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Falsehood, Like A Drawing In Perspective, Will Not Bear To Be Examined In Every Point Of View, Because It Is A Good Imitation Of Truth, As A Perspective Is Of The Reality, Only In One. But Truth, Like That Reality Of Which The Perspective Is The Representation, Will Bear To Be Scrutinized In All Points Of View, And Though Examined Under Every Situation, Is One And The Same.

-Charles Caleb Colton

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Falsehood, Like A Drawing

Charles Caleb Colton

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Falsehood, Like A Drawing In Perspective, Will Not Bear To Be Examined In Every Point Of View, Because It Is A Good Imitation Of Truth, As A Perspective Is Of The Reality, Only In One. But Truth, Like That Reality Of Which The Perspective Is The Representation, Will Bear To Be Scrutinized In All Points Of View, And Though Examined Under Every Situation, Is One And The Same.

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In Order To Try Whether A Vessel Be Leaky, We First Prove It With Water Before We Trust It With Wine.

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

Deliberate With Caution, But Act With Decision And Yield With Graciousness, Or Oppose With Firmness.

It Has Been Well Observed That We Should Treat Futurity As An Aged Friend From Whom We Expect A Rich Legacy.

Great Men, Like Comets, Are Eccentric In Their Courses, And Formed To Do Extensive Good By Modes Unintelligible To Vulgar Minds.

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.

He That Has Never Suffered Extreme Adversity Knows Not The Full Extent Of His Own Depravation.

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.

By Privileges, Immunities, Or Prerogatives To Give Unlimited Swing To The Passions Of Individuals, And Then To Hope That They Will Restrain Them, Is About As Reasonable As To Expect That The Tiger Will Spare The Hart To Browse Upon The Herbage.

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

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

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

The Policy That Can Strike Only While The Iron Is Hot Will Be Overcome By That Perseverance, Which ... Can Make That Iron Hot By Striking And He That Can Only Rule The Storm Must Yield To Him Who Can Both Raise And Rule It.

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.

The Most Notorious Swindler Has Not Assumed So Many Names As Self-love, Nor Is So Much Ashamed Of His Own. She Calls Herself Patriotism, When At The Same Time She Is Rejoicing At Just As Much Calamity To Her Native Country As Will Introduce Herself Into Power, And Expel Her Rivals.

The Moral Cement Of All Society Is Virtue; It Unites And Preserves, While Vice Separates And Destroys.

In The Pursuit Of Knowledge, Follow It Wherever It Is To Be Found; Like Fern, It Is The Produce Of All Climates, And Like Coin, Its Circulation Is Not Restricted To Any Particular Class.

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...

Times Of Great Calamity And Confusion Have Been Productive For The Greatest Minds. The Purest Ore Is Produced From The Hottest Furnace. The Brightest Thunder-bolt Is Elicited From The Darkest Storm.

Modesty Is The Richest Ornament Of A Woman ... The Want Of It Is Her Greatest Deformity.

Short As Life Is, Some Find It Long Enough To Outlive Their Characters, Their Constitutions And Their Estates.

If We Look Backwards To Antiquity It Should Be As Those That Are Winning A Race.

The Greatest Friend Of Truth Is Time, Her Greatest Enemy Is Prejudice, And Her Constant Companion Is Humility.

We Must Be Careful How We Flatter Fools Too Little, Or Wise Men Too Much, For The Flatterer Must Act The Very Reverse Of The Physician, And Administer The Strongest Dose Only To The Weakest Patient.

Constant Success Shows Us But One Side Of The World. For As It Surrounds Us With Friends Who Will Tell Us Only Our Merits, So It Silences Those Enemies From Whom Alone We Can Learn Our Defects.

He That Knows Himself, Knows Others; And He That Is Ignorant Of Himself, Could Not Write A Very Profound Lecture On Other Men's Heads.

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.

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

If It Be True That Men Of Strong Imaginations Are Usually Dogmatists--and I Am Inclined To Think It Is So--it Ought To Follow That Men Of Weak Imaginations Are The Reverse; In Which Case We Should Have Some Compensation For Stupidity. But It Unfortunately Happens That No Dogmatist Is More Obstinate Or Less Open To Conviction Than A Fool.

