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Some Philosophers Would Give A Sex To Revenge, And Appropriate It Almost Exclusively To The Female Mind. But, Like Most Other Vices, It Is Of Both Genders; Yet, Because Wounded Vanity And Slighted Love Are The Two Most Powerful Excitements To Revenge, It Has Been Thought, Perhaps, To Rage With More Violence In The Female Heart.

-Charles Caleb Colton

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Some Philosophers Would Give

Charles Caleb Colton

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Some Philosophers Would Give A Sex To Revenge, And Appropriate It Almost Exclusively To The Female Mind. But, Like Most Other Vices, It Is Of Both Genders; Yet, Because Wounded Vanity And Slighted Love Are The Two Most Powerful Excitements To Revenge, It Has Been Thought, Perhaps, To Rage With More Violence In The Female Heart.

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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?

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.

All Poets Pretend To Write For Immortality, But The Whole Tribe Have No Objection To Present Pay, And Present Praise. Lord Burleigh Is Not The Only Statesman Who Has Thought One Hundred Pounds Too Much For A Song, Though Sung By Spenser; Although Oliver Goldsmith Is The Only Poet Who Ever Considered Himself To Have Been Overpaid.

It Is Far Better To Borrow Experience Than To Buy It.

Many Speak The Truth When They Say That They Despise Riches, But They Mean The Riches Possessed By Others.

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

He That Can Enjoy The Intimacy Of The Great, And On No Occasion Disgust Them By Familiarity, Or Disgrace Himself By Servility, Proves That He Is As Perfect A Gentleman By Nature As His Companions Are By Rank.

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.

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

None Are So Fond Of Secrets As Those Who Do Not Mean To Keep Them; Such Persons Covet Secrets As A Spendthrift Covets Money, For The Purpose Of Circulation.

Literature Has Her Quacks No Less Than Medicine, And They Are Divided Into Two Classes; Those Who Have Erudition Without Genius, And Those Who Have Volubility Without Depth; We Shall Get Second-hand Sense From The One, And Original Nonsense From The Other.

Religion, Like Its Votaries, While It Exists On Earth, Must Have A Body As Well As A Soul. A Religion Purely Spiritual Might Suit A Being As Pure, But Men Are Compound Animals; And The Body Too Often Lords It Over The Mind.

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

A House May Draw Visitors, But It Is The Possessor Alone That Can Detain Them.

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.

Most Importantly: Don't Adjust Your Results To Build Up The Ego Of The Chief Strategist. Especially If The Strategist Is You.

Revenge Is A Debt, In The Paying Of Which The Greatest Knave Is Honest And Sincere, And, So Far As He Is Able, Punctual.

Much Too Oft We Make Life Gloomy-- When Happy We Might Be, If We Gathered More Of Sunshine, And Not Dark Shadows See.

Nobility Of Birth Does Not Always Insure A Corresponding Unity Of Mind; If It Did, It Would Always Act As A Stimulus To Noble Actions; But It Sometimes Acts As A Clog Rather Than A Spur.

It Has Been Observed That A Dwarf Standing On The Shoulders Of A Giant Will See Farther Than The Giant Himself; And The Moderns, Standing As They Do On The Vantage Ground Of Former Discoveries And Uniting All The Fruits Of The Experience Of Their Forefathers, With Their Own Actual Observation, May Be Admitted To Enjoy A More Enlarged And Comprehensive View Of Things Than The Ancients Themselves.

Eloquence Is The Language Of Nature, And Cannot Be Learned In The Schools; But Rhetoric Is The Creature Of Art, Which He Who Feels Least Will Most Excel In.

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

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.

Those That Are The Loudest In Their Threats Are The Weakest In Their Actions.

Observation Made In The Cloister Or In The Desert Will Generally Be As Obscure As The One And As Barren As The Other; But He That Would Paint With His Pencil Must Study Originals, And Not Be Over-fearful Of A Little Dust.

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.

Success Seems To Be That Which Forms The Distinction Between Confidence And Conceit.

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!

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 Merited, No Courage Can Stand Against Its Just Indignation.

The Sun Should Not Set Upon Our Anger, Neither Should He Rise Upon Our Confidence. We Should Forgive Freely, But Forget Rarely. I Will Not Be Revenged, And This I Owe To My Enemy; But I Will Remember, And This I Owe To Myself.

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.

