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Take The Selfishness Out Of This World And There Would Be More Happiness Than We Should Know What To Do With.

-Josh Billings

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Take The Selfishness Out

Josh Billings

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Take The Selfishness Out Of This World And There Would Be More Happiness Than We Should Know What To Do With.

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The Man Who Ain't Got An Enemy Is Really Poor.

If A Man Is Right, He Can't Be Too Radical; If He Is Wrong, He Can't Be Too Conservative.

Society Is Composed Of Slow Christians And Wide-awake Sinners.

I Have Lived In This World Just Long Enough To Look Carefully The Second Time Into Things That I Am Most Certain Of The First Time.

It Is A Statistical Fact That The Wicked Work Harder To Reach Hell Than The Righteous Do To Enter Heaven

Genius Ain't Anything More Than Elegant Common Sense.

Liberty, Like Chastity, Once Lost, Can Never Be Regained In Its Original Purity.

It Is Not All Bad, This Getting Old, Ripening. After The Fruit Has Got Its Growth It Should Juice Up And Mellow. God Forbid I Should Live Long Enough To Ferment And Rot And Fall To The Ground In A Squash.

Dangers Are Sum Like A Kold Bath, Very Dangerous While You Stand Stripped On The Bank, But Often Not Only Harmless, But Invigorating, If You Pitch Into Them.

In The Whole History Of The World There Is But One Thing That Money Cannot Buy...to Wit--the Wag Of A Dog's Tail.

Pity Costs Nothing, And It Ain't Worth Nothing.

It Ain't What A Man Don't Know That Makes Him A Fool, But What He Does Know That Ain't So.

Love Looks Through A Telescope; Envy, Through A Microscope.

Take The Selfishness Out Of This World And There Would Be More Happiness Than We Should Know What To Do With.

Wisdom Deprives Even Poverty Of Half Its Power.

There Is Gravity In Wisdom, But No Particular Wisdom In Gravity.

Learning Sleeps And Snores In Libraries, But Wisdom Is Everywhere, Wide Awake, On Tiptoe.

I've Never Known An Auctioneer To Lie Unless It Was Absolutely Necessary.

The Best Condition In Life Is To Be Not So Rich As To Be Envied Nor So Poor As To Be Damned.

Silence Is One Of The Hardest Kind Of Arguments To Refute. There Is No Good Substitute For Wisdom; But Silence Is The Best That Has Yet Been Discovered.

Clothes Form The Intellect Of The Dandy.

We Have Some Writers So Abstruse And Deep That They Drown Themselves In Their Fathomless Sentences.

Never Run Into Debt, Not If You Can Find Anything Else To Run Into.

Thrice Is He Armed That Hath His Quarrel Just, But Four Times He Who Gets His Blow In Fust

It Iz Comparitively Eazy Tew Repent Ov The Sins That We Hav Committed, But Tew Repent Ov Thoze Which We Intend To Commit, Is Asking Tew Mutch Ov Enny Man, Now Days.

Don't Mistake Pleasure For Happiness. They Are A Different Breed Of Dogs.

Don't Put Off Till Tomorrow What Can Be Enjoyed Today.

Procrastination

Experience Is A School Where A Man Learns What A Big Fool He Has Been.

Everyone Who Does The Best He Can Is A Hero.

Words Are Often Seen Hunting For An Idea, But Ideas Are Never Seen Hunting For Words.

It Is True That Wealth Won't Make A Man Virtuous, But I Notice There Ain't Anybody Who Wants To Be Poor Just For The Purpose Of Being Good.

As A General Thing, An Individual Who Is Neat In His Person Is Neat In His Morals.

Experience Increases Our Wisdom But Doesn't Reduce Our Follies.

To Bring Up A Child In The Way He Should Go, Travel That Way Yourself Once In A While.

It Is A Great Art To Be Superior To Others Without Letting Them Know It.

The Unfortunate Do Not Pity The Unfortunate.

Men Are Seldom Underrated; The Mercury In A Man Finds Its True Level In The Eyes Of The World Just As Certainly As It Does In The Glass Of A Thermometer.

One Of The Greatest Victories You Can Gain Over Someone Is To Beat Him At Politeness.

