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The Soil Of Friendship Is Worn Out With Constant Use. Habit May Still Attach Us To Each Other, But We Feel Ourselves Fettered By It. Old Friends Might Be Compared To Old Married People Without The Tie Of Children.

-William Hazlitt

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The Soil Of Friendship

William Hazlitt

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The Soil Of Friendship Is Worn Out With Constant Use. Habit May Still Attach Us To Each Other, But We Feel Ourselves Fettered By It. Old Friends Might Be Compared To Old Married People Without The Tie Of Children.

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A Wise Traveler Never Despises His Own Country.

A Man Who Is Determined Never To Move Out Of The Beaten Road Cannot Lose His Way.

There Is Nothing More To Be Esteemed Than A Manly Firmness And Decision Of Character.

The Affected Modesty Of Most Women Is A Decoy For The Generous, The Delicate, And Unsuspecting; While The Artful, The Bold, And Unfeeling Either See Or Break Through Its Slender Disguises.

What I Mean By Living To One's Self Is Living In The World, As In It, Not Of It.

When We Forget Old Friends, It Is A Sign We Have Forgotten Ourselves.

We Prefer A Person With Vivacity And High Spirits, Though Bordering Upon Insolence, To The Timid And Pusillanimous; We Are Fonder Of Wit Joined To Malice Than Of Dullness Without It.

When A Thing Ceases To Be A Subject Of Controversy, It Ceases To Be A Subject Of Interest.

Despair Swallows Up Cowardice.

A Great Chessplayer Is Not A Great Man, For He Leaves The World As He Found It.

Poverty, Labor, And Calamity Are Not Without Their Luxuries, Which The Rich, The Indolent, And The Fortunate In Vain Seek For.

While We Desire, We Do Not Enjoy; And With Enjoyment Desire Ceases.

We Can Be Said Only To Fulfil Our Destiny In The Place That Gave Us Birth. I Should On This Account Like Well Enough To Spend The Whole Of My Life In Travelling Abroad, If I Could Anywhere Borrow Another Life To Spend Afterwards At Home!

Like A Rustic At A Fair, We Are Full Of Amazement And Rapture, And Have No Thought Of Going Home, Or That It Will Soon Be Night.

Painting Gives The Object Itself; Poetry What It Implies. Painting Embodies What A Thing Contains In Itself; Poetry Suggests What Exists Out Of It, In Any Manner Connected With It.

To Think Justly, We Must Understand What Others Mean. To Know The Value Of Our Thoughts, We Must Try Their Effect On Other Minds.

I Have A Much Greater Ambition To Be The Best Racket Player Than The Best Prose Writer.

A Person Who Talks With Equal Vivacity On Every Subject, Excites No Interest In Any. Repose Is As Necessary In Conversation As In A Picture.

Any Woman May Act The Part Of A Coquette Successfully Who Has The Reputation Without The Scruples Of Modesty. If A Woman Passes The Bounds Of Propriety For Our Sakes, And Throws Herself Unblushingly At Our Heads, We Conclude It Is Either From A Sudden And Violent Liking, Or From Extraordinary Merit On Our Parts, Either Of Which Is Enough To Turn Any Man's Head Who Has A Single Spark Of Gallantry Or Vanity In His Composition.

The Expression Of A Gentleman's Face Is Not So Much That Of Refinement, As Of Flexibility, Not Of Sensibility And Enthusiasm As Of Indifference; It Argues Presence Of Mind Rather Than Enlargement Of Ideas.

Presence Of Mind

The Confined Air Of A Metropolis Is Hurtful To The Minds And Bodies Of Those Who Have Never Lived Out Of It. It Is Impure, Stagnant--without Breathing-space To Allow A Larger View Of Ourselves Or Others--and Gives Birth To A Puny, Sickly, Unwholesome, And Degenerate Race Of Beings.

We Judge Of Others For The Most Part By Their Good Opinion Of Themselves; Yet Nothing Gives Such Offense Or Creates So Many Enemies, As That Extreme Self-complacency Or Superciliousness Of Manner, Which Appears To Set The Opinion Of Every One Else At Defiance.

To Be Capable Of Steady Friendship Or Lasting Love, Are The Two Greatest Proofs, Not Only Of Goodness Of Heart, But Of Strength Of Mind.

