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Fear Loves The Idea Of Danger.

-Joseph Joubert

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Fear Loves The Idea

Joseph Joubert

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Fear Loves The Idea Of Danger.

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Young Authors Give Their Brains Much Exercise And Little Food.

The Evening Of A Well Spent Youth Brings It's Lamps With It.

The Ways Suited To Confidence Are Familiar To Me, But Not Those That Are Suited To Familiarity.

The Mind Conceives With Pain, But It Brings Forth With Delight.

Music Has Seven Letters, Writing Has Twenty-six Notes

Let Your Cry Be For Free Souls Rather Than For Freedom. Moral Liberty Is The Only Important Liberty.

Know That Morality Is A Curb, Not A Spur.

One Man Finds In Religion His Literature And His Science, Another Finds In It His Joy And His Duty.

Words Become Luminous When The Poet's Finger Has Passed Over Them Its Phosphorescence.

To The Liberal Ideas Of The Age Must Be Opposed The Moral Ideas Of All Ages.

Life Is A Country That The Old Have Seen, And Lived In. Those Who Have To Travel Through It Can Only Learn From Them.

Some Superior Minds Are Unrecognized Because There Is No Standard By Which To Weigh Them.

The Breath Of The Mind Is Attention.

Remorse Is The Punishment Of Crime; Repentance, Its Expiation. The Former Appertains To A Tormented Conscience; The Latter To A Soul Changed For The Better.

I Quit Paris Unwillingly, Because I Must Part From My Friends; And I Quit The Country Unwillingly, Because I Must Part From Myself.

I Do Not Call Reason That Brutal Reason Which Crushes With Its Weight What Is Holy And Sacred, That Malignant Reason Which Delights In The Errors It Succeeds In Discovering, That Unfeeling And Scornful Reason Which Insults Credulity.

We Know God Easily, If We Do Not Constrain Ourselves To Define Him.

Necessity May Render A Doubtful Act Innocent, But It Cannot Make It Praiseworthy

Who Ever Has No Fixed Opinions Has No Constant Feelings.

Before Using A Fine Word, Make A Place For It.

How Many Books There Are Whose Reputation Is Made That Would Not Obtain It Were It Now To Make?

Men Must Be Either The Slaves Of Duty, Or The Slaves Of Force.

Fancy, An Animal Faculty, Is Very Different From Imagination, Which Is Intellectual. The Former Is Passive; But The Latter Is Active And Creative. Children, The Weak Minded, And The Timid Are Full Of Fancy. Men And Women Of Intellect, Of Great Intellect, Are Alone Possessed Of Great Imagination.

Space Is The Stature Of God.

How Many People Eat, Drink, And Get Married; Buy, Sell, And Build; Make Contracts And Attend To Their Fortune; Have Friends And Enemies, Pleasures And Pains, Are Born, Grow Up, Live And Die - But Asleep!

Living Requires But Little Life; Doing Requires Much.

God Has Commanded Time To Console The Afflicted.

Genuine Bon Mots Surprise Those From Whose Lips They Fall, No Less Than They Do Those Who Listen To Them.

Moderation Consists In Being Moved As Angels Are Moved.

It Is Better To Debate A Question Without Settling It Than To Settle A Question Without Debating It.

We Should Always Keep A Corner Of Our Heads Open And Free, That We May Make Room For The Opinions Of Our Friends. Let Us Have Heart And Head Hospitality.

Never Be Sad For What Is Over, Just Be Glad It Was Once Yours. Kindness Is Loving People More Than They Deserve.

Never Write Anything That Does Not Give You Great Pleasure. Emotion Is Easily Transferred From The Writer To The Reader.

Never Giving Up

The Last Word Should Be The Last Word. It Is Like A Finishing Touch Given To Color; There Is Nothing More To Add. But What Precaution Is Needed In Order Not To Put The Last Word First.

Grace Imitates Modesty, As Politeness Imitates Kindness.

The True Character Of Epistolary Style Is Playfulness And Urbanity.

When Credulity Comes From The Heart It Does No Harm To The Intellect.

Pleasures Are Always Children, Pains Always Have Wrinkles.

You Will Find Poetry Nowhere Unless You Bring Some Of It With You.

The Soul Paints Itself In Our Machines.