Corruption Is Like A Ball Of Snow, Once It's Set A Rolling It Must Increase.

Moral Corruption

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

Precisely In Proportion To Our Own Intellectual Weakness Will Be Our Credulity As To Those Mysterious Powers Assumed By Others.

Villains Are Usually The Worst Casuists, And Rush Into Crimes To Avoid Less. Henry Viii. Committed Murder To Avoid The Imputation Of Adultery; And In Our Times, Those Who Commit The Latter Crime Attempt To Wash Off The Stain Of Seducing The Wife By Signifying Their Readiness To Shoot The Husband.

The Reason Why Great Men Meet With So Little Pity Or Attachment In Adversity, Would Seem To Be This: The Friends Of A Great Man Were Made By His Fortune, His Enemies By Himself, And Revenge Is A Much More Punctual Paymaster Than Gratitude.

It Is A Curious Paradox That Precisely In Proportion To Our Own Intellectual Weakness Will Be Our Credulity, To Those Mysterious Powers Assumed By Others; And In Those Regions Of Darkness And Ignorance Where Man Cannot Effect Even Those Things That Are Within The Power Of Man, There We Shall Ever Find That A Blind Belief In Feats That Are Far Beyond Those Powers Has Taken The Deepest Root In The Minds Of The Deceived, And Produced The Richest Harvest To The Knavery Of The Deceiver.

Drunkenness Is The Vice Of A Good Constitution Or Of A Bad Memory Of A Constitution So Treacherously Good That It Never Bends Till It Breaks; Or Of A Memory That Recollects The Pleasures Of Getting Intoxicated, But Forgets The Pains Of Getting Sober.

In All Countries Where Nature Does The Most, Man Does The Least.

Self-love, In A Well-regulated Breast, Is As The Steward Of The Household, Superintending The Expenditure, And Seeing That Benevolence Herself Should Be Prudential, In Order To Be Permanent, By Providing That The Reservoir Which Feeds Should Also Be Fed.

I Have Somewhere Seen It Observed That We Should Make The Same Use Of A Book That The Bee Does Of A Flower: She Steals Sweets From It, But Does Not Injure It.

The Further We Advance In Knowledge, The More Simplicity Shall We Discover In Those Primary Rules That Regulate All The Apparently Endless, Complicated, And Multiform Operations Of The Godhead.

To Diminish Envy, Let Us Consider Not What Others Possess, But What They Enjoy; Mere Riches May Be The Gift Of Lucky Accident Or Blind Chance, But Happiness Must Be The Result Of Prudent Preference And Rational Design; The Highest Happiness Then Can Have No Other Foundation Than The Deepest Wisdom; And The Happiest Fool Is Only As Happy As He Knows How To Be.

Men Pursue Riches Under The Idea That Their Possession Will Set Them At Ease, And Above The World. But The Law Of Association Often Makes Those Who Begin By Loving Gold As A Servant Finish By Becoming Themselves Its Slaves; And Independence Without Wealth Is At Least As Common As Wealth Without Independence.

So Blinded Are We By Our Passions, That We Suffer More To Be Damned Than To Be Saved.

Oppression Cannot Prosper Where None Will Submit To Be Enslaved.

God Is As Great In Minuteness As He Is In Magnitude.

There Are Truths Which Some Men Despise Because They Have Not Examined, And Which They Will Not Examine Because They Despise. There Is One Signal Instance On Record Where This Kind Of Prejudice Was Overcome By A Miracle; But The Age Of Miracles Is Past, While That Of Prejudice Remains.

Secrecy Is The Soul Of All Great Designs. Perhaps More Has Been Effected By Concealing Our Own Intentions Than By Discovering Those Of Our Enemy.

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.

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.

Custom Is The Law Of One Description Of Fools, And Fashion Of Another; But The Two Parties Often Clash--for Precedent Is The Legislator Of The First, And Novelty Of The Last. Custom, Therefore, Looks To Things That Are Past, And Fashion To Things That Are Present.

Wars Are To The Body Politic, What Drams Are To The Individual. There Are Times When They May Prevent A Sudden Death, But If Frequently Resorted To, Or Long Persisted In, They Heighten The Energies Only To Hasten The Dissolution.