The Insolence Of The Vulgar Is In Proportion To Their Ignorance. They Treat Everything With Contempt Which They Do Not Understand.

Gallantry To Women - The Sure Road To Their Favor - Is Nothing But The Appearance Of Extreme Devotion To All Their Wants And Wishes, A Delight In Their Satisfaction, And A Confidence In Yourself As Being Able To Contribute Toward It

The More We Do, The More We Can Do.

Leisure Activities

Famous Motivational

We Trifle With, Make Sport Of, And Despise Those Who Are Attached To Us, And Follow Those That Fly From Us.

If A Person Has No Delicacy, He Has You In His Power.

Cant Is The Voluntary Overcharging Or Prolongation Of A Real Sentiment; Hypocrisy Is The Setting Up A Pretension To A Feeling You Never Had And Have No Wish For.

Diffidence And Awkwardness Are Antidotes To Love.

The Player Envies Only The Player, The Poet Envies Only The Poet.

The Chain Of Habit Coils Itself Around The Heart Like A Serpent, To Gnaw And Stifle It.

Great Thoughts Reduced To Practice Become Great Acts.

The Present Is An Age Of Talkers, And Not Of Doers; And The Reason Is, That The World Is Growing Old. We Are So Far Advanced In The Arts And Sciences, That We Live In Retrospect, And Dote On Past Achievement.

There Is Nothing More Likely To Drive A Man Mad, Than The Being Unable To Get Rid Of The Idea Of The Distinction Between Right And Wrong, And An Obstinate, Constitutional Preference Of The True To The Agreeable.

As Is Our Confidence, So Is Our Capacity.

Positive Attitude

To The Proud The Slightest Repulse Or Disappointment Is The Last Indignity.

If The World Were Good For Nothing Else, It Is A Fine Subject For Speculation.

No Act Terminating In Itself Constitutes Greatness.

Envy Among Other Ingredients Has A Mixture Of The Love Of Justice In It. We Are More Angry At Undeserved Than At Deserved Good-fortune.

No One Ever Approaches Perfection Except By Stealth, And Unknown To Themselves.

We Are All Of Us, More Or Less, The Slaves Of Opinion.

I Like A Person Who Knows His Own Mind And Sticks To It; Who Sees At Once What, In Given Circumstances, Is To Be Done, And Does It.

But Of All Footmen The Lowest Class Is Literary Footmen.

Walk Groundly, Talk Profoundly, Drink Roundly, Sleep Soundly.

There Are Persons Who Are Never Easy Unless They Are Putting Your Books And Papers In Order--that Is, According To Their Notions Of The Matter--and Hide Things Lest They Should Be Lost, Where Neither The Owner Nor Anybody Else Can Find Them. This Is A Sort Of Magpie Faculty. If Anything Is Left Where You Want It, It Is Called Litter. There Is A Pedantry In Housewifery, As Well As In The Gravest Concerns. Abraham Tucker Complained That Whenever His Maid Servant Had Been In His Library, He Could Not See Comfortably To Work Again For Several Days.

Books Are A World In Themselves, It Is True; But They Are Not The Only World. The World Itself Is A Volume Larger Than All The Libraries In It.

Success In Business Is Seldom Owing To Uncommon Talents Or Original Power Which Is Untractable And Self-willed, But To The Greatest Degree Of Commonplace Capacity.

Political Truth Is Libel; Religious Truth, Blasphemy.

Those Who Have The Largest Hearts Have The Soundest Understandings; And They Are The Truest Philosophers Who Can Forget Themselves.

Death Is The Greatest Evil, Because It Cuts Off Hope.

If Goodness Were Only A Theory, It Were A Pity It Should Be Lost To The World. There Are A Number Of Things, The Idea Of Which Is A Clear Gain To The Mind. Let People, For Instance, Rail At Friendship, Genius, Freedom, As Long As They Will -the Very Names Of These Despised Qualities Are Better Than Anything Else That Could Be Substituted For Them, And Embalm Even The Most Envenomed Satire Against Them.

Greatness Is Great Power, Producing Great Effects. It Is Not Enough That A Man Has Great Power In Himself, He Must Shew It To All The World In A Way That Cannot Be Hid Or Gainsaid.