When You Give, Give With Joy And Smiling.

Only Just The Right Quantum Of Wit Should Be Put Into A Book; In Conversation A Little Excess Is Allowable.

Words Are Like Eyeglasses They Blur Everything That They Do Not Make Clear.

Heaven Is For Those Who Think Of It.

Slander Is The Solace Of Malignity.

A Man Who Shows No Defect Is A Fool Or A Hypocrite, Whom We Should Mistrust. There Are Defects So Bound To Fine Qualities That They Announce Them,--defects Which It Is Well Not To Correct.

Luckily, I Never Feel At One Time More Than Half My Pains.

The Sound Of The Drum Drives Out Thought; For That Very Reason It Is The Most Military Of Instruments.

A Temperate Style Is Alone Classical.

Let Us Have Justice, And Then We Shall Have Enough Liberty!

Contempt For Private Wrongs Was One Of The Features Of Ancient Morals.

To Be An Agreeable Guest One Need Only Enjoy Oneself.

Logic Works, Metaphysics Contemplates.

Our Ideals, Like Pictures, Are Made From Lights And Shadows.

Fully To Understand A Grand And Beautiful Thought Requires, Perhaps, As Much Time As To Conceive It.

Beautiful Thoughts

When The Painter Wishes To Represent An Event, He Cannot Place Before Us Too Great A Number Of Personages; But He Cannot Employ Too Few When He Wishes To Portray An Emotion.

The Lively Phraseology Of Montesquieu Was The Result Of Long Meditation. His Words, As Light As Wings, Bear On Them Grave Reflections.

Justice Is The Truth In Action.

Grief - Happiness Is To Feel That One's Soul Is Good; There Is No Other, In Truth, And This Kind Of Happiness May Exist Even In Sorrow, So That There Are Griefs Perfable To Every Joy, And Such As Would Be Preferred By All Those Who Have Felt Them.

Let Us Be Men With Men, And Always Children Before God; For In His Eyes We Are But Children. Old Age Itself, In Presence Of Eternity, Is But The First Moment Of A Morning.

Credulity Forges More Miracles Than Trickery Could Invent.

There Is Graciousness And A Kind Of Urbanity In Beginning With Men By Esteem And Confidence. It Proves, At Least, That We Have Long Lived In Good Company With Others And With Our Selves.

Men Have Torn Up The Roads Which Led To Heaven, And Which All The World Followed; Now We Have To Make Our Own Ladders.

Politeness Is The Flower Of Humanity.

Lenity Is A Part Of Justice; But She Must Not Speak Too Loud For Fear Of Waking Justice.

The Essential Thing Is Not That There Be Many Truths In A Work, But That No Truth Be Abused.

The Mind's Direction Is More Important Than Its Progress.

Thus, If The Clarity Of Our Thoughts Comes Through Better In A Play Of Words, Then The Wordplay Is Good. One Must Know How To Enter The Ideas Of Others And How To Leave Them.

Words, Like Glass, Obscure When They Do Not Aid Vision.

God Is The Place Where I Do Not Remember The Rest.

How Many People Become Abstract As A Way Of Appearing Profound.

Children Must Be Rendered Reasonable, But Not Reasoners. The First Thing To Teach Them Is That It Is Reasonable For Them To Obey, And Unreasonable For Them To Dispute.

There Are Single Thoughts That Contain The Essence Of A Whole Volume, Single Sentences That Have The Beauties Of A Large Work.

Words, Like Glasses, Obscure Everything They Do Not Make Clear. Before Using A Fine Word, Make A Place For It.

In The Interchange Of Thought Use No Coin But Gold And Silver.

Before You Use A Fancy Word, Make Room For It.

A Maxim Is The Exact And Noble Expression Of An Important And Indisputable Truth. Good Maxims Are The Germs Of All Excellence; When Firmly Fixed On The Memory, They Nourish The Will.

It Is Easier To Be Mistaken About The True Than The Beautiful.

If Fortune Wishes To Make A Man Estimable, She Gives Him Virtues; If She Wishes To Make Him Esteemed, She Gives Him Success.

Taste Has Never Been Corrupted By Simplicity.

Proverbs May Be Said To Be The Abridgment Of Wisdom.