Doubt Is The Vestibule Which All Must Pass Before They Can Enter Into The Temple Of Wisdom; Therefore, When We Are In Doubt And Puzzle Out The Truth By Our Own Exertions, We Have Gained A Something That Will Stay By Us, And Which Will Serve Us Again. But, If To Avoid The Trouble Of The Search We Avail Ourselves Of The Superior Information Of A Friend, Such Knowledge Will Not Remain With Us; We Have Not Bought But Borrowed 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.

A Lady Of Fashion Will Sooner Excuse A Freedom Flowing From Admiration Than A Slight Resulting From Indifference.

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.

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

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

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.

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

Great Minds Had Rather Deserve Contemporaneous Applause Without Obtaining It, Than Obtain Without Deserving It. If It Follow Them It Is Well, But They Will Not Deviate To Follow It.

How Strange It Is That We Of The Present Day Are Constantly Praising That Past Age Which Our Fathers Abused, And As Constantly Abusing That Present Age, Which Our Children Will Praise.

Where We Cannot Invent, We May At Least Improve.

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 Truths Which Some Men Despise Because They Have Not Examined, And Which They Will Not Examine Because They Despise.

The Acquirements Of Science May Be Termed The Armour Of The Mind; But That Armour Would Be Worse Than Useless, That Cost Us All We Had, And Left Us Nothing To Defend.

In Death Itself There Can Be Nothing Terrible, For The Act Of Death Annihilates Sensation; But There Are Many Roads To Death, And Some Of Them Justly Formidable, Even To The Bravest.

The True Motives Of Our Actions, Like The Real Pipes Of An Organ, Are Usually Concealed; But The Gilded And Hollow Pretext Is Pompously Placed In The Front For Show.

To Cure Us Of Our Immoderate Love Of Gain, We Should Seriously Consider How Many Goods There Are That Money Will Not Purchase, And These The Best; And How Many Evils There Are That Money Will Not Remedy, And These The Worst.

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.

Time Is The Measurer Of All Things, But Is Itself Immeasurable, And The Grand Discloser Of All Things, But Is Itself Undisclosed.

There Are Three Difficulties In Authorship; To Write Any Thing Worth The Publishing — To Find Honest Men To Publish It — And To Get Sensible Men To Read It.

The Interests Of Society Often Render It Expedient Not To Utter The Whole Truth, The Interests Of Science Never: For In This Field We Have Much More To Fear From The Deficiency Of Truth Than From Its Abundance.

No Two Things Differ More Than Hurry And Despatch. Hurry Is The Mark Of A Weak Mind; Despatch Of A Strong One.

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 One Passage In The Scriptures To Which All The Potentates Of Europe Seem To Have Given Their Unanimous Assent And Approbation...."there Went Out A Decree In The Days Of Caesar Augustus, That All The World Should Be Taxed."

We Are Not More Ingenious In Searching Out Bad Motives For Good Actions When Performed By Others, Than Good Motives For Bad Actions When Performed By Ourselves.

When We Live Habitually With The Wicked, We Become Necessarily Either Their Victim Or Their Disciple; When We Associate, On The Contrary, With Virtuous Men, We Form Ourselves In Imitation Of Their Virtues, Or, At Least, Lose Every Day Something Of Our Faults.

Most Plagiarists, Like The Drone, Have Neither Taste To Select, Industry To Acquire, Nor Skill To Improve, But Impudently Pilfer The Honey Ready Prepared, From The Hive.

No Improvement That Takes Place In Either Sex Can Possibly Be Confined To Itself. Each Is A Universal Mirror To Each, And The Respective Refinement Of The One Will Always Be In Reciprocal Proportion To The Polish Of The Other.

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

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.

Love One Another

Courage Is Like The Diamond,--very Brilliant; Not Changed By Fire, Capable Of High Polish, But Except For The Purpose Of Cutting Hard Bodies Useless.

He That Aspires To Be The Head Of A Party Will Find It More Difficult To Please His Friends Than To Perplex His Foes. He Must Often Act From False Reasons Which Are Weak, Because He Dares Not Avow The True Reasons Which Are Strong.