Learning Is Its Own Exceeding Great Reward; And At The Period Of Which We Speak, It Bore Other Fruits, Not Unworthy Of It.

Belief Is With Them Mechanical, Voluntary: They Believe What They Are Paid For - They Swear To That Which Turns To Account. Do You Suppose, That After Years Spent In This Manner, They Have Any Feeling Left Answering To The Difference Between Truth And Falsehood?

We Do Not Like Our Friends The Worse Because They Sometimes Give Us An Opportunity To Rail At Them Heartily. Their Faults Reconcile Us To Their Virtues.

If You Give An Audience A Chance They Will Do Half Your Acting For You.

No Man Would, I Think, Exchange His Existence With Any Other Man, However Fortunate. We Had As Lief Not Be, As Not Be Ourselves.

Our Repugnance To Death Increases In Proportion To Our Consciousness Of Having Lived In Vain.

We All Wear Some Disguise, Make Some Professions, Use Some Artifice, To Set Ourselves Off As Being Better Than We Are; And Yet It Is Not Denied That We Have Some Good Intentions And Praiseworthy Qualities At Bottom.

Good Intentions

An Honest Man Is Respected By All Parties.

To Impress The Idea Of Power On Others, They Must Be Made In Some Way To Feel It.

Silence Is One Great Art Of Conversation.

The Incentive To Ambition Is The Love Of Power.

All Is Without Form And Void. Someone Said Of His Landscapes That They Were Pictures Of Nothing And Very Like.

We Are Thankful For Good-will Rather Than For Services, For The Motive Than The Quantum Of Favor Received.

He Who Undervalues Himself Is Justly Undervalued By Others.

...greatness Sympathises With Greatness, And Littleness Shrinks Into Itself.

To Get Others To Come Into Our Ways Of Thinking, We Must Go Over To Theirs; And It Is Necessary To Follow, In Order To Lead.

Man Is An Intellectual Animal, And Therefore An Everlasting Contradiction To Himself. His Senses Centre In Himself, His Ideas Reach To The Ends Of The Universe; So That He Is Torn In Pieces Between The Two, Without A Possibility Of Its Ever Being Otherwise.

The Mind Revolts Against Certain Opinions, As The Stomach Rejects Certain Foods.

The Book-worm Wraps Himself Up In His Web Of Verbal Generalities, And Sees Only The Glimmering Shadows Of Things Reflected From The Minds Of Others.

We Are Fonder Of Visiting Our Friends In Health Than In Sickness. We Judge Less Favorably Of Their Characters When Any Misfortune Happens To Them; And A Lucky Hit, Either In Business Or Reputation, Improves Even Their Personal Appearance In Our Eyes.

To Great Evils We Submit, We Resent Little Provocations.

I Like A Person Who Knows His Own Mind And Sticks To It; Who Sees At Once What Is To Be Done In Given Circumstances And Does It. He Does Not Beat About The Bush For Difficulties Or Excuses, But Goes The Shortest And Most Effectual Way To Work To Attain His Own Ends, Or To Accomplish A Useful Object.

The Truth Is, We Pamper Little Griefs Into Great Ones, And Bear Great Ones As Well As We Can.

Words Are The Only Things That Last For Ever.

Every Man, In His Own Opinion, Forms An Exception To The Ordinary Rules Of Morality.

We Would Willingly, And Without Remorse, Sacrifice Not Only The Present Moment, But All The Interval (no Matter How Long) That Separates Us From Any Favorite Object.

In What We Really Understand, We Reason But Little.

The Temple Of Fame Stands Upon The Grave: The Flame That Burns Upon Its Altars Is Kindled From The Ashes Of Great Men.

None But Those Who Are Happy In Themselves Can Make Others So.

Most Of The Methods For Measuring The Lapse Of Time Have, I Believe, Been The Contrivance Of Monks And Religious Recluses, Who, Finding Time Hang Heavy On Their Hands, Were At Some Pains To See How They Got Rid Of It.

Look Up, Laugh Loud, Talk Big, Keep The Color In Your Cheek And The Fire In Your Eye, Adorn Your Person, Maintain Your Health, Your Beauty And Your Animal Spirits.

