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Nothing Is So Contemptible As That Affectation Of Wisdom, Which Some Display, By Universal Incredulity.

-Oliver Goldsmith

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Nothing Is So Contemptible

Oliver Goldsmith

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Nothing Is So Contemptible As That Affectation Of Wisdom, Which Some Display, By Universal Incredulity.

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Friendship Is Made Up Of Esteem And Pleasure; Pity Is Composed Of Sorrow And Contempt: The Mind May For Some Time Fluctuate Between Them, But It Can Never Entertain Both At Once.

Let Observation With Observant View, Observe Mankind From China To Peru.

The Europeans Are Themselves Blind Who Describe Fortune Without Sight. No First-rate Beauty Ever Had Finer Eyes, Or Saw More Clearly. They Who Have No Other Trade But Seeking Their Fortune Need Never Hope To Find Her; Coquette-like, She Flies From Her Close Pursuers, And At Last Fixes On The Plodding Mechanic Who Stays At Home And Minds His Business.

The Mind Is Ever Ingenious In Making Its Own Distress.

Be Not Affronted At A Joke. If One Throw Salt At Thee, Thou Wilt Receive No Harm, Unless Thou Art Raw.

Good People All, With One Accord, Lament For Madam Blaize, Who Never Wanted A Good Word From Those Who Spoke Her Praise.

True Wisdom Consists Of Tracing Effects To Their Causes.

Wealth Accumulates, And Men Decay.

I Have Found By Experience That They Who Have Spent All Their Lives In Cities Contract Not Only An Effeminacy Of Habit, But Of Thinking.

Titles And Mottoes To Books Are Like Escutcheons And Dignities In The Hands Of A King. The Wise Sometimes Condescend To Accept Of Them; But None But A Fool Would Imagine Them Of Any Real Importance. We Ought To Depend Upon Intrinsic Merit, And Not The Slender Helps Of The Title.

Such Is The Patriot's Boast, Where'er We Roam, His First Best Country Ever Is At Home.

With Disadvantages Enough To Bring Him To Humility, A Scotsman Is One Of The Proudest Things Alive.

By Sports Like These Are All Their Cares Beguil'd; The Sports Of Children Satisfy The Child.

As Ten Millions Of Circles Can Never Make A Square, So The United Voice Of Myriads Cannot Lend The Smallest Foundation To Falsehood.

Thus Love Is The Most Easy And Agreeable, And Gratitude The Most Humiliating, Affection Of The Mind. We Never Reflect On The Man We Love Without Exulting In Our Choice, While He Who Has Bound Us To Him By Benefits Alone Rises To Our Ideas As A Person To Whom We Have In Some Measure Forfeited Our Freedom.

Processions, Cavalcades, And All That Fund Of Gay Frippery, Furnished Out By Tailors, Barbers, And Tire-women, Mechanically Influence The Mind Into Veneration; An Emperor In His Nightcap Would Not Meet With Half The Respect Of An Emperor With A Crown.

The Wisdom Of The Ignorant Somewhat Resembles The Instinct Of Animals; It Is Diffused In But A Very Narrow Sphere, But Within The Circle It Acts With Vigor, Uniformity, And Success.

How Wide The Limits Stand Between A Splendid And A Happy Land.

The Polite Of Every Country Seem To Have But One Character. A Gentleman Of Sweden Differs But Little, Except In Trifles, From One Of Any Other Country. It Is Among The Vulgar We Are To Find Those Distinctions Which Characterize A People.

Both Wit And Understanding Are Trifles Without Integrity; It Is That Which Gives Value To Every Character. The Ignorant Peasant, Without Fault, Is Greater Than The Philosopher With Many; For What Is Genius Or Courage Without A Heart?

Religion Does What Philosophy Could Never Do; It Shows The Equal Dealings Of Heaven To The Happy And The Unhappy, And Levels All Human Enjoyments To Nearly The Same Standard. It Gives To Both Rich And Poor The Same Happiness Hereafter, And Equal Hopes To Aspire After It.

A Traveler Of Taste Will Notice That The Wise Are Polite All Over The World, But The Fool Only At Home.

There Is Nothing Magnanimous In Bearing Misfortunes With Fortitude, When The Whole World Is Looking On.... He Who, Without Friends To Encourage Or Even Without Hope To Alleviate His Misfortunes, Can Behave With Tranquility And Indifference, Is Truly Great.