Greatest Victory

A Witty Writer Is Like A Porcupine; His Quill Makes No Distinction Between Friend And Foe.

Morally Considered, Laughter Is Next To The Ten Commandments.

Ten Commandments

Stupidity,--unconscious Ignorance.

[science Is] The Literature Of Truth.

When The Truth Is In Your Way, You Are On The Wrong Road.

If The World Despises A Hypocrite, What Must They Think Of Him In Heaven?

Newfoundland Dogs Are Good To Save Children From Drowning, But You Must Have A Pond Of Water Handy And A Child, Or Else There Will Be No Profit In Boarding A Newfoundland.

Too Many Individuals Are Like Shakespeare's Definition Of "echo,"--babbling Gossips Of The Air.

Honesty Is The Rarest Wealth Anyone Can Possess, And Yet All The Honesty In The World Ain't Lawful Tender For A Loaf Of Bread.

One Of The Rarest Things That A Man Ever Does, Is To Do The Best He Can.

Theres Not A Lot Of Good Humor In Medicine, But Theres A Lot Of Medicine In Good Humor.

Marrying A Woman For Her Money Is Very Much Like Setting A Rat-trap, And Baiting It With Your Own Finger.

Advice Can Be Like Cod Liver Oil, Easy Enough To Administer But Not So Pleasant To Take For Anybody.

It Is A Great Deal Easier For A Man To Find A Pedigree To Fit His Virtues Than Virtues To Fit His Pedigree.

To Enjoy A Good Reputation, Give Publicly, And Steal Privately.

There Are People So Addicted To Exaggeration That They Actually Can't Tell The Truth Without Lying.

Exaggeration Is

Pride Seems Tew Be Quite Equally Distributed; The Man Who Owns The Carriage And The Man Who Drives It Seem Tew Have It Just Alike.

I Am A Poor Man, But I Have This Consolation: I Am Poor By Accident, Not By Design.

Silence Is A Still Noise.

If Animals Had Reason, They Would Act Just As Ridiculous As We Menfolks Do.

Ignorance Ain't Not Knowin' Stuff; Ignorance Is Knowin' Stuff That Ain't True.

Everybody In This World Wants Watching, But Nobody More Than Ourselves.

Most Men Had Rather Say A Smart Thing Than Do A Good One. John P. Kotter, Leading Change.

Peace Is The Soft And Holy Shadow That Virtue Casts.

If Mankind Were Only Just What They Pretend To Be, The Problem Of The Millennium Would Be Immediately Solved.

Nature Makes All The Noblemen; Wealth, Education, Or Pedigree Never Made One Yet.

The Highest Philosophers, In Explaining The Mystery Of This World, Are Obliged To Call In The Aid Of Another.

Waves Are Inspiring Not Because They Rise And Fail, But Because Each Time They Fall. They Never Fail To Rise Again.

Sekts And Creeds Ov Religion, Are Like Pocket Compesses, Good Enuff Tu Pinte Out The Direction, But The Nearer The Pole Yu Git Thewuss Tha Wurk.

Wisdom That Don't Make Us Happier Ain't Worth Plowing For.

Music Wasn't Made To Make Us Wise, But Better Natured.

The Dog That Will Follow Everbody Ain't Worth A Curse.

A Man Running For Office Puts Me In Mind Of A Dog That's Lost-he Smells Everybody He Meets, And Wags Himself All Over.

Ambition Is Like Hunger; It Obeys No Law But Its Appetite

Knowledge Is Like Money, The More A Man Gits The More He Hankers For.

Wisdom Has Never Made A Bigot, But Learning Has.

Show Me A Thoroughly Contented Person, And I Will Show You A Useless One.

Some Folks As They Grow Older Grow Wise But Most Folks Simply Grow Stubborner.

As In A Game Ov Cards, So In The Game Ov Life, We Must Play What Is Dealt Tew Us, And The Glory Consists, Not So Mutch In Winning, As In Playing A Poor Hand Well.

Doesn't Know Much, But Leads The League In Nostril Hair.

Confess Your Sins To The Lord And You Will Be Forgiven; Confess Them To Man And You Will Be Laughed At.

Theory Looks Well On Paper, But Does Not Amount To Anything Without Practice.