Our Lives Are Ruled By Impermanence. The Challenge Is How To Create Something Of Enduring Value Within The Context Of Our Impermanent Lives. Soka Gakkai Great Thoughts Reduced To Practice Become Great Acts.

Life Is The Art Of Being Well Deceived; And In Order That The Deception May Succeed It Must Be Habitual And Uninterrupted.

When I Take Up A Book I Have Read Before, I Know What To Expect; The Satisfaction Is Not Lessened By Being Anticipated. I Shake Hands With, And Look Our Old Tried And Valued Friend In The Face,--compare Notes And Chat The Hour Away.

A Man Is A Hypocrite Only When He Affects To Take A Delight In What He Does Not Feel, Not Because He Takes A Perverse Delight In Opposite Things.

Literature, Like Nobility, Runs In The Blood.

Habitual Liars Invent Falsehoods Not To Gain Any End Or Even To Deceive Their Hearers, But To Amuse Themselves. It Is Partly Practice And Partly Habit. It Requires An Effort In Them To Speak Truth.

We Are Very Much What Others Think Of Us. The Reception Our Observations Meet With Gives Us Courage To Proceed, Or Damps Our Efforts.

General Principles Are Not The Less True Or Important Because From Their Nature They Elude Immediate Observation; They Are Like The Air, Which Is Not The Less Necessary Because We Neither See Nor Feel It.

Good Temper Is An Estate For Life.

Prosperity Is A Great Teacher; Adversity Is A Greater. Possession Pampers The Mind; Privation Trains And Strengthens It.

It Is Hard For Any One To Be An Honest Politician Who Is Not Born And Bred A Dissenter.

The Garb Of Religion Is The Best Cloak For Power.

No Young Man Ever Thinks He Shall Die.

Every One In A Crowd Has The Power To Throw Dirt; None Out Of Ten Have The Inclination.

Satirists Gain The Applause Of Others Through Fear, Not Through Love.

However We May Flatter Ourselves To The Contrary, Our Friends Think No Higher Of Us Than The World Do. They See Us Through The Jaundiced Or Distrustful Eyes Of Others. They May Know Better, But Their Feelings Are Governed By Popular Prejudice. Nay, They Are More Shy Of Us (when Under A Cloud) Than Even Strangers; For We Involve Them In A Common Disgrace, Or Compel Them To Embroil Themselves In Continual Quarrels And Disputes In Our Defense.

Tears May Be Considered As The Natural And Involuntary Resource Of The Mind Overcome By Some Sudden And Violent Emotion, Before Ithas Had Time To Reconcile Its Feelings To The Change In Circumstances: While Laughter May Be Defined To Be The Same Sort Of Convulsive And Involuntary Movement, Occasioned By Mere Sur Prise Or Contrast (in The Absence Of Any More Serious Emotion), Before It Has Time To Reconcile Its Belief To Contradictory Appearances.

Defoe Says That There Were A Hundred Thousand Country Fellows In His Time Ready To Fight To The Death Against Popery, Without Knowing Whether Popery Was A Man Or A Horse.

Those Who Have Little Shall Have Less, And That Those Who Have Much Shall Take All That Others Have Left.

Wit Is, In Fact, The Eloquence Of Indifference.

A Taste For Liberal Art Is Necessary To Complete The Character Of A Gentleman, Science Alone Is Hard And Mechanical. It Exercises The Understanding Upon Things Out Of Ourselves, While It Leaves The Affections Unemployed, Or Engrossed With Our Own Immediate, Narrow Interests.

Society Is A More Level Surface Than We Imagine. Wise Men Or Absolute Fools Are Hard To Be Met With, As There Are Few Giants Or Dwarfs. The Heaviest Charge We Can Bring Against The General Texture Of Society Is That It Is Commonplace. Our Fancied Superiority To Others Is In Some One Thing Which We Think Most Of Because We Excel In It, Or Have Paid Most Attention To It; Whilst We Overlook Their Superiority To Us In Something Else Which They Set Equal And Exclusive Store By.

No Really Great Man Ever Thought Himself So.

Our Friends Are Generally Ready To Do Everything For Us, Except The Very Thing We Wish Them To Do.