Her Modest Looks The Cottage Might Adorn, Sweet As The Primrose Peeps Beneath The Thorn.

To The Last Moment Of His Breath, On Hope The Wretch Relies; And Even The Pang Preceding Death Bids Expectation Rise.

It Is Not Easy To Recover An Art When Once Lost.

The Wretch Condemn'd With Life To Part, Still, Still On Hope Relies; And Every Pang That Rends The Heart Bids Expectation Rise.

When Any One Of Our Relations Was Found To Be A Person Of A Very Bad Character, A Troublesome Guest, Or One We Desired To Get Rid Of, Upon His Leaving My House I Ever Took Care To Lend Him A Riding-coat, Or A Pair Of Boots, Or Sometimes A Horse Of Small Value, And I Always Had The Satisfaction Of Finding He Never Came Back To Return Them.

As For Disappointing Them I Should Not So Much Mind; But I Can't Abide To Disappoint Myself.

I Fancy The Character Of A Poet Is In Every Country The Same,--fond Of Enjoying The Present, Careless Of The Future; His Conversation That Of A Man Of Sense, His Actions Those Of A Fool.

In Proportion As Society Refines, New Books Must Ever Become More Necessary.

And The Weak Soul, Within Itself Unbless'd, Leans For All Pleasure On Another's Breast.

Taste Is The Power Of Relishing Or Rejecting Whatever Is Offered For The Entertainment Of The Imagination.

Age, That Lessens The Enjoyment Of Life, Increases Our Desire Of Living

Wit Generally Succeeds More From Being Happily Addressed Than From Its Native Poignancy. A Jest, Calculated To Spread At A Gaming-table, May Be Received With, Perfect Indifference Should It Happen To Drop In A Mackerel-boat.

That Virtue Which Requires To Be Ever Guarded Is Scarce Worth The Sentinel.

And Learn The Luxury Of Doing Good.

And His Best Riches, Ignorance Of Wealth.

Truth From His Lips Prevailed With Double Sway, And Fools, Who Came To Scoff, Remained To Pray.

And As A Bird Each Fond Endearment Tries To Tempt Its New-fledg'd Offspring To The Skies, He Tried Each Art, Reprov'd Each Dull Delay, Allur'd To Brighter Worlds, And Led The Way.

And E'en While Fashion's Brightest Arts Decoy, The Heart Distrusting Asks If This Be Joy.

Of Praise A Mere Glutton, He Swallow'd What Came, And The Puff A Dunce, He Mistook It For Fame; Till His Relish Grown Callous, Almost To Displease, Who Pepper'd The Highest Was Surest To Please.

A French Woman Is A Perfect Architect In Dress: She Never, With Gothic Ignorance, Mixes The Orders; She Never Tricks Out A Snobby Doric Shape With Corinthian Finery; Or, To Speak Without Metaphor, She Conforms To General Fashion Only When It Happens Not To Be Repugnant To Private Beauty.

The Person Whose Clothes Are Extremely Fine I Am Too Apt To Consider As Not Being Possessed Of Any Superiority Of Fortune, But Resembling Those Indians Who Are Found To Wear All The Gold They Have In The World In A Bob At The Nose.

If One Wishes To Become Rich They Must Appear Rich.

For Praise Too Dearly Lov'd, Or Warmly Sought, Enfeebles All Internal Strength Of Thought; And The Weak Soul Within Itself Unblest, Leans For All Pleasure On Another's Breast.

The Best Way To Make Your Audience Laugh Is To Start Laughing Yourself.

A Man He Was To All The Country Dear, And Passing Rich With Forty Pounds A Year.

I Do Not Love A Man Who Is Zealous For Nothing.

A Boy Will Learn More True Wisdom In A Public School In A Year Than By A Private Education In Five. It Is Not From Masters, But From Their Equals, That Youth Learn A Knowledge Of The World.

All The Sciences Are, In Some Measure, Linked With Each Other, And Before The One Is Ended, The Other Begins.

Measures, Not Men, Have Always Been My Mark.

They Please, Are Pleas'd, They Give To Get Esteem Till, Seeming Blest, They Grow To What They Seem.

Ill Fares The Land, To Hastening Ills A Prey, Where Wealth Accumulates, And Men Decay.

The Hawthorn Bush, With Seats Beneath The Shade, For Talking Age And Whispering Lovers Made.