Time Is The Most Subtle Yet The Most Insatiable Of Depredators, And By Appearing To Take Nothing Is Permitted To Take All; Nor Can It Be Satisfied Until It Has Stolen The World From Us, And Us From The World. It Constantly Flies, Yet Overcomes All Things By Flight; And Although It Is The Present Ally, It Will Be The Future Conqueror Of Death.

What Would You Do If You Knew For Sure That No One Would Ever Find Out?

There Are Male As Well As Female Gossips.

Ambition Is To The Mind What The Cap Is To The Falcon; It Blinds Us First, And Then Compels Us To Tower By Reason Of Our Blindness.

Time Is The Most Undefinable Yet Paradoxical Of Things; The Past Is Gone, The Future Is Not Come, And The Present Becomes The Past, Even While We Attempt To Define It.

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.

Examinations Are Formidable Even To The Best Prepared, For The Greatest Fool May Ask More Than The Wisest Man Can Answer.

The Integrity That Lives Only On Opinion Would Starve Without It.

Philosophy Is A Goddess, Whose Head Indeed Is In Heaven, But Whose Feet Are Upon Earth; She Attempts More Than She Accomplishes, And Promises More Than She Performs.

Doubt Is The Vestibule Of Faith.

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

It Is In The Middle Classes Of Society That All The Finest Feeling, And The Most Amiable Propensities Of Our Nature Do Principally Nourish And Abound. For The Good Opinion Of Our Fellow-men Is The Strongest Though Not The Purest Motive To Virtue. The Privations Of Poverty Render Us Too Cold And Callous, And The Privileges Of Property Too Arrogant And Confidential, To Feel; The First Places Us Beneath The Influence Of Opinion--the Second, Above It.

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.

Sleep, The Type Of Death, Is Also, Like That Which It Typifies, Restricted To The Earth. It Flies From Hell And Is Excluded From Heaven.

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

A Thorough-paced Antiquary Not Only Remembers What All Other People Have Thought Proper To Forget, But He Also Forgets What All Other People Think Is Proper To Remember.

Wars Of Opinion, As They Have Been The Most Destructive, Are Also The Most Disgraceful Of Conflicts.

War Kills Men, And Men Deplore The Loss; But War Also Crushes Bad Principles And Tyrants, And So Saves Societies.

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.

He That Sympathizes In All The Happiness Of Others, Perhaps Himself Enjoys The Safest Happiness.

It Is An Easy And Vulgar Thing To Please The Mob, And No Very Arduous Task To Astonish Them.

Bigotry Murders Religion To Frighten Fools With Her Ghost.

Religious Bigotry

Wealth Is A Relative Thing Since Those Who Have Little And Want Less Are Richer Than Those Who Have Much But Want More.

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.

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!

Man, If He Compare Himself With All That He Can See, Is At The Zenith Of Power; But If He Compare Himself With All That He Can Conceive, He Is At The Nadir Of Weakness.

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

In Cases Of Doubtful Morality, It Is Usual To Say Is There Any Harm In Doing This? This Question May Sometimes Be Best Answered By Asking Ourselves Another; Is There Any Harm In Letting It Alone?

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

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.

A Semi-civilized State Of Society, Equally Removed From The Extremes Of Barbarity And Of Refinement, Seems To Be That Particular Meridian Under Which All The Reciprocities And Gratuities Of Hospitality Do Most Readily Flourish And Abound. For It So Happens That The Ease, The Luxury, And The Abundance Of The Highest State Of Civilization, Are As Productive Of Selfishness, As The Difficulties, The Privations, And The Sterilities Of He Lowest.

None Of Us Are So Much Praised Or Censured As We Think.

Eloquence, To Produce Her Full Effect, Should Start From The Head Of The Orator, As Pallas From The Brain Of Jove, Completely Armed And Equipped. Diffidence, Therefore, Which Is So Able A Mentor To The Writer, Would Prove A Dangerous Counsellor For The Orator.

To Admit That There Is Any Such Thing As Chance, In The Common Acceptation Of The Term, Would Be To Attempt To Establish A Power Independent Of God.

Death Is The Only Sovereign Whom No Partiality Can Warp, And No Price Corrupt.

By Paying Our Other Debts, We Are Equal With All Mankind; But In Refusing To Pay A Debt Of Revenge, We Are Superior.

