opponent, And Silence Is Less Injurious Than A Bad Reply.

There Is More Jealousy Between Rival Wits Than Rival Beauties, For Vanity Has No Sex. But In Both Cases There Must Be Pretensions, Or There Will Be No Jealousy.

Living Authors, Therefore, Are Usually, Bad Companions. If They Have Not Gained Character, They Seek To Do So By Methods Often Ridiculous, Always Disgusting; And If They Have Established A Character, They Are Silent For Fear Of Losing By Their Tongue What They Have Acquired By Their Pen--for Many Authors Converse Much More Foolishly Than Goldsmith, Who Have Never Written Half So Well.

There Are Three Kinds Of Power,--wealth, Strength, And Talent; But As Old Age Always Weakens, Often Destroys, The Two Latter, The Aged Are Induced To Cling With The Greater Avidity To The Former.

He [the Miser] Falls Down And Worships The God Of This World, But Will Have Neither Its Pomps, Its Vanities Nor Its Pleasures For His Trouble.

Fame Is An Undertaker That Pays But Little Attention To The Living, But Bedizens The Dead, Furnishes Out Their Funerals, And Follows Them To The Grave

Is There Anything More Tedious Than The Often Repeated Tales Of The Old And Forgetful?

I Have Found By Experience That They Who Have Spent All Their Lives In Cities, Improve Their Talents But Impair Their Virtues; And Strengthen Their Minds But Weaken Their Morals.

There Is This Paradox In Fear: He Is Most Likely To Inspire It In Others Who Has None Himself!

Taking Things Not As They Ought To Be, But As They Are, I Fear It Must Be Allowed That Macchiavelli Will Always Have More Disciples Than Jesus.

Two Things, Well Considered, Would Prevent Many Quarrels: First, To Have It Well Ascertained Whether We Are Not Disputing About Terms, Rather Than Things; And, Secondly, To Examine Whether That On Which We Differ Is Worth Contending About.

Love Is A Volcano, The Crater Of Which No Wise Man Will Approach Too Nearly, Lest ... He Should Be Swallowed Up.

As The Rays Of The Sun, Notwithstanding Their Velocity, Injure Not The Eye, By Reason Of Their Minuteness, So The Attacks Of Envy, Notwithstanding Their Number, Ought Not To Wound Our Virtue By Reason Of Their Insignificance.

The Intoxication Of Anger, Like That Of The Grape, Shows Us To Others, But Hides Us From Ourselves.

Afflictions Sent By Providence Melt The Constancy Of The Noble Minded, But Confirm The Obduracy Of The Vile, As The Same Furnace That Liquefies The Gold, Hardens The Clay Charles Caleb Colton.

The Upright, If He Suffer Calumny To Move Him, Fears The Tongue Of Man More Than The Eye Of God.

If That Marvellous Microcosm, Man, With All The Costly Cargo Of His Faculties And Powers, Were Indeed A Rich Argosy, Fitted Out And Freighted Only For Shipwreck And Destruction, Who Amongst Us That Tolerate The Present Only From The Hope Of The Future, Who That Have Any Aspirings Of A High And Intellectual Nature About Them, Could Be Brought To Submit To The Disgusting Mortifications Of The Voyage?

As The Gout Seems Privileged To Attack The Bodies Of The Wealthy, So Ennui Seems To Exert A Similar Prerogative Over Their Minds.

Whenever We Find Ourselves More Inclined To Persecute Than To Persuade, We May Then Be Certain That Our Zeal Has More Of Pride In It Than Of Charity.

There Is A Holy Love And A Holy Rage, And Our Best Virtues Never Glow So Brightly As When Our Passions Are Excited In The Cause. Sloth, If It Has Prevented Many Crimes, Has Also Smothered Many Virtues; And The Best Of Us Are Better When Roused.

A High Degree Of Intellectual Refinement In The Female Is The Surest Pledge Society Can Have For The Improvement Of The Male.

A Town, Before It Can Be Plundered And, Deserted, Must First Be Taken; And In This Particular Venus Has Borrowed A Law From Her Consort Mars. A Woman That Wishes To Retain Her Suitor Must Keep Him In The Trenches; For This Is A Siege Which The Besieger Never Raises For Want Of Supplies, Since A Feast Is More Fatal To Love Than A Fast, And A Surfeit Than A Starvation. Inanition May Cause It To Die A Slow Death, But Repletion Always Destroys It By A Sudden One.