Near Yonder Copse, Where Once The Garden Smil'd, And Still Where Many A Garden Flower Grows Wild, There, Where A Few Torn Shrubs The Place Disclose, The Village Preacher's Modest Mansion Rose. A Man He Was To All The Country Dear, And Passing Rich With Forty Pounds A Year; Remote From Town's He Ran His Godly Race, Nor E'er Had Chang'd Nor Wish'd To Change His Place; Unskilful He To Fawn, Or Seek For Power, By Doctrines Fashion'd To The Varying Hour; Far Other Aims His Heart Had Learn'd To Prize. More Bent To Raise The Wretched Than To Rise.

Quality And Title Have Such Allurements That Hundreds Are Ready To Give Up All Their Own Importance, To Cringe, To Flatter, To Look Little, And To Pall Every Pleasure In Constraint, Merely To Be Among The Great, Though Without The Least Hopes Of Improving Their Understanding Or Sharing Their Generosity. They Might Be Happier Among Their Equals.

Let Schoolmasters Puzzle Their Brain, With Grammar, And Nonsense, And Learning, Good Liquor, I Stoutly Maintain, Gives Genius A Better Discerning.

Absence, Like Death, Sets A Seal On The Image Of Those We Love: We Cannot Realize The Intervening Changes Which Time May Have Effected.

One Should Not Quarrel With A Dog Without A Reason Sufficient To Vindicate One Through All The Courts Of Morality.

Ill Fares The Land, To Hastening Ills A Prey, Where Wealth Accumulates, And Men Decay. Princes And Lords May Flourish Or May Fade,- A Breath Can Make Them, As A Breath Has Made; But A Bold Peasantry, Their Country's Pride, When Once Destroy'd, Can Never Be Supplied.

The First Time I Read An Excellent Book, It Is To Me Just As If I Had Gained A New Friend. When I Read A Book Over I Have Perused Before, It Resembles The Meeting With An Old One.

There Is Unspeakable Pleasure Attending The Life Of A Voluntary Student.

I Always Get The Better When I Argue Alone.

Pity And Friendship Are Two Passions Incompatible With Each Other.

To What Fortuitous Occurrence Do We Not Owe Every Pleasure And Convenience Of Our Lives.

Where Wealth And Freedom Reign Contentment Fails, And Honour Sinks Where Commerce Long Prevails.

Well Had The Boding Tremblers Learn'd To Trace The Day's Disasters In His Morning Face; Full Well They Laugh'd With Counterfeited Glee At All His Jokes, For Many A Joke Had He; Full Well The Busy Whisper Circling Round Convey'd The Dismal Tidings When He Frown'd. Yet Was He Kind, Or If Severe In Aught, The Love He Bore To Learning Was In Fault; The Village All Declar'd How Much He Knew, 'twas Certain He Could Write And Cipher Too.

Who Mix'd Reason With Pleasure, And Wisdom With Mirth: If He Had Any Faults, He Has Left Us In Doubt.

The Ingratitude Of The World Can Never Deprive Us Of The Conscious Happiness Of Having Acted With Humanity Ourselves.

You Will Always Find That Those Are Most Apt To Boast Of National Merit, Who Have Little Or Not Merit Of Their Own To Depend On . . .

In My Time, The Follies Of The Town Crept Slowly Among Us, But Now They Travel Faster Than A Stagecoach.

Elegy On The Death Of A Mad Dog And In That Town A Dog Was Found, As Many Dogs There Be, Both Mongrel, Puppy, Whelp, And Hound, And Curs Of Low Degree.

There Are Some Faults So Nearly Allied To Excellence That We Can Scarce Weed Out The Vice Without Eradicating The Virtue.

Mortifications Are Often More Painful Than Real Calamities.

Villainy, When Detected, Never Gives Up, But Boldly Adds Impudence To Imposture.

The Nakedness Of The Indigent World May Be Clothed From The Trimmings Of The Vain.

Man Wants But Little Here Below, Nor Wants That Little Long.

The Ambitious Are Forever Followed By Adulation For They Receive The Most Pleasure From Flattery.

They Say Women And Music Should Never Be Dated.

A Great Source Of Calamity Lies In Regret And Anticipation; Therefore A Person Is Wise Who Thinks Of The Present Alone, Regardless Of The Past Or Future.