The Learned Languages Are Indispensable To Form The Gentleman And The Scholar, And Are Well Worth All The Labor That They Have Cost Us, Provided They Are Valued Not For Themselves Alone, Which Would Make A Pedant, But As A Foundation For Further Acquirements.

It Is Far More Easy To Acquire A Fortune Like A Knave, Than To Expend It, Like A Gentleman.

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.

Pedantry Prides Herself On Being Wrong By Rules; While Common Sense Is Contented To Be Right Without Them.

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.

Light, Whether It Be Material Or Moral, Is The Best Reformer; For It Prevents Those Disorders Which Other Remedies Sometimes Cure, But Sometimes Confirm.

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

Unity Of Opinion Is Indeed A Glorious And Desirable Thing, And Its Circle Cannot Be Too Strong And Extended, If The Centre Be Truth; But If The Centre Be Error, The Greater The Circumference, The Greater The Evil.

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.

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

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.

I'm Aiming By The Time I'm Fifty To Stop Being An Adolescent.

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

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.

It Is Adverse To Talent To Be Consorted And Trained Up With Inferior Minds And Inferior Companions, However High They May Rank. The Foal Of The Racer Neither Finds Out His Speed Nor Calls Out His Powers If Pastured Out With The Common Herd, That Are Destined For The Collar And The Yoke.

No Man Can Purchase His Virtue Too Dear, For It Is The Only Thing Whose Value Must Ever Increase With The Price It Has Cost Us. Our Integrity Is Never Worth So Much As When We Have Parted With Our All To Keep It.

It Was Observed Of Elizabeth That She Was Weak Herself, But Chose Wise Counsellors; To Which It Was Replied, That To Choose Wise Counsellors Was, In A Prince, The Highest Wisdom.

Happiness, That Grand Mistress Of The Ceremonies In The Dance Of Life, Impels Us Through All Its Mazes And Meanderings, But Leads None Of Us By The Same Route.

The Most Consistent Men Are Not More Unlike To Others, Than They Are At Times To Themselves.

The Brightest Thunder-bolt Is Elicited From The Darkest Storm.

If Our Eloquence Be Directed Above The Heads Of Our Hearers, We Shall Do No Execution. By Pointing Our Arguments Low, We Stand A Chance Of Hitting Their Hearts As Well As Their Heads. In Addressing Angels, We Could Hardly Raise Our Eloquence Too High; But We Must Remember That Men Are Not Angels.

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

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.

To Be Satisfied With The Acquittal Of The World, Though Accompanied With The Secret Condemnation Of Conscience, This Is The Mark Of A Little Mind; But It Requires A Soul Of No Common Stamp To Be Satisfied With Its Own Acquittal, And To Despise The Condemnation Of The World.

There Are Many Who Say More Than The Truth On Some Occasions, And Balance The Account With Their Consciences By Saying Less Than The Truth On Others. But The Fact Is That They Are In Both Instances As Fraudulant As He Would Be That Exacted More Than His Due From His Debtors, And Paid Less Than Their Due To His Creditors.

If A Book Really Wants The Patronage Of A Great Name, It Is A Bad Book; And If It Be A Good Book, It Wants It Not.

Nothing Is More Durable Than The Dynasty Of Doubt; For He Reigns In The Hearts Of All His People, But Gives Satisfaction To None Of Them, And Yet He Is The Only Despot Who Can Never Die, While Any Of His Subjects Live.

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

Neither Can We Admit That Definition Of Genius That Some Would Propose--"a Power To Accomplish All That We Undertake;" For We Might Multiply Examples To Prove That This Definition Of Genius Contains More Than The Thing Defined. Cicero Failed In Poetry, Pope In Painting, Addison In Oratory; Yet It Would Be Harsh To Deny Genius To These Men.

Sensibility Would Be A Good Portress If She Had But One Hand; With Her Right She Opens The Door To Pleasure, But With Her Left To Pain.

The Excess Of Our Youth Are Checks Written Against Our Age And They Are Payable With Interest Thirty Years Later.

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

A Christian Builds His Fortitude On A Better Foundation Than Stoicism; He Is Pleased With Every Thing That Happens, Because He Knows It Could Not Happen Unless It First Pleased God, And That Which Pleases Him Must Be Best.

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

Fashions Smile Has Given Wit To Dullness And Grace To Deformity, And Has Brought Everything Into Vogue, By Turns, But Virtue.