The Mind Is The Atmosphere Of The Soul.

One Should Choose For A Wife Only Such A Woman As He Would Choose For A Friend, Were She A Man.

The Joy Which Is Caused By Truth And Noble Thoughts Shows Itself In The Words By Which They Are Expressed.

To Teach Is To Learn Twice. About All Some Parents Accomplish In Life Is To Send A Child To Harvard. The Purpose Of A Liberal Education Is To Make One's Mind A Pleasant Place To Spend One's Leisure.

We Shall Always Keep A Spare Corner In Our Heads To Give Passing Hospitality To Our Friends' Opinion.

In These Times Gain Is Not Only A Matter Of Greed, But Of Ambition.

We Live In An Age In Which Superfluous Ideas Abound And Essential Ideas Are Lacking.

The God Of Metaphysics Is But An Idea. But The God Of Religion, The Maker Of Heaven And Earth, The Sovereign Judge Of Actions And Thoughts, Is A Power.

If You Are Poor, Distinguish Yourself By Your Virtues; If Rich, By Your Good Deeds.

Our Worries Always Come From Our Weaknesses.

The Best Remedy For A Short Temper Is A Long Walk.

Poetry Is To Be Found Nowhere Unless We Carry It Within Us.

There Was A Time When The World Acted On Books; Now Books Act On The World.

We Find Little In A Book But What We Put There. But In Great Books, The Mind Finds Room To Put Many Things.

Success Serves Men As A Pedestal. It Makes Them Seem Greater When Not Measured By Reflection.

Politeness Smooths Wrinkles.

All Disputation Makes The Mind Deaf; And When People Are Deaf, I Am Dumb.

One Can With Dignity Be Wife And Widow But Once.

The Aim Of Argument, Or Of Discussion, Should Not Be Victory, But Progress.

What Is True By Lamplight Is Not Always True By Sunlight.

The Worst Thing About New Books Is That They Keep Us From Reading The Old Ones.

Those Readiest To Criticise Are Often Least Able To Appreciate.

Virtue Is The Health Of The Soul.

What A Man Knows Only Through Feeling Can Be Explained Only Through Enthusiasm.

We Always Believe God Is Like Ourselves, The Indulgent Think Him Indulgent And The Stern, Terrible.

There Are Some Heads Which Have No Windows, And The Day Can Never Strike From Above; Nothing Enters From Heavenard.

Professional Critics Are Incapable Of Distinguishing And Appreciating Either Diamonds In The Rough Or Gold In Bars. They Are Traders, And In Literature Know Only The Coins That Are Current. Their Critical Lab Has Scales And Weights, But Neither Crucible Or Touchstone.

The Voice Is A Human Sound Which Nothing Inanimate Can Perfectly Imitate. It Has An Authority And An Insinuating Property Which Writing Lacks. It Is Not Merely So Much Air, But Air Modulated And Impregnated With Life.

Common Sense Suits Itself To The Ways Of The World. Wisdom Tries To Confirm To The Ways Of Heaven.

Taste Is The Literary Conscience Of The Soul.

Virtue Is The Health Of The Soul. It Gives A Flavor To The Smallest Leaves Of Life.

Ideas Never Lack For Words. It Is Words That Lack Ideas. As Soon As The Idea Has Come To Its Last Degree Of Perfection, The Word Blossoms.

Abuse Of Words Is The Foundation Of Ideology.

Antiquity! I Like Its Ruins Better Than Its Reconstructions.

We Use Up In The Passions The Stuff That Was Given Us For Happiness.

When We Love, It Is The Heart That Judges.

Thoughts There Are, That Need No Embodying, No Form, No Expression. It Is Enough To Hint At Them Vaguely; A Word, And They Are Heard And Seen.

The Evening Of Life Brings With It Its Lamps.

He Who Has Not The Weakness Of Friendship Has Not The Strength.

The Bible Remained For Me A Book Of Books, Still Divine - But Divine In The Sense That All Great Books Are Divine Which Teach Men How To Live Righteously.

Order Is To Arrangement What The Soul Is To The Body, And What Mind Is To Matter.

Without The Spiritual World The Material World Is A Disheartening Enigma.

Children Need Models Rather Than Critics.