Books Are Necessary To Correct The Vices Of The Polite; But Those Vices Are Ever Changing, And The Antidote Should Be Changed Accordingly Should Still Be New.

Some Fleeting Good, That Mocks Me With The View.

If We Look Round The World, There Seem To Be Not Above Six Distinct Varieties In The Human Species, Each Of Which Is Strongly Marked, And Speaks The Kind Seldom To Have Mixed With Any Other. But There Is Nothing In The Shape, Nothing In The Faculties, That Shows Their Coming From Different Originals; And The Varieties Of Climate, Of Nourishment, And Custom, Are Sufficient To Produce Every Change.

The Loud Laugh That Spoke The Vacant Mind.

Novels Teach The Youthful Mind To Sigh After Happiness That Never Existed.

What We Say Of A Thing That Has Just Come In Fashion And That Which We Do With The Dead, Is The Name Of The Honestest Man In The Nation: What More Of A Man Can Be Said?

At Night Returning, Every Labour Sped, He Sits Him Down, The Monarch Of A Shed; Smiles By His Cheerful Fire, And Round Surveys His Children's Looks, That Brighten At The Blaze; While His Lov'd Partner, Boastful Of Her Hoard, Displays Her Cleanly Platter On The Board.

We Seldom Speak Of The Virtue Which We Have, But Much Oftener Of That Which We Lack.

It Seemed To Me Pretty Plain, That They Had More Of Love Than Matrimony In Them.

This Is That Eloquence The Ancients Represented As Lightning, Bearing Down Every Opposer; This The Power Which Has Turned Whole Assemblies Into Astonishment, Admiration And Awe- - That Is Described By The Torrent, The Flame, And Every Other Instance Of Irresistible Impetuosity.

True Generosity Is A Duty As Indispensably Necessary As Those Imposed On Us By Law.

The Little Mind Who Loves Itself, Will Wr'te And Think With The Vulgar; But The Great Mind Will Be Bravely Eccentric, And Scorn The Beaten Road, From Universal Benevolence.

Of All Kinds Of Ambition, That Which Pursues Poetical Fame Is The Wildest

Our Garrick 's A Salad; For In Him We See Oil, Vinegar, Sugar, And Saltness Agree!

The Dog, To Gain Some Private Ends, Went Mad, And Bit The Man.

Both Wit And Understanding Are Trifles Without Integrity.

Could A Man Live By It, It Were Not Unpleasant Employment To Be A Poet.

Blame Where You Must, Be Candid Where You Can, And Be Each Critic The Good-natured Man.

Our Pleasures Are Short, And Can Only Charm At Intervals; Love Is A Method Of Protraction Our Greatest Pleasure.

To Me More Dear, Congenial To My Heart, One Native Charm, Than All The Gloss Of Art.

Is It That Nature, Attentive To The Preservation Of Mankind, Increases Our Wishes To Live, While She Lessens Our Enjoyments, And As She Robs The Senses Of Every Pleasure, Equips Imag-ination In The Spoil?

Pity, Though It May Often Relieve, Is But, At Best, A Short-lived Passion, And Seldom Affords Distress More Than Transitory Assistance; With Some It Scarce Lasts From The First Impulse Till The Hand Can Be Put Into The Pocket.

Those Who Think Must Govern Those That Toil.

There Is Probably No Country So Barbarous That Would Not Disclose All It Knew, If It Received Equivalent Information; And I Am Apt To Think That A Person Who Was Ready To Give More Knowledge Than He Received Would Be Welcome Wherever He Came.

Turn, Gentle Hermit Of The Dale, And Guide My Lonely Way To Where Yon Taper Cheers The Vale With Hospitable Ray.

I Have Seen Her And Sister Cry Over A Book For An Hour Together, And They Said, They Liked The Book The Better The More It Made Them Cry.

What If In Scotland's Wilds We Viel'd Our Head, Where Tempests Whistle Round The Sordid Bed; Where The Rug's Two-fold Use We Might Display, By Night A Blanket, And A Plaid By Day.

Creation's Heir, The World, The World Is Mine!

The Way To Acquire Lasting Esteem Is Not By The Fewness Of A Writer's Faults, But The Greatness Of His Beauties, And Our Noblest Works Are Generally Most Replete With Both.

To Make A Fine Gentleman, Several Trades Are Required, But Chiefly A Barber.

Blest That Abode, Where Want And Pain Repair, And Every Stranger Finds A Ready Chair.