She Is Deceitful As The Calm That Precedes The Hurricane, Smooth As The Water On The Verge Of The Cataract, And Beautiful As The Rainbow, That Smiling Daughter Of The Storm; But, Like The Mirage In The Desert, She Tantalizes Us With A Delusion That Distance Creates, And That Contiguity Destroys.

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.

Philosophers Have Widely Differed As To The Seat Of The Soul, And St. Paul Has Told Us That Out Of The Heart Proceed Murmurings; But There Can Be No Doubt That The Seat Of Perfect Contentment Is In The Head, For Every Individual Is Thoroughly Satisfied With His Own Proportion Of Brains.

There Is Not A Little Generalship And Stratagem Required In The Managing And Marshalling Of Our Pleasures, So That Each Shall Not Mutually Encroach To The Destruction Of All. For Pleasures Are Very Voracious, Too Apt To Worry One Another, And Each, Like Aaron's Serpent, Is Prone To Swallow Up The Rest. Thus Drinking Will Soon Destroy The Power, Gaming The Means, And Sensuality The Taste, For Other Pleasures Less Seductive, But Far More Salubrious, And Permanent As They Are Pure.

The Road To Glory Would Cease To Be Arduous If It Were Trite And Trodden; And Great Minds Must Be Ready Not Only To Take Opportunities But To Make Them.

The Good Opinion Of Our Fellow Men Is The Strongest, Though Not The Purest Motive To Virtue.

Professors In Every Branch Of The Sciences, Prefer Their Own Theories To Truth: The Reason Is That Their Theories Are Private Property, But Truth Is Common Stock.

True Goodness Is Not Without That Germ Of Greatness That Can Bear With Patience The Mistakes Of The Ignorant.

Dreams Ought To Produce No Conviction Whatever On Philosophical Minds. If We Consider How Many Dreams Are Dreamt Every Night, And How Many Events Occur Every Day, We Shall No Longer Wonder At Those Accidental Coincidences Which Ignorance Mistakes For Verifications.

Our Very Best Friends Have A Tincture Of Jealousy Even In Their Friendship; And When They Hear Us Praised By Others, Will Ascribe It To Sinister And Interested Motives If They Can.

Lost Friendship

In Answering An Opponent, Arrange Your Ideas, But Not Your Words.

Make The Most Of The Day, By Determining To Spend It On Two Sorts Of Acquaintances Only--those By Whom Something May Be Got, And Those From Whom Something May Be Learned.

Brutes Leave Ingratitude To Man.

A Wise Minister Would Rather Preserve Peace Than Gain A Victory, Because He Knows That Even The Most Successful War Leaves Nations Generally More Poor, Always More Profligate, Than It Found Them.

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.

The Rich Are More Envied By Those Who Have A Little, Than By Those Who Have Nothing.

The Family Is The Most Basic Unit Of Government. As The First Community To Which A Person Is Attached And The First Authority Under Which A Person Learns To Live, The Family Establishes Society's Most Basic Values.

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.

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.

No Company Is Preferable To Bad. We Are More Apt To Catch The Vices Of Others Than Virtues, As Disease Is Far More Contagious Than Health.

The Wisest Man May Be Wiser To-day Than He Was Yesterday, And To-morrow Than He Is To-day. Total Freedom From Change Would Imply Total Freedom From Error; But This Is The Prerogative Of Omniscience Alone.

Ambition Makes The Same Mistake Concerning Power That Avarice Makes Concerning Wealth. She Begins By Accumulating Power As A Means To Happiness, And She Finishes By Continuing To Accumulate It As An End.

My Lowest Days As A Christian Have Been More Fulfilling And Rewarding Than All The Days Of Glory In The White House.

When Young, We Trust Ourselves Too Much, And We Trust Others Too Little When Old. Rashness Is The Error Of Youth, Timid Caution Of Age. Manhood Is The Isthmus Between The Two Extremes; The Ripe And Fertile Season Of Action, When Alone We Can Hope To Find The Head To Contrive, United With The Hand To Execute.

He That Is Gone So Far As To Cut The Claws Of The Lion, Will Not Feel Himself Quite Secure, Until He Has Also Drawn His Teeth.

When You Have Nothing To Say, Say Nothing.

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

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

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.