Genius Begins Beautiful Works, But Only Labor Finishes Them.

The Essence Of Life Consists In Thinking, And Being Conscious Of One's Soul.

A Work Is Perfectly Finished Only When Nothing Can Be Added To It And Nothing Taken Away.

I Resemble The Poplar,--that Tree Which, Even When Old, Still Looks Young.

Grace Is In Garments, In Movements, In Manners; Beauty In The Nude, And In Forms. This Is True Of Bodies; But When We Speak Of Feelings, Beauty Is In Their Spirituality, And Grace In Their Moderation.

The Dregs May Stir Themselves As They Please; They Fall Back To The Bottom By Their Own Coarseness.

Genuine Witticisms Surprise Those Who Say Them As Much As Those Who Listen To Them; They Arise In Us In Spite Of Us, Or, At Least, Without Our Participation,--like Everything Inspired.

We Do Not Do Well Except When We Know Where The Best Is And When We Are Assured That We Have Touched It And Hold Its Power Within Us.

The Bible Is To Religion What The Iliad Is To Poetry

How Many People Make Themselves Abstract To Appear Profound. The Most Useful Part Of Abstract Terms Are The Shadows They Create To Hide A Vacuum.

In Bringing Up A Child, Think Of Its Old Age.

Happy Is The Man Who Can Do Only One Thing; In Doing It, He Fulfills His Destiny.

He Who Has Imagination Without Learning Has Wings But No Feet. [fr., Celui Qui A De L'imagination Sans Erudition A Des Ailes, Et N'a Pas De Pieds.]

Drawing Is Speaking To The Eye; Talking Is Painting To The Ear.

Religion Is The Only Metaphysic That The Multitude Can Understand And Adopt.

Beautiful Works Do Not Intoxicate, But They Enchant.

You Want To Talk To Someone; First Open Your Ears.

All Luxury Corrupts Either The Morals Or The Taste.

There Is In The Soul A Taste For The Good, Just As There Is In The Body An Appetite For Enjoyment.

Mediocrity Is Excellent To The Eyes Of Mediocre People.

Think Of The Ills From Which You Are Exempt.

The Beautiful Invariably Possesses A Visible And A Hidden Beauty; And It Is Certain That No Style Is So Beautiful As That Which Presents To The Attentive Reader A Half-hidden Meaning.

Be Saving, But Not At The Cost Of All Liberality. Have The Soul Of A King And The Hand Of A Wise Economist.

To Teach Is To Learn Twice.

To Be Capable Of Respect Is Almost As Rare As To Be Worthy Of It.

One Day, A Daughter Of Aristotle, Pythias By Name, Was Asked What Color Pleased Her Most. She Replied, "the Color With Which Modesty Suffuses The Face Of Simple, Inoffensive Men.

Of The Two, I Prefer Those Who Render Vice Lovable To Those Who Degrade Virtue.

Attention Is Like A Narrow Mouthed Vessel; Pour Into It What You Have To Say Cautiously, And, As It Were, Drop By Drop.

It Would Be Next To Impossible To Discover A Handsome Woman Who Was Not Also A Vain Woman.

Nothing Ruins The Truth Like Stretching It... Get Rich Quick! Count Your Blessings... Stop Telling God How Big Your Storm Is. Instead, Tell The Storm How Big Your God Is!!!!!! Contentment Begins Where Comparison Ends. The Aim Of Argument, Or Of Discussion, Should Not Be Victory, But Progress.

To See The World Is To Judge The Judges.

Sexes. One Has The Look Of A Wound, The Other Of Something Skinned.

Maxims Are To The Intellect What Laws Are To Actions; They Do Not Enlighten, But They Guide And Direct, And, Although Themselves Blind, Are Protective.

The Idea Of The Nest In The Bird's Mind, Where Does It Come From?

Innocence Is Always Unsuspicious.

Misery Is Almost Always The Result Of Thinking.

History Needs Distance, Perspective. Facts And Events Which Are Too Well Attested Cease, In Some Sort, To Be Malleable.

Xenophon Wrote With A Swan's Quill, Plato With A Pen Of Gold, And Thucydides With A Brazen Stylus.

When You Go In Search Of Honey You Must Expect To Be Stung By Bees.