Mankind Are A Herd Of Knaves And Fools. It Is Necessary To Join The Crowd, Or Get Out Of Their Way, In Order Not To Be Trampled To Death By Them.

The Amiable Is The Voluptuous In Expression Or Manner. The Sense Of Pleasure In Ourselves Is That Which Excites It In Others; Or, The Art Of Pleasing Is To Seem Pleased.

To Speak Highly Of One With Whom We Are Intimate Is A Species Of Egotism. Our Modesty As Well As Our Jealousy Teaches Us Caution On This Subject.

Dandyism Is A Species Of Genius.

True Friendship Is Self-love At Second Hand; Where, As In A Flattering Mirror We May See Our Virtues Magnified And Our Errors Softened, And Where We May Fancy Our Opinion Of Ourselves Confirmed By An Impartial And Faithful Witness.

One Truth Discovered Is Immortal, And Entitles Its Author To Be So; For, Like A New Substance In Nature, It Cannot Be Destroyed.

He Who Expects From A Great Name In Politics, In Philosophy, In Art, Equal Greatness In Other Things, Is Little Versed In Human Nature. Our Strength Lies In Our Weakness. The Learned In Books Are Ignorant Of The World. He Who Is Ignorant Of Books Is Often Well Acquainted With Other Things; For Life Is Of The Same Length In The Learned And Unlearned; The Mind Cannot Be Idle; If It Is Not Taken Up With One Thing, It Attends To Another Through Choice Or Necessity; And The Degree Of Previous Capacity In One Class Or Another Is A Mere Lottery.

To Display The Greatest Powers, Unless They Are Applied To Great Purposes, Makes Nothing For The Character Of Greatness.

I Am Always Afraid Of A Fool. One Cannot Be Sure That He Is Not A Knave As Well.

There Cannot Be A Surer Proof Of Low Origin, Or Of An Innate Meanness Of Disposition, Than To Be Always Talking And Thinking Of Being Genteel.

Envy Is The Deformed And Distorted Offspring Of Egotism; And When We Reflect On The Strange And Disproportioned Character Of The Parent, We Cannot Wonder At The Perversity And Waywardness Of The Child.

There Is Evil Poured Upon The Earth From The Overflowings Of Corruption-- Sickness, And Poverty, And Pain, And Guilt, And Madness, And Sorrow; But, As The Water From A Fountain Riseth And Sinketh To Its Level, Ceaselessly Toileth Justice To Equalize The Lots Of Men.

A Thing Is Not Vulgar Merely Because It Is Common.

The Only True Retirement Is That Of The Heart; The Only True Leisure Is The Repose Of The Passions. To Such Persons It Makes Little Difference Whether They Are Young Or Old; And They Die As They Have Lived, With Graceful Resignation.

Society Is A More Level Surface Than We Imagine. Wise Men Or Absolute Fools Are Hard To Be Met With, As There Are Few Giants Or Dwarfs.

The Imagination Is Of So Delicate A Texture That Even Words Wound It.

It May Be Made A Question Whether Men Grow Wiser As They Grow Older, Anymore Than They Grow Stronger Or Healthier Or Honest.

Honesty Is One Part Of Eloquence. We Persuade Others By Being In Earnest Ourselves.

Wherever The Government Does Not Emanate...from The People, The Principle Of The Government, The Esprit De Corps, The Point Of Honour, In All Those Connected With It, And Raised By It To Privileges Above The Law And Above Humanity, Will Be Hatred To The People.

It Has Been The Resolution Of Mankind In All Ages Of The World. No People, No Age, Ever Threw Away The Fruits Of Past Wisdom, Or The Enjoyment Of Present Blessings, For Visionary Schemes Of Ideal Perfection. It Is The Knowledge Of The Past, The Actual Infliction Of The Present, That Has Produced All Changes, All Innovations, And All Improvements - Not (as Is Pretended) The Chimerical Anticipation Of Possible Advantages, But The Intolerable Pressure Of Long-established, Notorious, Aggravated, And Growing Abuses.

From The Height From Which The Great Look Down On The World All The Rest Of Mankind Seem Equal.

Time,--the Most Independent Of All Things.