Love Is An Alchemist That Can Transmute Poison Into Food.

Most Men Know What They Hate, Few What They Love.

Ladies Of Fashion Starve Their Happiness To Feed Their Vanity, And Their Love To Feed Their Pride.

Were We As Eloquent As Angels We Still Would Please People Much More By Listening Rather Than Talking.

It Is A Mortifying Truth, And Ought To Teach The Wisest Of Us Humility, That Many Of The Most Valuable Discoveries Have Been The Result Of Chance Rather Than Of Contemplation, And Of Accident Rather Than Of Design.

To Know A Man, Observe How He Wins His Object, Rather Than How He Loses It; For When We Fail, Our Pride Supports Us - When We Succeed, It Betrays Us.

There Were Moments Of Despondency When Shakespeare Thought Himself No Poet, And Raphael No Painter; When The Greatest Wits Have Doubted The Excellence Of Their Happiest Efforts.

The Sceptic, When He Plunges Into The Depths Of Infidelity, Like The Miser Who Leaps From The Shipwreck, Will Find That The Treasures Which He Bears About Him Will Only Sink Him Deeper In The Abyss.

It Is The Briefest Yet Wisest Maxim Which Tells Us To Meddle Not.

If Often Happens Too, Both In Courts And In Cabinets, That There Are Two Things Going On Together,--a Main Plot And An Under-plot; And He That Understands Only One Of Them Will, In All Probability, Be The Dupe Of Both. A Mistress May Rule A Monarch, But Some Obscure Favorite May Rule The Mistress.

Fortune Has Been Considered The Guardian Divinity Of Fools; And, On This Score, She Has Been Accused Of Blindness; But It Should Rather Be Adduced As A Proof Of Her Sagacity, When She Helps Those Who Cannot Help Themselves.

Heaven May Have Happiness As Utterly Unknown To Us As The Gift Of Perfect Vision Would Be To A Man Born Blind. If We Consider The Inlets Of Pleasure From Five Senses Only, We May Be Sure That The Same Being Who Created Us Could Have Given Us Five Hundred, If He Had Pleased.

With Respect To The Authority Of Great Names, It Should Be Remembered That He Alone Deserves To Have Any Weight And Influence With Posterity, Who Has Shown Himself Superior To The Particular And Predominant Error Of His Own Times; Who, Like The Peak Of Teneriffe, Has Hailed The Intellectual Sun Before Its Beams Have Reached The Horizon Of Common Minds.

If Martyrdom Is Now On The Decline, It Is Not Because Martyrs Are Less Zealous, But Because Martyr-mongers Are More Wise. The Light Of Intellect Has Put Out The Fire Of Persecution, As Other Fires Are Observed To Smoulder Before The Light Of The Same.

He That Dies A Martyr Proves That He Was Not A Knave, But By No Means That He Was Not A Fool; Since The Most Absurd Doctrines Are Not Without Such Evidence As Martyrdom Can Produce. A Martyr, Therefore, By The Mere Act Of Suffering, Can Prove Nothing But His Own Faith.

We Are Ruined, Not By What We Really Want, But By What We Think We Do; Therefore Never Go Abroad In Search Of Your Wants; If They Be Real Wants, They Will Come Home In Search Of You; For He That Buys What He Does Not Want, Will Soon Want What He Cannot Buy.

In Its Primary Signification, All Vice, That Is, All Excess, Brings On Its Own Punishment, Even Here. By Certain Fixed, Settled And Established Laws Of Him Who Is The God Of Nature, Excess Of Every Kind Destroys That Constitution Which Temperance Would Preserve. The Debauchee Offers Up His Body A "living Sacrifice To Sin.

Antithesis May Be The Blossom Of Wit, But It Will Never Arrive At Maturity Unless Sound Sense Be The Trunk And Truth The Root.

Men Of Strong Minds And Who Think For Themselves, Should Not Be Discouraged On Finding Occasionally That Some Of Their Best Ideas Have Been Anticipated By Former Writers; They Will Neither Anathematize Others Nor Despair Themselves. They Will Rather Go On Discovering Things Before Discovered, Until They Are Rewarded With A Land Hitherto Unknown, An Empire Indisputably Their Own, Both Right Of Conquest And Of Discovery.