If There Be A Pleasure On Earth Which Angels Cannot Enjoy, And Which They Might Almost Envy Man The Possession Of, It Is The Power Of Relieving Distress--if There Be A Pain Which Devils Might Pity Man For Enduring, It Is The Death-bed Reflection That We Have Possessed The Power Of Doing Good, But That We Have Abused And Perverted It To Purposes Of Ill.

If All Seconds Were As Averse To Duels As Their Principals, Very Little Blood Would Be Shed In That Way.

Light, Whether It Be Material Or Moral, Is The Best Reformer.

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

The Cynic Who Twitted Aristippus By Observing That The Philosopher Who Could Dine On Herbs Might Despise The Company Of A King, Was Well Replied To By Aristippus, When He Remarked That The Philosopher Who Could Enjoy The Company Or A King Might Also Despise A Dinner Of Herbs.

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

Some Persons Will Tell You, With An Air Of The Miraculous, That They Recovered Although They Were Given Over; Whereas They Might With More Reason Have Said, They Recovered Because They Were Given Over.

Peace Is The Evening Star Of The Soul, As Virtue Is Its Sun, And The Two Are Never Far Apart.

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.

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.

Where True Religion Has Prevented One Crime, False Religions Have Afforded A Pretext For A Thousand.

If The Prodigal Quits Life In Debt To Others, The Miser Quits It Still Deeper In Debt To Himself.

Imitation Is The Highest Form Of Flattery.

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

Imitation Is The Sincerest Of Flattery.

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.

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

Liberty Will Not Descend To A People; A People Must Raise Themselves To Liberty; It Is A Blessing That Must Be Earned Before It Can Be Enjoyed.

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

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.

Those Graces Which From Their Presumed Facility Encourage All To Attempt An Imitation Of Them, Are Usually The Most Inimitable.

Hope Is A Prodigal Young Heir, And Experience Is His Banker.

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

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.

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

When Millions Applaud You Seriously Ask Yourself What Harm You Have Done; And When They Disapprove You, What Good.

The Firmest Of Friendships Have Been Formed In Mutual Adversity, As Iron Is Most Strongly United By The Fiercest Flame.

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.

Pity A Thing Often Avowed, Seldom Felt; Hatred Is A Thing Often Felt, Seldom Avowed.

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

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.

When In Reading We Meet With Any Maxim That May Be Of Use, We Should Take It For Our Own, And Make An Immediate Application Of It, As We Would Of The Advice Of A Friend Whom We Have Purposely Consulted.

Ennui Has Made More Gamblers Than Avarice.

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

Sturdy Beggars Can Bear Stout Denials.

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

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.

Flattery Is Often A Traffic Of Mutual Meanness, Where Although Both Parties Intend Deception, Neither Are Deceived.

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

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.

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.

No Two Things Differ More Than Hurry And Dispatch. Hurry Is The Mark Of A Weak Mind, Dispatch Of A Strong One. A Weak Man In Office, Like A Squirrel In A Cage, Is Laboring Eternally, But To No Purpose, And Is In Constant Motion Without Getting On A Job; Like A Turnstile, He Is In Everybody's Way, But Stops Nobody; He Talks A Great Deal, But Says Very Little; Looks Into Everything But Sees Nothing; And Has A Hundred Irons In The Fire, But Very Few Of Them Are Hot, And With Those Few That Are, He Only Burns His Fingers.

Perhaps That Is Nearly The Perfection Of Good Writing Which Is Original, But Whose Truth Alone Prevents The Reader From Suspecting That It Is So; And Which Effects That For Knowledge Which The Lens Effects For The Sunbeam, When It Condenses Its Brightness In Order To Increase Its Force.

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

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.

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

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. Literature Has Now Become A Game; In Which The Booksellers Are The Kings; The Critics The Knaves; The Public, The Pack; And The Poor Author, The Mere Table, Or The Thing Played Upon.

A Fool Is Often As Dangerous To Deal With As A Knave, And Always More Incorrigible.

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

There Is Nothing More Imprudent Than Excessive Prudence.

Our Admiration Of Fine Writing Will Always Be In Proportion To Its Real Difficulty And Its Apparent Ease.

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

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.

Any One Can Give Advice, Such As It Is, But Only A Wise Man Knows How To Profit By It.

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.

Of All The Faculties Of The Mind, Memory Is The First That Flourishes, And The First That Dies.