To Be Poor, And To Seem Poor, Is A Certain Method Never To Rise.

I Can't Say Whether We Had More Wit Among Us Now Than Usual, But I Am Certain We Had More Laughing, Which Answered The End As Well.

I Find You Want Me To Furnish You With Argument And Intellects Too. No, Sir, These, I Protest You, Are Too Hard For Me.

The Very Pink Of Perfection.

The English Laws Punish Vice; The Chinese Laws Do More, They Reward Virtue.

An Emperor In His Nightcap Will Not Meet With Half The Respect Of An Emperor With A Crown.

Where'er I Roam, Whatever Realms To See, My Heart Untravelled, Fondly Turns To Thee; Still To My Brother Turns, With Ceaseless Pain, And Drags At Each Remove A Lengthening Chain.

Missing Someone

Little Things Are Great To Little Men.

The Premises Being Thus Settled, I Proceed To Observe That The Concatenation Of Self-existence, Proceeding In A Reciprocal Duplicate Ratio, Naturally Produces A Problematical Dialogism, Which In Some Measure Proves That The Essence Of Spirituality May Be Referred To The Second Predicable.

The Volumes Of Antiquity, Like Medals, May Very Well Serve To Amuse The Curious, But The Works Of The Moderns, Like The Current Coin Of A Kingdom, Are Much Better For Immediate Use.

Philosophy Can Add To Our Happiness In No Other Manner But By Diminishing Our Misery; It Should Not Pretend To Increase Our Present Stock, But Make Us Economists Of What We Are Possessed Of. Happy Were We All Born Philosophers; All Born With A Talent Of Thus Dissipating Our Own Cares By Spreading Them Upon All Mankind.

While Selfishness Joins Hands With No One Of The Virtues, Benevolence Is Allied To Them All.

A Night-cap Deck'd His Brows Instead Of Bay,- A Cap By Night, A Stocking All The Day.

A Book May Be Very Amusing With Numerous Errors, Or It May Be Very Dull Without A Single Absurdity.

As Some Tall Cliff That Lifts Its Awful Form, Swells From The Vale, And Midway Leaves The Storm,- Though Round Its Breast The Rolling Clouds Are Spread, Eternal Sunshine Settles On Its Head.

The World Is Like A Vast Sea: Mankind Like A Vessel Sailing On Its Tempestuous Bosom. ... [t]he Sciences Serve Us For Oars.

Silence Gives Consent.

All That A Husband Or Wife Really Wants Is To Be Pitied A Little, Praised A Little, And Appreciated A Little.

[t]here Are Depths Of Thousands Of Miles Which Are Hidden From Our Inquiry. The Only Tidings We Have From Those Unfathomable Regions Are By Means Of Volcanoes, Those Burning Mountains That Seem To Discharge Their Materials From The Lowest Abysses Of The Earth.

Men May Be Very Learned, And Yet Very Miserable; It Is Easy To Be A Deep Geometrician, Or A Sublime Astronomer, But Very Difficult To Be A Good Man. I Esteem, Therefore, The Traveller Who Instructs The Heart, But Despise Him Who Only Indulges The Imagination. A Man Who Leaves Home To Mend Himself And Others, Is A Philosopher; But He Who Goes From Country To Country, Guided By The Blind Impulse Of Curiosity, Is Only A Vagabond.

The Heart Of Every Man Lies Open To The Shafts Of Correction If The Archer Can Take Proper Aim.

Wisdom Makes A Slow Defense Against Trouble, Though A Sure One In The End.

Teach Erring Man To Spurn The Rage Of Gain.

Girls Like To Be Played With And Rumpled A Little Too Sometimes.

In Arguing Too, The Parson Own'd His Skill, For E'en Though Vanquish'd He Could Argue Still; While Words Of Learned Length And Thundering Sound Amaz'd The Gazing Rustics Rang'd Around; And Still They Gaz'd, And Still The Wonder Grew That One Small Head Could Carry All He Knew.

People Seek Within A Short Span Of Life To Satisfy A Thousand Desires, Each Of Which Is Insatiable.

One Writer, For Instance, Excels At A Plan Or A Title Page, Another Works Away At The Body Of The Book, And A Third Is A Dab At An Index.

Alas! The Joys That Fortune Brings Are Trifling, And Decay, And Those Who Prize The Trifling Things, More Trifling Still Than They.