The Benevolent Have The Advantage Of The Envious, Even In This Present Life; For The Envious Man Is Tormented Not Only By All The Ill That Befalls Himself, But By All The Good That Happens To Another; Whereas The Benevolent Man Is The Better Prepared To Bear His Own Calamities Unruffled, From The Complacency And Serenity He Has Secured From Contemplating The Prosperity Of All Around Him.

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.

All The Poets Are Indebted More Or Less To Those Who Have Gone Before Them; Even Homer's Originality Has Been Questioned, And Virgil Owes Almost As Much To Theocritus, In His Pastorals, As To Homer, In His Heroics; And If Our Own Countryman, Milton, Has Soared Above Both Homer And Virgil, It Is Because He Has Stolen Some Feathers From Their Wings.

It Is With Antiquity As With Ancestry, Nations Are Proud Of The One, And Individuals Of The Other; But If They Are Nothing In Themselves, That Which Is Their Pride Ought To Be Their Humiliation.

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.

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

Metaphysicians Have Been Learning Their Lessons For The Last Four Thousand Years, And It Is High Time That They Should Now Begin To Teach Us Something. Can Any Of The Tribe Inform Us Why All The Operations Of The Mind Are Carried On With Undiminished Strength And Activity In Dreams, Except The Judgment, Which Alone Is Suspended And Dormant?

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.

The Plainest Man That Can Convince A Woman That He Is Really In Love With Her Has Done More To Make Her In Love With Him Than The Handsomest Man, If He Can Produce No Such Conviction. For The Love Of Woman Is A Shoot, Not A Seed, And Flourishes Most Vigorously Only When Ingrafted On That Love Which Is Rooted In The Breast Of Another.

Habit Will Reconcile Us To Everything But Change

Words Indeed Are But The Signs And Counters Of Knowledge, And Their Currency Should Be Strictly Regulated By The Capital Which They Represent.

Life Isn't Like A Book. Life Isn't Logical Or Sensible Or Orderly. Life Is A Mess Most Of The Time. And Theology Must Be Lived In The Midst Of That Mess.

Total Freedom From Error Is What None Of Us Will Allow To Our Neighbors; However We May Be Inclined To Flirt A Little With Such Spotless Perfection Ourselves.

Vice Has More Martyrs Than Virtue; And It Often Happens That Men Suffer More To Be Lost Than To Be Saved.

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

The Enthusiast Has Been Compared To A Man Walking In A Fog; Everything Immediately Around Him, Or In Contact With Him, Appears Sufficiently Clear And Luminous; But Beyond The Little Circle Of Which He Himself Is The Centre, All Is Mist And Error And Confusion.

In All Societies, It Is Advisable To Associate If Possible With The Highest; Not That The Highest Are Always The Best, But Because, If Disgusted There, We Can Descend At Any Time; But If We Begin With The Lowest, To Ascend Is Impossible.

As The Grand Discordant Harmony Of The Celestial Bodies May Be Explained By The Simple Principles Of Gravity And Impulse, So Also In That More Wonderful And Complicated Microcosm, The Heart Of Man, All The Phenomena Of Morals Are Perhaps Resolvable Into One Single Principle, The Pursuit Of Apparent Good; For Although Customs Universally Vary, Yet Man In All Climates And Countries Is Essentially The Same.

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

To Look Back To Antiquity Is One Thing, To Go Back To It Is Another.

Levity Is Often Less Foolish And Gravity Less Wise Than Each Of Them Appears.

Love Is An Alchemist That Can Transmute Poison Into Food--and A Spaniel, That Prefers Even Punishment From One Hand To Caresses From Another. But It Is In Love As In War, We Are Often More Indebted For Our Success To The Weakness Of The Defence Than To The Energy Of The Attack; For Mere Idleness Has Ruined More Women Than Passion; Vanity More Than Idleness, And Credulity More Than Either.

There Are Three Kinds Of Praise, That Which We Yield, That Which We Lend, And That Which We Pay. We Yield It To The Powerful From Fear, We Lend It To The Weak From Interest, And We Pay It To The Deserving From Gratitude.

In Great Cities Men Are More Callous Both To The Happiness And The Misery Of Others, Than In The Country; For They Are Constantly In The Habit Of Seeing Both Extremes.