Very Great Personages Are Not Likely To Form Very Just Estimates Either Of Others Or Of Themselves; Their Knowledge Of Themselves Is Obscured By The Flattery Of Others; Their Knowledge Of Others Is Equally Clouded By Circumstances Peculiar To Themselves. For In The Presence Of The Great, The Modest Are Sure To Suffer From Too Much Diffidence, And The Confident From Too Much Display.

No Men Deserve The Title Of Infidels So Little As Those To Whom It Has Been Usually Applied; Let Any Of Those Who Renounce Christianity, Write Fairly Down In A Book All The Absurdities That They Believe Instead Of It, And They Will Find That It Requires More Faith To Reject Christianity Than To Embrace It.

For All The Practical Purposes Of Life, Truth Might As Well Be In A Prison As In The Folio Of A Schoolman; And Those Who Release Her From Her Cobwebbed Shelf And Teach Her To Live With Men Have The Merit Of Liberating, If Not Of Discovering, Her.

The Excesses Of Our Youth Are Drafts Upon Our Old Age.

Emulation Looks Out For Merits, That She May Exalt Herself By A Victory; Envy Spies Out Blemishes That She May Lower Another By Defeat.

We Are Sure To Be Losers When We Quarrel With Ourselves; It Is Civil War.

It Is Curious That Some Learned Dunces, Because They Can Write Nonsense In Languages That Are Dead, Should Despise Those That Talk Sense In Languages That Are Living.

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.

Contemporaries Appreciate The Person Rather Than Their Merit, Posterity Will Regard The Merit Rather Than The Person.

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

Early Rising Not Only Gives Us More Life In The Same Number Of Years, But Adds, Likewise, To Their Number; And Not Only Enables Us To Enjoy More Of Existence In The Same Time, But Increases Also The Measure.

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

Mystery Is Not Profoundness.

To Be Obliged To Beg Our Daily Happiness From Others Bespeaks A More Lamentable Poverty Than That Of Him Who Begs His Daily Bread.

It Has Been Well Observed That The Tongue Discovers The State Of The Mind No Less Than That Of The Body; But In Either Case, Before The Philosopher Or The Physician Can Judge, The Patient Must Open His Mouth.

Pain May Be Said To Follow Pleasure As Its Shadow.

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.

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

Public Charities And Benevolent Associations For The Gratuitous Relief Of Every Species Of Distress, Are Peculiar To Christianity; No Other System Of Civil Or Religious Policy Has Originated Them; They Form Its Highest Praise And Characteristic Feature.

Subtract From Many Modern Poets All That May Be Found In Shakespeare, And Trash Will Remain.

There Are Some Men Who Are Fortune's Favorites, And Who, Like Cats, Light Forever On Their Legs.

Others, Again, Give Us The Mere Carcass Of Another Man’s Thoughts, But Deprived Of All Their Life And Spirit, And This Is To Add Murder To Robbery. I Have Somewhere Seen It Observed, That We Should Make The Same Use Of A Book, As A Bee Does Of A Flower; She Steals Sweets From It, But Does Not Injure It; And Those Sweets She Herself Improves And Concocts Into Honey. But Most Plagiarists, Like The Drone, Have Neither Taste To Select, Nor Industry To Acquire, Nor Skill To Improve, But Impudently Pilfer The Honey Ready Prepared From The Hive.

Revenge Is A Much More Punctual Paymaster Than Gratitude

That Author, However, Who Has Thought More Than He Has Read, Read More Than He Has Written, And Written More Than He Has Published, If He Does Not Command Success, Has At Least Deserved It.

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.

A Public Debt Is A Kind Of Anchor In The Storm; But If The Anchor Be Too Heavy For The Vessel, She Will Be Sunk By That Very Weight Which Was Intended For Her Preservation.

Men Spend Their Lives In Anticipations,—in Determining To Be Vastly Happy At Some Period When They Have Time. But The Present Time Has One Advantage Over Every Other—it Is Our Own. Past Opportunities Are Gone, Future Have Not Come. We May Lay In A Stock Of Pleasures, As We Would Lay In A Stock Of Wine; But If We Defer The Tasting Of Them Too Long, We Shall Find That Both Are Soured By Age.

Envy, If Surrounded On All Sides By The Brightness Of Another's Prosperity, Like The Scorpion Confined Within A Circle Of Fire, Will Sting Itself To Death.