It Is Better To Know Nothing Than To Know What Ain't So.

As The Flint Contains The Spark, Unknown To Itself, Which The Steel Alone Can Awaken To Life, So Adversity Often Reveals To Us Hidden Gems, Which Prosperity Or Negligence Would Forever Have Hidden.

There Are Very Few Good Judges Of Humor, And They Don't Agree.

About The Only Difference Between The Poor And The Rich, Is This, The Poor Suffer Misery, While The Rich Have To Enjoy It.

One Of The Best Temporary Cures For Pride And Affectation Is Seasickness; A Man Who Wants To Vomit Never Puts On Airs.

There Is No Revenge So Complete As Forgiveness.

The Devil Is The Father Of Lies, But He Neglected To Patent The Idea, And The Business Now Suffers From Competition.

There's A Lot Of People In This World Who Spend So Much Time Watching Their Health That They Haven't The Time To Enjoy It.

And Now The Lads And Lasses, Following The Example Of The Birds, Bill And Coo Together.

Method Is The Arithmetic Of Success.

The Secret Of Forgiving Everything Is To Understand Nothing.

Common Sense Is Instinct, And Enough Of It Is Genius.

Common Sense Is An Instinct Given To Man And Enough Of It Is Genius. Smartness Is Measured By The Level Of Common Sense One Has, Not By How Much Educated Or Knowledgeable He Is.

Put An Englishman Into The Garden Of Eden, And He Would Find Fault With The Whole Blasted Concern; Put A Yankee In, And He Would See Where He Could Alter It To Advantage; Put An Irishman In, And He Would Want To Boss The Thing; Put A Dutchman In, And He Would Proceed To Plant It.

There Are Only Two Qualities In The World: Efficiency And Inefficiency; And Only Two Sorts Of People: The Efficient And The Inefficient.

Lying Is Like Trying To Hide In A Fog: If You Move About You're In Danger Of Bumping Your Head Against The Truth, And As Soon As The Fog Blows Off, You Are Gone Anyhow.

You Can Reach Stupidity Only With A Cannon Ball.

There Is No Passion Of The Human Heart That Promises So Much And Pays So Little As Revenge.

Man Was Created A Little Lower Than The Angels And Has Been Getting A Little Lower Ever Since.

Occasions Are Rare; And Those, Who Know How To Seize Upon Them, Are Rarer.

Rare Opportunities

Fools Carry Their Daggers In Their Open Mouths.

Young Widows Still Bide Their Time.

If A Man Should Happen To Reach Perfection In This World, He Would Have To Die Immediately To Enjoy Himself.

When A Young Man Begins To Go Down Hill Everything Seems To Be Greased For The Occasion.

I Hate To Be A Kicker, I Always Long For Peace, But The Wheel That Does The Squeaking, Is The One That Gets The Grease.

Never Teach Your Child To Be Cunning Or You May Be Certain You Will Be One Of The Very First Victims Of His Shrewdness.

The Truly Innocent Are Those Who Not Only Are Guiltless Themselves But Who Think Others Are.

Error Will Slip Through A Crack, While Truth Will Stick In A Doorway.

The Fools In This World Make About As Much Trouble As The Wicked Do.

I Have Never Known A Person To Live To Be One Hundred And Be Remarkable For Anything Else.

There Are Two Things In Life For Which We Are Never Truly Prepared: Twins.

Silence Is Said To Be Golden, But The Best Fools The World Has Ever Produced Had Nothing To Say On The Subject

It's Not What We Don't Know That Prevents Us From Succeeding; It's What We Know That Just Ain't So That Is Our Greatest Obstacle.

It's Not Ignorance Does So Much Damage; It's Knowin' So Derned Much That Ain't So.

The Greatest Thief This World Has Ever Produced Is Procrastination, And He Is Still At Large.

There Are Two Kinds Of Fools: Those Who Can't Change Their Opinions And Those Who Won't.

People Who Have Nothing To Say Are Never At A Loss In Talking.

I Hold That A Man Has As Much Right To Spell A Word As It Is Pronounced As He Has To Pronounce It The Way It Ain't Spelled.

Don't Take The Bull By The Horns, Take Him By The Tail; Then You Can Let Go When You Want To.