A Volcano May Be Considered As A Cannon Of Immense Size.

Unequal Combinations Are Always Disadvantageous To The Weaker Side.

Our Bounty, Like A Drop Of Water, Disappears, When Diffus'd Too Widely

If The Soul Be Happily Disposed, Every Thing Becomes Capable Of Affording Entertainment, And Distress Will Almost Want A Name.

Error Is Always Talkative.

People Seldom Improve When They Have No Other Model But Themselves To Copy.

What Is Genius Or Courage Without A Heart?

A Mind Too Vigorous And Active, Serves Only To Consume The Body To Which It Is Joined.

Careless Their Merits Or Their Faults To Scan, His Pity Gave Ere Charity Began. Thus To Relieve The Wretched Was His Pride, And Even His Failings Lean'd To Virtue's Side.

When A Person Has No Need To Borrow They Find Multitudes Willing To Lend.

The Work Of Eradicating Crimes Is Not By Making Punishment Familiar, But Formidable.

In Arguing One Should Meet Serious Pleading With Humor, And Humor With Serious Pleading.

But Times Are Alter'd; Trade's Unfeeling Train Usurp The Land, And Dispossess The Swain; Along The Lawn, Where Scatter'd Hamlets Rose, Unwieldy Wealth And Cumbrous Pomp Repose.

Vain, Very Vain, My Weary Search To Find That Bliss Which Only Centers In The Mind.

No One But A Fool Would Measure Their Satisfaction By What The World Thinks Of It.

The Pregnant Quarry Teem'd With Human Form.

So The Loud Torrent, And The Whirlwind's Roar, But Bind Him To His Native Mountains More.

The Greatest Object In The Universe, Says A Certain Philosopher, Is A Good Man Struggling With Adversity; Yet There Is Still A Greater, Which Is The Good Man Who Comes To Relieve It.

Embosom'd In The Deep Where Holland Lies. Methinks Her Patient Sons Before Me Stand, Where The Broad Ocean Leans Against The Land.

The Genteel Thing Is The Genteel Thing Any Time, If As Be That A Gentleman Bees In A Concatenation Accordingly.

We Are All Sure Of Two Things, At Least; We Shall Suffer And We Shall All Die.

What Cities, As Great As This, Have... Promised Themselves Immortality! Posterity Can Hardly Trace The Situation Of Some. The Sorrowful Traveller Wanders Over The Awful Ruins Of Others... Here Stood Their Citadel, But Now Grown Over With Weeds; There Their Senate-house, But Now The Haunt Of Every Noxious Reptile; Temples And Theatres Stood Here, Now Only An Undistinguished Heap Of Ruins.

Eternal Blessings Crown My Earliest Friend, And Round His Dwelling Guardian Saints Attend.

He Cast Off His Friends As A Huntsman His Pack, For He Knew When He Pleas'd He Could Whistle Them Back.

Like The Tiger, That Seldom Desists From Pursuing Man After Having Once Preyed Upon Human Flesh, The Reader Who Has Once Gratified His Appetite With Calumny Makes Ever After The Most Agreeable Feast Upon Murdered Reputations!

Who, Born For The Universe, Narrow'd His Mind, And To Party Gave Up What Was Meant For Mankind; Though Fraught With All Learning, Yet Straining His Throat To Persuade Tommy Townshend To Lend Him A Vote. Who Too Deep For His Hearers Still Went On Refining, And Thought Of Convincing While They Thought Of Dining: Though Equal To All Things, For All Things Unfit; Too Nice For A Statesman, Too Proud For A Wit.

Those Who Place Their Affections At First On Trifles For Amusement, Will Find These Trifles Become At Last Their Most Serious Concerns.

Logicians Have But Ill Defined As Rational The Human Mind; Reason, They Say, Belongs To Man, But Let Them Prove It If They Can.

Fortune Is Ever Seen Accompanying Industry.

Where Wealth Accumulates, Men Decay.

If You Were To Make Little Fishes Talk, They Would Talk Like Whales.

The Volume Of Nature Is The Book Of Knowledge.

As Few Subjects Are More Interesting To Society, So Few Have Been More Frequently Written Upon Than The Education Of Youth.