The Way To Secure Success Is To Be More Anxious About Obtaining Than About Deserving It.

We Find Many Things To Which The Prohibition Of Them Constitutes The Only Temptation.

Violent Antipathies Are Always Suspicious, And Betray A Secret Affinity.

Charity, Like Nature, Abhors A Vacuum. Next To Putting It In A Bank, Men Like To Squander Their Superfluous Wealth On Those To Whom It Is Sure To Be Doing The Least Possible Good.

To Be Forward To Praise Others Implies Either Great Eminence, That Can Afford To, Part With Applause; Or Great Quickness Of Discernment, With Confidence In Our Own Judgments; Or Great Sincerity And Love Of Truth, Getting The Better Of Our Self-love.

They Are, As It Were, Train-bearers In The Pageant Of Life, And Hold A Glass Up To Humanity, Frailer Than Itself. We See Ourselves At Second-hand In Them: They Show Us All That We Are, All That We Wish To Be, And All That We Dread To Be. What Brings The Resemblance Nearer Is, That, As They Imitate Us, We, In Our Turn, Imitate Them. There Is No Class Of Society Whom So Many Persons Regard With Affection As Actors.

Comedy Naturally Wears Itself Out - Destroys The Very Food On Which It Lives; And By Constantly And Successfully Exposing The Follies And Weaknesses Of Mankind To Ridicule, In The End Leaves Itself Nothing Worth Laughing At.

A Great Man La An Abstraction Of Some One Excellence; But Whoever Fancies Himself An Abstraction Of Excellence, So Far From Being Great, May Be Sure That He Is A Blockhead, Equally Ignorant Of Excellence Or Defect Of Himself Or Others.

The Greatest Grossness Sometimes Accompanies The Greatest Refinement, As A Natural Relief.

A King (as Such) Is Not A Great Man. He Has Great Power, But It Is Not His Own.

There Are Many Who Talk On From Ignorance Rather Than From Knowledge, And Who Find The Former An Inexhaustible Fund Of Conversation.

To Die Is Only To Be As We Were Before We Were Born; Yet No One Feels Any Remorse, Or Regret, Or Repugnance, In Contemplating This Last Idea.

Envy Is The Most Universal Passion. We Only Pride Ourselves On The Qualities We Possess, Or Think We Possess; But We Envy The Pretensions We Have, And Those Which We Have Not, And Do Not Even Wish For. We Envy The Greatest Qualities And Every Trifling Advantage. We Envy The Most Ridiculous Appearance Or Affectation Of Superiority. We Envy Folly And Conceit; Nay, We Go So Far As To Envy Whatever Confers Distinction Of Notoriety, Even Vice And Infamy.

Popularity Disarms Envy In Well-disposed Minds. Those Are Ever The Most Ready To Do Justice To Others Who Feel That The World Has Done Them Justice. When Success Has Not This Effect In Opening The Mind, It Is A Sign That It Has Been Ill Deserved.

The Worst Old Age Is That Of The Mind.

Men Of Gravity Are Intellectual Stammerers, Whose Thoughts Move Slowly.

That Humanity And Sincerity Which Dispose Men To Resist Injustice And Tyranny Render Them Unfit To Cope With The Cunning And Power Of Those Who Are Opposed To Them. The Friends Of Liberty Trust To The Professions Of Others Because They Are Themselves Sincere, And Endeavour To Secure The Public Good With The Least Possible Hurt To Its Enemies, Who Have No Regard To Anything But Their Own Unprincipled Ends, And Stick At Nothing To Accomplish Them.

Actors Are The Only Honest Hypocrites.

Modesty Is The Lowest Of The Virtues, And Is A Real Confession Of The Deficiency It Indicates. He Who Undervalues Himself Is Justly Undervalued By Others.

A Thought Must Tell At Once, Or Not At All.

Refinement Creates Beauty Everywhere. It Is The Grossness Of The Spectator That Discovers Anything Like Grossness In The Object.

Beauty Everywhere

We Are The Creatures Of Imagination, Passion, And Self-will, More Than Of Reason Or Even Of Self-interest. Even In The Common Transactions And Daily Intercourse Of Life, We Are Governed By Whim, Caprice, Prejudice, Or Accident. The Falling Of A Teacup Puts Us Out Of Temper For The Day; And A Quarrel That Commenced About The Pattern Of A Gown May End Only With Our Lives.