The French Revolution Was A .eune Invented And Constructed For The Purpose Of Manufacturing Liberty; But It Had Neither Lever Cogs, Nor Adjusting Powers, And The Consequences Were That It Worked So Rapidly That It Destroyed Its Own Inventors, And Set Itself On Fire.

Let Us Not Be Too Prodigal When We Are Young, Nor Too Parsimonious When We Are Old. Otherwise We Shall Fall Into The Common Error Of Those, Who, When They Had The Power To Enjoy, Had Not The Prudence To Acquire; And When They Had The Prudence To Acquire, Had No Longer The Power To Enjoy.

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

Cruel Men Are The Greatest Lovers Of Mercy, Avaricious Men Of Generosity, And Proud Men Of Humility; That Is To Say, In Other, Not In Themselves.

The Man Of Pleasure, By A Vain Attempt To Be More Happy Than Any Man Can Be, Is Often More Miserable Than Most Men Are.

Law And Equity Are Two Things Which God Has Joined, But Which Man Has Put Asunder.

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.

Princes Rule The People, And Their Own Passions Rule Princes; But Providence Can Over-rule The Whole, And Draw The Instruments Of His Inscrutable Purposes From The Vices, No Less Than The Virtues Of Kings.

Next To Acquiring Good Friends, The Best Acquisition Is That Of Good Books.

Honor Is Unstable And Seldom The Same; For She Feeds Upon Opinion, And Is As Fickle As Her Food.

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

A Coxcomb Begins By Determining That His Own Profession Is The First; And He Finishes By Deciding That He Is The First Of Profession.

The Awkwardness And Embarrassment Which All Feel On Beginning To Write, When They Themselves Are The Theme, Ought To Serve As A Hint To Author's That Self Is A Subject They Ought Very Rarely To Descant Upon.

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

In Pulpit Eloquence, The Grand Difficulty Lies Here--to Give The Subject All The Dignity It So Fully Deserves, Without Attaching Any Importance To Ourselves. The Christian Messenger Cannot Think Too Highly Of His Prince, Nor Too Humbly Of Himself.

If Rich, It Is Easy Enough To Conceal Our Wealth; But, If Poor, It Is Not Quite So Easy To Conceal Our Poverty. We Shall Find That It Is Less Difficult To Hide A Thousand Guineas, Than One Hole In Our Coat.

The Breast Of A Good Man Is A Little Heaven Commencing On Earth; Where The Deity Sits Enthroned With Unrivaled Influence, Every Subjugated Passion, "like The Wind And Storm, Fulfilling His Word.

That Alliance May Be Said To Have A Double Tie, Where The Minds Are United As Well As The Body; And The Union Will Have All Its Strength When Both The Links Are In Perfection Together.

It Is A Mistake, That A Lust For Power Is The Mark Of A Great Mind; For Even The Weakest Have Been Captivated By It; And For Minds Of The Highest Order, It Has No Charms.

That Profound Firmness Which Enabler A Man To Regard Difficulties But As Evils To Be Surmounted, No Matter What Shape They May Assume.

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

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

Vanity Finds In Self-love So Powerful An Ally That It Storms, As It Were, By A Coup De Main,, The Citadel Of Our Heads, Where, Having Blinded The Two Watchmen, It Readily Descends Into The Heart.

We Cannot Think Too Highly Of Our Nature, Nor Too Humbly Of Ourselves. When We See The Martyr To Virtue, Subject As He Is To The Infirmities Of A Man, Yet Suffering The Tortures Of A Demon, And Bearing Them With The Magnanimity Of A God, Do We Not Behold A Heroism That Angels May Indeed Surpass, But Which They Cannot Imitate, And Must Admire.

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

There Is A Diabolical Trio Existing In The Natural Man, Implacable, Inextinguishable, Co-operative And Consentaneous, Pride, Envy, And Hate; Pride That Makes Us Fancy We Deserve All The Goods That Others Possess; Envy That Some Should Be Admired While We Are Overlooked; And Hate, Because All That Is Bestowed On Others, Diminishes The Sum We Think Due To Ourselves.

The Young Fancy That Their Follies Are Mistaken By The Old For Happiness. The Old Fancy That Their Gravity Is Mistaken By The Young For Wisdom.

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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