Take All The Fools Out Of This World And There Wouldn't Be Any Fun Living In It, Or Profit.

It Is The Little Bits Of Things That Fret And Worry Us; We Can Dodge A Elephant, But We Can't Dodge A Fly.

There Is Not A Whole Lot Of Fun In Medicine But There Is A Whole Lot Of Medicine In Fun.

About The Most Originality That Any Writer Can Hope To Achieve Honestly Is To Steal With Good Judgment.

There's A Great Power In Words, If You Don't Hitch Too Many Of Them Together.

The Less We Know The More We Suspect

Remember The Poor, It Costs Nothing.

I Never Had A Man Come To Me For Advice Yet, But What I Soon Discovered That He Thought More Of His Own Opinion Than He Did Of Mine.

Pyrotechnically Considered, [laughing] Is The Fire-works Of The Soul.

Life Is Short, But It's Long Enough To Ruin Any Man Who Wants To Be Ruined.

Never Work Before Breakfast; If You Have To Work Before Breakfast, Eat Your Breakfast First.

When You Do Laugh, Open Your Mouth Wide Enough For The Noise To Get Out Without Squealing, Throw Your Head Back As Though You Were Going To Be Shaved, Hold On To Your False Hair With Both Hands And Then Laugh Till Your Soul Gets Thoroughly Rested.

Beauty Is A Very Handy Thing To Have, Especially For A Woman Who Ain't Handsome.

Opinions Should Be Formed With Great Caution, And Changed With Greater.

I Don't Never Have Any Trouble In Regulating My Own Conduct, But To Keep Other Folks' Straight Is What Bothers Me.

The Best Medicine I Know For Rheumatism Is To Thank The Lord That It Ain't Gout.

The Best Creed We Can Have Is Charity Toward The Creeds Of Others.

Building Air Castles Is A Harmless Business As Long As You Don't Attempt To Live In Them.

If You Ever Find Happiness By Hunting For It, You Will Find It, As The Old Woman Did Her Lost Spectacles, Safe On Her Own Nose All The Time.

The Squeeky Wheel Gets The Grease.

Dr. Holmes Says, Both Wittily And Truly, That Crying Widows Are Easiest Consoled.

Taking From Others Never Results In Prosperity. If We Steal From Others, Life Will Steal From Us. There Is An Incredible Abundance On This Planet. True Prosperity Begins With Feeling Good About Yourself And About The Choices You Make. Life Is Here For Us. Life Is Here To Support Us In Every Way. We Give Out, We Get Back. Honesty Is The Rarest Wealth Anyone Can Possess, And Yet All The Honesty In The World Ain't Lawful Tender For A Loaf Of Bread.

True Wisdom Is Plenty Of Experience, Observation, And Reflection. False Wisdom Is Plenty Of Ignorance, Arrogance, And Impudence.

Metaphysics Is The Science Of Proving What We Don't Understand.

Silence Never Makes Any Blunders.

There Is No Limit To The Vanity Of This World. Each Spoke In The Wheel Thinks The Whole Strength Of The Wheel Depends Upon It.

Time Is Like Money, The Less We Have Of It To Spare The Further We Make It Go.

What The World Wants Iz [sic] Good Examples, Not So Mutch Advice; Advice May Be Wrong, But Examples Prove Themselves.

The Books Are Balanced In Heaven, Not Here.

Don't Have Any More Secrets Than You Can Keep Yourself.

Better Make A Weak Man Your Enemy Than Your Friend.

Contentment Is A Kind Of Moral Laziness; If There Wasn't Anything But Contentment In His World, Man Wouldn't Be Any More Of A Success Than An Angleworm Is

A Man Cannot Learn To Be Wise Any More Than He Can Learn To Be Handsome.

If Men Were Stubborn Just In Proportion As They Were Right, Stubbornness Would Take Her Seat Among The Virtues; But Men Are Generally Stubborn Just In Proportion As They Are Ignorant And Wrong.

There's One Good Thing About Tight Shoes; They Make You Forget Your Other Troubles.

Faith Is The Soul Riding At Anchor.

The Road To Ruin Is Always In Good Repair, And The Travellers Pay The Expense Of It.