Religion Either Makes Men Wise And Virtuous, Or It Makes Them Set Up False Pretenses To Both.

He Who Draws Upon His Own Resources Easily Comes To An End Of His Wealth.

The Admiration Of Power In Others Is As Common To Man As The Love Of It In Himself; The One Makes Him A Tyrant, The Other A Slave.

Our Opinions Are Not Our Own, But In The Power Of Sympathy. If A Person Tells Us A Palpable Falsehood, We Not Only Dare Not Contradict Him, But We Dare Hardly Disbelieve Him To His Face. A Lie Boldly Uttered Has The Effect Of Truth For The Instant.

To-day Kings, To-marrow Beggars, It Is Only When They Are Themselves That They Are Nothing.

To Be Remembered After We Are Dead, Is But Poor Recompense For Being Treated With Contempt While We Are Living.

A Man In Love Prefers His Passion To Every Other Consideration, And Is Fonder Of His Mistress Than He Is Of Virtue. Should She Prove Vicious, She Makes Vice Lovely In His Eyes.

There Are Few Things In Which We Deceive Ourselves More Than In The Esteem We Profess To Entertain For Our Firends. It Is Little Better Than A Piece Of Quackery. The Truth Is, We Think Of Them As We Please, That Is, As They Please Or Displease Us.

Prejudice Is The Child Of Ignorance.

Rules And Models Destroy Genius And Art.

A Man's Reputation Is Not In His Own Keeping, But Lies At The Mercy Of The Profligacy Of Others. Calumny Requires No Proof.

Every Man Depends On The Quantity Of Sense, Wit, Or Good Manners He Brings Into Society For The Reception He Meets With In It.

We Are Never So Much Disposed To Quarrel With Others As When We Are Dissatisfied With Ourselves.

Positive Thinking

A Great Chess-player Is Not A Great Man, For He Leaves The World As He Found It. No Act Terminating In Itself Constitutes Greatness. This Will Apply To All Displays Of Power Or Trials Of Skill, Which Are Confined To The Momentary, Individual Effort, And Construct No Permanent Image Or Trophy Of Themselves Without Them

Envy Is A Littleness Of Soul, Which Cannot See Beyond A Certain Point, And If It Does Not Occupy The Whole Space Feels Itself Excluded.

To A Superior Race Of Being The Pretensions Of Mankind To Extraordinary Sanctity And Virtue Must Seem... Ridiculous.

Let A Man's Talents Or Virtues Be What They May, He Will Only Feel Satisfaction In His Society As He Is Satisfied In Himself.

Those People Who Are Always Improving Never Become Great. Greatness Is An Eminence, The Ascent To Which Is Steep And Lofty, And Which A Man Must Seize On At Once By Natural Boldness And Vigor, And Not By Patient, Wary Steps.

Those Only Deserve A Monument Who Do Not Need One; That Is, Who Have Raised Themselves A Monument In The Minds And Memories Of Men.

The Multitude Who Require To Be Led, Still Hate Their Leaders.

Poetry Is The Universal Language Which The Heart Holds With Nature And Itself. He Who Has A Contempt For Poetry, Cannot Have Much Respect For Himself, Or For Anything Else.

Asleep, Nobody Is A Hypocrite

The Last Pleasure In Life Is The Sense Of Discharging Our Duty.

The Love Of Fame Is Too High And Delicate A Feeling In The Mind To Be Mixed Up With Realities, It Is A Solitary Abstraction. * * * A Name "fast Anchored In The Deep Abyss Of Time" Is Like A Star Twinkling In The Firmament, Cold, Silent, Distant, But Eternal And Sublime; And Our Transmitting One To Posterity Is As If We Should Contemplate Our Translation To The Skies.

Wrong Dressed Out In Pride, Pomp, And Circumstance Has More Attraction Than Abstract Right.

By Retaliating Our Sufferings On The Heads Of Those We Love, We Get Rid Of A Present Uneasiness And Incur Lasting Remorse. With The Accomplishment Of Our Revenge Our Fondness Returns; So That We Feel The Injury We Have Done Them, Even More Than They Do.