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.

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.

Hope Is A Prodigal Young Heir, And Experience Is His Banker; But His Drafts Are Seldom Honoured, Since There Is Often A Heavy Balance Against Him, Because He Draws Largely On A Small Capital, Is Not Yet In Possession, And If He Were, Would Die.

Antithesis May Be The Blossom Of Wit, But It Will Never Arrive At Maturity Unless Sound Sense Be The Trunk And Truth The Root. Charles Caleb Colton, Lacon; Or, Many Things In A Few Words Light, Whether It Be Material Or Moral, Is The Best Reformer; For It Prevents Those Disorders Which Other Remedies Sometimes Cure, But Sometimes Confirm.

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

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

Reply To Wit With Gravity, And To Gravity With Wit.

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.

That Is Fine Benevolence, Finely Executed, Which, Like The Nile, Comes From Hidden Sources.

Be Real And Adjust You Strategy According To Honest Results.

Books, Like Friends, Should Be Few And Well Chosen. Like Friends, Too, We Should Return To Them Again And Again For, Like True Friends, They Will Never Fail Us - Never Cease To Instruct - Never Cloy.

From Its Very Inaction, Idleness Ultimately Becomes The Most Active Cause Of Evil; As A Palsy Is More To Be Dreaded Than A Fever. The Turks Have A Proverb Which Says That The Devil Tempts All Other Men, But That Idle Men Tempt The Devil.

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

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

Temperate Men Drink The Most, Because They Drink The Longest.

He That Abuses His Own Profession Will Not Patiently Bear With Any One Else Who Does So. And This Is One Of Our Most Subtle Operations Of Self-love. For When We Abuse Our Own Profession, We Tacitly Except Ourselves; But When Another Abuses It, We Are Far From Being Certain That This Is The Case.

It Is Good To Act As If. It Is Even Better To Grow To The Point Where It Is No Longer An Act.

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.

Insults Are Engendered From Vulgar Minds, Like Toadstools From A Dunghill.

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.

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.

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.

Those Who Visit Foreign Nations, But Who Associate Only With Their Own Countrymen, Change Their Climate, But Not Their Customs 'caelum Non Animum Mutant': They See New Meridians, But The Same Men, And With Heads As Empty As Their Pockets.

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.

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.

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

Genius In One Grand Particular Is Like Life. We Know Nothing Of Either But By Their Effects.

Novels May Teach Us As Wholesome A Moral As The Pulpit. There Are "sermons In Stones," In Healthy Books, And "good In Everything.

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.

Jealousy Is Sustained As Often By Pride As By Affection.

Pride, Like The Magnet, Constantly Points To One Object, Self; But, Unlike The Magnet, It Has No Attractive Pole, But At All Points Repels.

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

He That Has Energy Enough To Root Out A Vice Should Go Further, And Try To Plant A Virtue In Its Place.

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.

Words Are In This Respect Like Water, That They Often Take Their Taste, Flavour, And Character, From The Mouth Out Of Which They Proceed, As The Water From The Channel Through Which It Flows.

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.

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

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

He That Can Please Nobody Is Not So Much To Be Pitied As He That Nobody Can Please.

Strong As Our Passions Are, They May Be Starved Into Submission, And Conquered Without Being Killed.

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

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?

Riches May Enable Us To Confer Favors, But To Confer Them With Propriety And Grace Requires A Something That Riches Cannot Give.

Oppression Cannot Prosper Where None Will Submit To Be Enslaved.

Physical Courage, Which Despises All Danger, Will Make A Man Brave In One Way; And Moral Courage, Which Despises All Opinion, Will Make A Man Brave In Another.

The Wealth Is Ultimately Just A Relative Thing. As A Person With Little Money And Little More Needs To Rich Guys Money But Really Wishes

Power Will Intoxicate The Best Hearts, As Wine The Strongest Heads. No Man Is Wise Enough, Nor Good Enough To Be Trusted With Unlimited Power.

A Man Who Knows The World Will Not Only Make The Most Of Everything He Does Know, But Of Many Things He Does Not Know, And Will Gain More Credit By His Adroit Mode Of Hiding His Ignorance Than The Pedant By His Awkward Attempt To Exhibit His Erudition.

Faults Of The Head Are Punished In This World, Those Of The Heart In Another; But As Most Of Our Vices Are Compound, So Also Is Their Punishment.

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