We May Affirm Of Mr. Buffon, That Which Has Been Said Of The Chemists Of Old; Though He May Have Failed In Attaining His Principal Aim, Of Establishing A Theory, Yet He Has Brought Together Such A Multitude Of Facts Relative To The History Of The Earth, And The Nature Of Its Fossil Productions, That Curiosity Finds Ample Compensation, Even While It Feels The Want Of Conviction.

By Every Remove I Only Drag A Greater Length Of Chain.

Error Is Ever Talkative.

Blest Be Those Feasts, With Simple Plenty Crowned, Where All The Ruddy Family Around Laugh At The Jests Or Pranks That Never Fail Or Sigh With Pity At Some Mournful Tale.

Every Want That Stimulates The Breast Becomes A Source Of Pleasure When Redressed.

A Kind And Gentle Heart He Had, To Comfort Friends And Foes; The Naked Every Day He Clad When He Put On His Clothes.

Man Little Knows What Calamities Are Beyond His Patience To Bear Till He Tries Them; As In Ascending The Heights Of Ambition, Which Look Bright From Below, Every Step We Rise Shows Us Some New And Gloomy Prospect Of Hidden Disappointment; So In Our Descent From The Summits Of Pleasure, Though The Vale Of Misery Below May Appear, At First, Dark And Gloomy, Yet The Busy Mind, Still Attentive To Its Own Amusement, Finds, As We Descend, Something To Flatter And To Please. Still As We Approach, The Darkest Objects Appear To Brighten, And The Mortal Eye Becomes Adapted To Its Gloomy Situation.

There Is Yet A Silent Agony In Which The Mind Appears To Disdain All External Help, And Broods Over Its Distresses With Gloomy Reserve. This Is The Most Dangerous State Of Mind; Accidents Or Friendships May Lessen The Louder Kinds Of Grief, But All Remedies For This Must Be Had From Within, And There Despair Too Often Finds The Most Deadly Enemy.

The Life Of A Scholar Seldom Abounds With Adventure.

Like The Bee, We Should Make Our Industry Our Amusement.

Romance And Novel Paint Beauty In Colors More Charming Than Nature, And Describe A Happiness That Humans Never Taste. How Deceptive And Destructive Are Those Pictures Of Consummate Bliss!

We Sometimes Had Those Little Rubs Which Providence Sends To Enhance The Value Of Its Favors.

If Frugality Were Established In The State, And If Our Expenses Were Laid Out To Meet Needs Rather Than Superfluities Of Life, There Might Be Fewer Wants, And Even Fewer Pleasures, But Infinitely More Happiness.

It Has Been Remarked That Almost Every Character Which Has Excited Either Attention Or Pity Has Owed Part Of Its Success To Merit, And Part To A Happy Concurrence Of Circumstances In Its Favor. Had Caesar Or Cromwell Exchanged Countries, The One Might Have Been A Sergeant And The Other An Exciseman.

There Is A Greatness In Being Generous, And There Is Only Simple Justice In Satisfying Creditors. Generosity Is The Part Of The Soul Raised Above The Vulgar.

Thus 'tis With All; Their Chief And Constant Care Is To Seem Everything But What They Are.

Life Has Been Compared To A Race, But The Allusion Improves By Observing, That The Most Swift Are Usually The Least Manageable And The Most Likely To Stray From The Course. Great Abilities Have Always Been Less Serviceable To The Possessors Than Moderate Ones.

Thus Let Me Hold Thee To My Heart, And Every Care Resign: And We Shall Never, Never Part, My Life-my All That's Mine!

A Modest Woman, Dressed Out In All Her Finery, Is The Most Tremendous Object Of The Whole Creation.

And What Is Friendship But A Name, A Charm That Lulls To Sleep, A Shade That Follows Wealth Or Fame, And Leaves The Wretch To Weep?

Were I To Be Angry At Men Being Fools, I Could Here Find Ample Room For Declamation; But, Alas! I Have Been A Fool Myself; And Why Should I Be Angry With Them For Being Something So Natural To Every Child Of Humanity?

He Makes A Very Handsome Corpse And Becomes His Coffin Prodigiously.

Trade's Proud Empire Hastes To Swift Decay.

Pride In Their Port, Defiance In Their Eye, I See The Lords Of Humankind Pass By.

You, That Are Going To Be Married, Think Things Can Never Be Done Too Fast: But We That Are Old, And Know What We Are About, Must Elope Methodically, Madam.

Nobody With Me At Sea But Myself.

All His Faults Are Such That One Loves Him Still The Better For Them.

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