Danger Is A Good Teacher, And Makes Apt Scholars. So Are Disgrace, Defeat, Exposure To Immediate Scorn And Laughter. There Is No Opportunity In Such Cases For Self-delusion, No Idling Time Away, No Being Off Your Guard (or You Must Take The Consequences) - Neither Is There Any Room For Humour Or Caprice Or Prejudice.

As A General Rule, Those Who Are Dissatisfied With Themselves Will Seek To Go Out Of Themselves Into An Ideal World. Persons In Strong Health And Spirits, Who Take Plenty Of Air And Exercise, Who Are "in Favor With, Their Stars," And Have A Thorough Relish Of The Good Things Of This Life, Seldom Devote Themselves In Despair To Religion Or The Muses. Sedentary, Nervous, Hypochondriacal People, On The Contrary, Are Forced, For Want Of An Appetite For The Real And Substantial, To Look Out For A More Airy Food And Speculative Comforts.

What Passes In The World For Talent Or Dexterity Or Enterprise Is Often Only A Want Of Moral Principle. We May Succeed Where Others Fail, Not From A Greater Share Of Invention, But From Not Being Nice In The Choice Of Expedients.

The Public Is So In Awe Of Its Own Opinion That It Never Dares To Form Any, But Catches Up The First Idle Rumour, Lest It Should Be Behindhand In Its Judgment, And Echoes It Till It Is Deafened With The Sound Of Its Own Voice.

Our Energy Is In Proportion To The Resistance It Meets.

Love And Joy Are Twins Or Born Of Each Other.

Men Will Die For An Opinion As Soon As For Anything Else.

True Modesty And True Pride Are Much The Same Thing: Both Consist In Setting A Just Value On Ourselves - Neither More Nor Less.

He Who Does Nothing Renders Himself Incapable Of Doing Any Thing; But While We Are Executing Any Work, We Are Preparing And Qualifying Ourselves To Undertake Another.

The Contemplation Of Truth And Beauty Is The Proper Object For Which We Were Created, Which Calls Forth The Most Intense Desires Of The Soul, And Of Which It Never Tires.

Everything Is In Motion. Everything Flows. Everything Is Vibrating.

Without Life There Can Be No Action — No Objects Of Pursuit — No Restless Desires — No Tormenting Passions. Hence It Is That We Fondly Cling To It — That We Dread Its Termination As The Close, Not Of Enjoyment, But Of Hope.

Vice Is Man's Nature: Virtue Is A Habit -- Or A Mask. . . . The Foregoing Maxim Shows The Difference Between Truth And Sarcasm.

He Who Lives Wisely To Himself And His Own Heart Looks At The Busy World Through The Loopholes Of Retreat, And Does Not Want To Mingle In The Fray.

Indolence Is A Delightful But Distressing State; We Must Be Doing Something To Be Happy. Action Is No Less Necessary Than Thought To The Instinctive Tendencies Of The Human Frame.

It Is Better To Be Able Neither To Read Nor Write Than To Be Able To Do Nothing Else.

It Is Well There Is No One Without Fault; For He Would Not Have A Friend In The World. He Would Seem To Belong To S Different Species.

By Conversing With The Mighty Dead, We Imbibe Sentiment With Knowledge. We Become Strongly Attached To Those Who Can No Longer Either Hurt Or Serve Us, Except Through The Influence Which They Exert Over The Mind. We Feel The Presence Of That Power Which Gives Immortality To Human Thoughts And Actions, And Catch The Flame Of Enthusiasm From All Nations And Ages.

The Surest Hindrance Of Success Is To Have Too High A Standard Of Refinement In Our Own Minds, Or Too High An Opinion Of The Judgment Of The Public. He Who Is Determined Not To Be Satisfied With Anything Short Of Perfection Will Never Do Anything To Please Himself Or Others.

Vice, Like Disease, Floats In The Atmosphere.

The Definition Of Genius Is That It Acts Unconsciously, And Those Who Have Produced Immortal Works Have Done So Without Knowing How Or Why.

Familiarity Confounds All Traits Of Distinction; Interest And Prejudice Take Away The Power Of Judging.

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