Perfection Doesn't Exist... Only Good Attempts.

Patience Is The Support Of Weakness; Impatience The Ruin Of Strength.

He That Has Never Known Adversity Is But Half Acquainted With Others, Or With Himself.

Our Incomes Should Be Like Our Shoes, If Too Small, They Will Gall And Pinch Us, But If Too Large, They Will Cause Us To Stumble And To Trip. Wealth, After All, Is A Relative Thing, Since He That Has Little And Wants Less Is Richer Than He That Has Much But Wants More. True Contentment Depends Not Upon What We Have; A Tub Was Large Enough For Diogenes, But A World Was Too Little For Alexander.

Ignorance Lies At The Bottom Of All Human Knowledge, And The Deeper We Penetrate The Nearer We Arrive Unto It. For What Do We Truly Know, Or What Can We Clearly Affirm, Of Any One Of Those Important Things Upon Which All Our Reasonings Must Of Necessity Be Built--time And Space, Life And Death, Matter And Mind?

Faith And Works Are Necessary To Our Spiritual Life As Christians, As Soul And Body Are To Our Natural Life As Men; For Faith Is The Soul Of Religion, And Works The Body.

The Victim To Too Severe A Law Is Considered As A Martyr Rather Than A Criminal.

There Are Two Way Of Establishing A Reputation, One To Be Praised By Honest People And The Other To Be Accused By Rogues. It Is Best, However, To Secure The First One, Because It Will Always Be Accompanied By The Latter.

The Martyrs To Vice Far Exceed The Martyrs To Virtue, Both In Endurance And In Number.

It Is Better To Meet Danger Than To Wait For It. He That Is On A Lee Shore, And Foresees A Hurricane, Stands Out To Sea And Encounters A Storm To Avoid A Shipwreck.

Men Will Wrangle For Religion, Write For It, Fight For It, Die For It; Anything But Live For It.

The Only Kind Office Performed For Us By Our Friends Of Which We Never Complain Is Our Funeral; And The Only Thing Which We Most Want, Happens To Be The Only Thing We Never Purchase--our Coffin.

No Propagation Or Multiplication Is More Rapid That That Of Evil, Unless It Be Checked; No Growth More Certain.

It Is A Common Observation That Any Fool Can Get Money; But They Are Not Wise That Think So.

The Study Of Mathematics, Like The Nile, Begins In Minuteness But Ends In Magnificence.

That Extremes Beget Extremes Is An Apothegm Built On The Most Profound Observation Of The Human Mind.

Many ... Begin To Make Converts From Motives Of Charity, But Continue To Do So From Motives Of Pride. ... Charity Is Contented With Exhortation And Example, But Pride Is Not To Be So Easily Satisfied. ... Whenever We Find Ourselves More Inclined To Persecute Than Persuade, We May Then Be Certain That Our Zeal Has More Of Pride In It Than Of Charity.

Reform Is A Good Replete With Paradox; It Is A Cathartic Which Our Political Quacks, Like Our Medical, Recommend To Others, But Will Not Take Themselves; It Is Admired By All Who Cannot Effect It, And Abused By All Who Can; It Is Thought Pregnant With Danger, For All Time That Is Present, But Would Have Been Extremely Profitable For That Which Is Past, And Will Be Highly Salutary For That Which Is To Come.

To Dare To Live Alone Is The Rarest Courage; Since There Are Many Who Had Rather Meet Their Bitterest Enemy In The Field, Than Their Own Hearts In Their Closet.

Wit In Women Is A Jewel, Which, Unlike All Others, Borrows Lustre From Its Setting, Rather Than Bestows It; Since Nothing Is So Easy As To Fancy A Very Beautiful Woman Extremely Witty.

Some Men Are Very Entertaining For A First Interview, But After That They Are Exhausted, And Run Out; On A Second Meeting We Shall Find Them Flat And Monotonous; Like Hand-organs, We Have Heard All Their Tunes.