Only Choose In Marriage A Man Whom You Would Choose As A Friend If He Were A Woman.

Wedding Anniversary

We Should Make Ourselves Loved, For Men Are Only Just Towards Those Whom They Love.

Old Age Takes From The Man Of Intellect No Qualities Save Those That Are Useless To Wisdom.

You Arrive At Truth Through Poetry; I Arrive At Poetry Through Truth.

I Would Fain Coin Wisdom,—mould It, I Mean, Into Maxims, Proverbs, Sentences, That Can Easily Be Retained And Transmitted. Would That I Could Denounce And Banish From The Language Of Men—as Base Money—the Words By Which They Cheat And Are Cheated!

Tenderness Is The Rest Of Passion.

What Can You Possibly Add To A Mind That's Full, Especially One That's Full Of Itself.

Strength Is Natural, But Grace Is The Growth Of Habit. This Charming Quality Requires Practice If It Is To Become Lasting.

There Are People Who Are Virtuous Only In A Piece-meal Way; Virtue Is A Fabric From Which They Never Make Themselves A Whole Garment.

A Part Of Kindness Consists In Loving People More Than They Deserve.

I Think Reading Is A Gift. It Was A Gift That Was Given To Me As A Child By Many People, And Now As An Adult And A Writer, I'm Trying To Give A Little Of It Back To Others. It's One Of The Greatest Pleasures I Know." Ann M. Martin "never Write Anything That Does Not Give You Great Pleasure. Emotion Is Easily Transferred From The Writer To The Reader.

Today There Are No More Irreconcilable Enmities, Because There Are No More Disinterested Emotions: That's A Good Thing Born From A Bad Thing.

Strength Is Not Energy; Some Authors Have More Muscles Than Talent.

All Gardeners Live In Beautiful Places Because They Make Them So.

God Multiplies Intelligence, Which Communicates Itself, Like Fire, Ad Infinitum. Light A Thousand Torches At One Touch, The Flame Remains Always The Same.

All Are Born To Observe Order, But Few Are Born To Establish It.

Man Is Born With The Faculty Of Speech. Who Gives It To Him? He Who Gives The Bird Its Song.

Chance Generally Favors The Prudent.

In Really Good Acting We Should Be Able To Believe That What We Hear And See Is Of Our Own Imagining; It Should Seem To Be To Us As A Charming Dream.

Genuinely Good Remarks Surprise Their Author As Well As His Audience.

A Thought Is A Thing As Real As A Cannonball.

Combien De Gens Se Font Abstraits Pour Para?tre Profonds! La Plupart Des Termes Abstraits Sont Des Ombres Qui Cachent Des Vides. How Many People Become Abstract In Order To Appear Profound! Most Abstract Terms Are Shadows That Conceal A Void.

I Love Prudence Very Little, If It Is Not Moral.

Without Duty, Life Is Soft And Boneless.

Our Life Is Woven Wind.

Every Legitimate Authority Should Respect Its Extent And Its Limits.

The Punishment Of Those Who Have Loved Women Too Much Is To Love Them Always.

Forms Of Government Become Established Of Themselves. They Shape Themselves, They Are Not Created. We May Give Them Strength And Consistency, But We Cannot Call Them Into Being. Let Us Rest Assured That The Form Of Government Can Never Be A Matter Of Choice: It Is Almost Always A Matter Of Necessity.

Old Age Deprives The Intelligent Man Only Of Qualities Useless To Wisdom.

There Is An Admiration Which Is The Daughter Of Knowledge.

We May Convince Others By Our Arguements, But We Can Only Persuade Them By Their Own

Nothing Which Does Not Transport Is Poetry. The Lyre Is A Winged Instrument.

Genius Is The Ability To See Things Invisible, To Manipulate Things Intangible, To Paint Things That Have No Features

Reason Is A Bee, And Exists Only On What It Makes; His Usefulness Takes The Place Of Beauty.

Which Is More Misshapen,--religion Without Virtue, Or Virtue Without Religion?

Those Who Never Retract Their Opinions Love Themselves More Than They Love The Truth.

Tormented By The Cursed Ambition Always To Put A Whole Book In A Page, A Whole Page In A Sentence, And This Sentence In A Word. I Am Speaking Of Myself.

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