There Is A Sort Of Charm In Ugliness, If The Person Has Some Redeeming Qualities And Is Only Ugly Enough.

A Dog Is The Only Thing On Earth That Loves You More Than You Love Yourself.

Plenty Of Folks Are So Contrary That If They Should Fall Into The River, They Would Insist Upon Floating Upstream.

A Good Way I Know To Find Happiness, Is To Not Bore A Hole To Fit The Plug.

I Think When The Full Horror Of Being Fifty Hits You, You Should Stay Home And Have A Good Cry.

Seneca Devoted Much Of His Time To Writing Essays In Praise Of Poverty, And In Lending Money At Usurious Rates.

I Haven't Got As Much Money As Some Folks, But I've Got As Much Impudence As Any Of Them, And That's The Next Thing To Money.

The Nearest We Can Come To) Perfect Happiness Is To Cheat Ourselves With The Belief That We Have Got It.

Jealousy Is One Of Love's Parasites.

A Wise Man Never Enjoys Himself So Much, Or A Fool So Little, As When He Is Alone.

When A Man Comes To Me For Advice, I Find Out The Kind Of Advice He Wants, And I Give It To Him.

Be Like A Postage Stamp. Stick To One Thing Until You Get There.

As Long As We Are Lucky We Attribute It To Our Smartness; Our Bad Luck We Give The Gods Credit For.

It Is Easier To Be Virtuous Than It Is To Appear So, And It Pays Better.

Pity Cost Nothing And Ain't Worth Nothing.

Threescore Years And Ten Is Enough; If A Man Can't Suffer All The Misery He Wants In That Time, He Must Be Numb.

Honesty Is The Rarest Wealth Anyone Can Possess.

Rumor Is A Vagrant Without A Home, And Lives Upon What It Can Pick Up.

When A Man Gets Talking About Himself, He Seldom Fails To Be Eloquent And Often Reaches The Sublime.

The Man Who Has Never Been Tempted Doesn't Know How Dishonest He Is.

There Never Yet Was A Mother Who Taught Her Child To Be An Infidel.

There Is No Greater Evidence Of Superior Intelligence Than To Be Surprised At Nothing.

Caution, Though Very Often Wasted Is A Good Risk To Take.

Advice Is Like Kissing: It Costs Nothing And Is A Pleasant Thing To Do.

Friendship Is Like Earthenware, Once Broken, It Can Be Mended; Love Is Like A Mirror, Once Broken That Ends It.

You Should Always Live Within Your Income, Even If You Have To Borrow To Do So.

The More Humble A Man Is Before God The More He Will Be Exalted; The More Humble He Is Before Man, The More He Will Get Rode Roughshod.

As A General Rule, If You Want To Get At The Truth - Hear Both Sides And Believe Neither.

Fun Is A Sugar-coated Physic.

Life Consists Not In Holding Good Cards But In Playing Those You Hold Well.

Tears Are A Good Alterative, But A Poor Diet.

Money Will Buy A Pretty Good Dog, But It Won't Buy The Wag Of His Tail.

Love Is Said To Be Blind, But I Know Some Fellows In Love Who Can See Twice As Much In Their Sweethearts As I Do.

A Slander Is Like A Hornet; If You Cannot Kill It Dead At The First Blow, Better Not To Strike At It.

A Secret Ceases To Be A Secret If It Is Once Confided - It Is Like A Dollar Bill, Once Broken, It Is Never A Dollar Again.

He Whom Prosperity Humbles, And Adversity Strengthens, Is The True Hero.

There Are Lots Of People Who Mistake Their Imagination For Their Memory.

Titles Are Valuable; They Make Us Acquainted With Many Persons Who Otherwise Would Be Lost Among The Rubbish.

Some Folks Are Wise And Some Otherwise.

Stupidity And Ignorance

Debt Is Like Any Other Trap, Easy Enough To Get Into, But Hard Enough To Get Out Of.

We Mingle In Society Not So Much To Meet Others As To Escape Ourselves.

Incredulity Is The Wisdom Of The Fool.

Laughter Is The Fireworks Of The Soul.

Fuss Is Half-sister To Hurry, And Neither Of Them Can Do Anything Without Getting In Their Own Way.

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