He That Has Energy Enough In His Constitution To Root Out A Vice Should Go A Little Further, And Try To Plant A Virtue In Its Place; Otherwise He Will Have His Labor To Renew. A Strong Soil That Has Produced Weeds May Be Made To Produce Wheat With Far Less Difficulty Than It Would Cost To Make It Produce Nothing.

We Must Suit The Flattery To The Mind And Taste Of The Recipient. We Do Not Put Essences Into Hogsheads, Nor Porter Into Phials. Delicate Minds May Be Disgusted By Compliments That Would Please A Grosser Intellect; As Some Fine Ladies Who Would Be Shocked At The Idea Of A Dram Will Not Refuse A Liqueur.

A Youth Without Fire Is Followed By An Old Age Without Experience.

It Was Served Of The Jesuits, That They Constantly Inculcated A Thorough Contempt Of Worldly Things In Their Doctrines, But Eagerly Grasped At Them In Their Lives. They Were Wise In Their Generation; For They Cried Down Worldly Things Because They Wanted To Obtain Them, And Cried Up Spiritual Things, Because They Wanted To Dispose Of Them.

Of Two Evils, It Is Perhaps Less Injurious To Society, That Good Doctrine Should Be Accompanied By A Bad Life, Than That A Good Life Should Lend Its Support To A Bad Doctrine.

True Contentment Depends Not Upon What We Have; A Tub Was Large Enough For Diogenes, But A World Was Too Little For Alexander.

Avarice Begets More Vices Than Priam Did Children And Like Priam Survives Them All. It Starves Its Keeper To Surfeit Those Who Wish Him Dead, And Makes Him Submit To More Mortifications To Lose Heaven Than The Martyr Undergoes To Gain It.

In All Places, And In All Times, Those Religionists Who Have Believed Too Much Have Been More Inclined To Violence And Persecution Than Those Who Have Believed Too Little.

It Is Almost As Difficult To Make A Man Unlearn His Errors As His Knowledge.

Did Universal Charity Prevail, Earth Would Be A Heaven, And Hell A Fable.

We Cannot Think Too Highly Of Our Nature, Nor Too Humbly Of Ourselves.

Secrecy Is The Soul Of All Great Designs.

It May Be Observed Of Good Writing, As Of Good Blood, That It Is Much Easier To Say What It Is Composed Of Than To Compose It.

If Satan Ever Laughs, It Must Be At Hypocrites; They Are The Greatest Dupes He Has.

Emulation Has Been Termed A Spur To Virtue, And Assumes To Be A Spur Of Gold. But It Is A Spur Composed Of Baser Materials, And If Tried In The Furnace Will Be Found To Want That Fixedness Which Is The Characteristic Of Gold. He That Pursues Virtue, Only To Surpass Others, Is Not Far From Wishing Others Less Forward Than Himself; And He That Rejoices Too Much At His Own Perfections Will Be Too Little Grieved At The Defects Of Other Men.

Human Foresight Often Leaves Its Proudest Possessor Only A Choice Of Evils.

Forgiveness, That Noblest Of All Self-denial, Is A Virtue Which He Alone Who Can Practise In Himself Can Willingly Believe In Another.

Genius, In One Respect, Is Like Gold; Numbers Of Persons Are Constantly Writing About Both, Who Have Neither.

The Soundest Argument Will Produce No More Conviction In An Empty Head Than The Most Superficial Declamation; As A Feather And A Guinea Fall With Equal Velocity In A Vacuum.

We Injure Mysteries, Which Are Matters Of Faith, By Any Attempt At Explanation In Order To Make Them Matters Of Reason. Could They Be Explained, They Would Cease To Be Mysteries; And It Has Been Well Said That A Thing Is Not Necessarily Against Reason Because It Happens To Be Above It.

All Poets Pretend To Write For Immortality, But The Whole Tribe Have No Objection To Present Pay And Present Praise.

Sir Richard Steele Has Observed, That There Is This Difference Between The Church Of Rome And The Church Of England: The One Professes To Be Infallible, The Other To Be Never In The Wrong.

I Question If Epicurus And Hume Have Done Mankind A Greater Service By The Looseness Of Their Doctrines Than By The Purity Of Their Lives. Of Such Men We May More Justly Exclaim, Than Of Caesar, "confound Their Virtues, They've Undone The World!

Honor Is The Most Capricious In Her Rewards. She Feeds Us With Air, And Often Pulls Down Our House, To Build Our Monument.

If Sensuality Be Our Only Happiness We Ought To Envy The Brutes, For Instinct Is A Surer, Shorter, Safer Guide To Such Happiness Than Reason.

An Act By Which We Make One Friend And One Enemy Is A Losing Game; Because Revenge Is A Much Stronger Principle Than Gratitude

We Strive As Hard To Hide Our Hearts From Ourselves As From Others, And Always With More Success; For In Deciding Upon Our Own Case We Are Both Judge, Jury, And Executioner, And Where Sophistry Cannot Overcome The First, Or Flattery The Second, Self-love Is Always Ready To Defeat The Sentence By Bribing The Third.

Those Who Bequeath Unto Themselves A Pompous Funeral, Are At Just So Much Expense To Inform The World Of Something That Had Much Better Be Concealed; Namely, That Their Vanity Has Survived Themselves.

Where Thou Perceivest Knowledge, Bend The Ear Of Attention And Respect; But Yield Not Further To The Teaching, Than As Thy Mind Is Warranted By Reasons. Better Is An Obstinant Disputant, That Yieldeth Inch By Inch, Than The Shallow Traitor To Himself, Who Surrendereth To Half An Argument.

Of All The Passions, Jealousy Is That Which Exacts The Hardest Service, And Pays The Bitterest Wages. Its Service Is To Watch The Success Of One's Enemy; Its Wages To Be Sure Of It.

Be Real And Adjust You Strategy According To Honest Results.

It Is Easier To Pretend To Be What You Are Not Than To Hide What You Really Are; But He That Can Accomplish Both Has Little To Learn In Hypocrisy.

That Theatrical Kind Of Virtue, Which Requires Publicity For Its Stage, And An Applauding World For Its Audience, Could Not Be Depended On, In The Secrecy Of Solitude, Or The Retirement Of A Desert.

There Is Nothing More Imprudent Than Excessive Prudence.

It Is Curious That We Pay Statesmen For What They Say, Not For What They Do; And Judge Of Them From What They Do, Not From What They Say. Hence They Have One Code Of Maxims For Profession And Another For Practice, And Make Up Their Consciences As The Neapolitans Do Their Beds, With One Set Of Furniture For Show And Another For Use.

Tyrants Have Not Yet Discovered Any Chains That Can Fetter The Mind.

As There Are None So Weak That We May Venture To Injure Them With Impunity, So There Are None So Low That They May Not At Some Time Be Able To Repay An Obligation. Therefore, What Benevolence Would Dictate, Prudence Would Confirm.

Extemporaneous And Oral Harangues Will Always Have This Advantage Over Those That Are Read From A In Manuscript: Every Burst Of Eloquence Or Spark Of Genius They May Contain, However Studied They May Have Been Beforehand, Will Appear To The Audience To Be The Effect Of The Sudden Inspiration Of Talent.

Heroism, Self-denial, And Magnanimity, In All Instances Where They Do Not Spring From A Principle Of Religion, Are But Splendid Altars On Which We Sacrifice One Kind Of Self-love To Another.

Nothing More Completely Baffles One Who Is Full Of Trick And Duplicity Himself, Than Straight Forward And Simple Integrity In Another.

Silence Is Less Injurious Than A Weak Reply.

Tomorrow! It Is A Period Nowhere To Be Found In All The Registers Of Time, Unless, Perchance, In The Fool's Calendar.

Subtract From The Great Man All That He Owes To Opportunity, All That He Owes To Chance, And All That He Gained By The Wisdom Of His Friends And The Folly Of His Enemies, And The Giant Will Often Be Seen To Be A Pygmy.

There Are Too Many Who Reverse Both The Principles And The Practice Of The Apostles; They Become All Things To All Men, Not To Serve Others, But Themselves; And They Try All Things Only To Hold Fast That Which Is Bad.

The Grecian’s Maxim Would Indeed Be A Sweeping Clause In Literature; It Would Reduce Many A Giant To A Pygmy; Many A Speech To A Sentence; And Many A Folio To A Primer.

There Are Three Modes Of Bearing The Ills Of Life; By Indifference, Which Is The Most Common; By Philosophy, Which Is The Most Ostentatious; And By Religion, Which Is The Most Effectual.

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