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The Truth Is That The Spectators Are Always In Their Senses, And Know, From The First Act To The Last, That The Stage Is Only A Stage, And That The Players Are Only Players.

-Samuel Johnson

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The Truth Is That

Samuel Johnson

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The Truth Is That The Spectators Are Always In Their Senses, And Know, From The First Act To The Last, That The Stage Is Only A Stage, And That The Players Are Only Players.

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Admiration Begins Where Acquaintance Ceases

It Is Necessary To The Success Of Flattery, That It Be Accommodated To Particular Circumstances Or Characters, And Enter The Heart On That Side Where The Passions Are Ready To Receive It.

But Grant, The Virtues Of A Temp'rate Prime Bless With An Age Exempt From Scorn Or Crime; An Age That Melts With Unperceived Decay, And Glides In Modest Innocence Away

Is Not A Patron One Who Looks With Unconcern On A Man Struggling For Life In The Water, And, When He Has Reached Ground, Encumbers Him With Help?

The Mental Disease Of The Present Generation Is Impatience Of Study, Contempt Of The Great Masters Of Ancient Wisdom, And A Disposition To Rely Wholly Upon Unassisted Genius And Natural Sagacity.

If We Require More Perfection From Women Than From Ourselves, It Is Doing Them Honor.

This Is My History; Like All Other Histories, A Narrative Of Misery.

Diligence In Employments Of Less Consequence Is The Most Successful Introduction To Greater Enterprises.

The Prospect Of Penury In Age Is So Gloomy And Terrifying That Every Man Who Looks Before Him Must Resolve To Avoid It; And It Must Be Avoided Generally By The Science Of Sparing.

The Business Of Life Is To Go Forward.

No People Can Be Great Who Have Ceased To Be Virtuous.

Truth, Sir, Is A Cow Which Will Yield Such People No More Milk, And So They Are Gone To Milk The Bull.

To Buried Merit Rise The Tardy Bust.

To Strive With Difficulties, And To Conquer Them, Is The Highest Human Felicity; The Next Is, To Strive, And Deserve To Conquer: But He Whose Life Has Passed Without A Contest, And Who Can Boast Neither Success Nor Merit, Can Survey Himself Only As A Useless Filler Of Existence; Ad If He Is Content With His Own Character, Must Owe His Satisfaction To Insensibility.

It Is Advantageous To An Author That His Book Should Be Attacked As Well As Praised. Fame Is A Shuttlecock. If It Be Struck At One End Of The Room, It Will Soon Fall To The Ground. To Keep It Up, It Must Be Struck At Both Ends.

Liberty Is The Parent Of Truth, But Truth And Decency Are Sometimes At Variance. All Men And All Propositions Are To Be Treated Here As They Deserve, And There Are Many Who Have No Claim Either To Respect Or Decency.

It Is Unpleasing To Represent Our Affairs To Our Own Disadvantage; Yet It Is Necessary To Shew The Evils Which We Desire To Be Removed.

A Man's Mind Grows Narrow In A Narrow Place.

Language Is The Dress Of Thought; Every Time You Talk Your Mind Is On Parade.

The Common People Do Not Accurately Adapt Their Thoughts To Objects; Nor, Secondly, Do They Accurately Adapt Their Words To Their Thoughts; They Do Not Mean To Lie; But, Taking No Pains To Be Exact, They Give You Very False Accounts. A Great Part Of Their Language Is Proverbial; If Anything Rocks At All, They Say It Rocks Like A Cradle; And In This Way They Go On.

A Married Man Has Many Cares, But A Bachelor No Pleasures.

You Can Never Be Wise Unless You Love Reading.

Being In A Ship Is Being In A Jail, With The Chance Of Being Drowned.

Nature Makes Us Poor Only When We Want Necessaries, But Custom Gives The Name Of Poverty To The Want Of Superfluities.

Civilized Nations

To Prevent Evil Is The Great End Of Government, The End For Which Vigilance And Severity Are Properly Employed.

No Wonder, Sir, That He Is Vain; A Man Who Is Perpetually Flattered In Every Mode That Can Be Conceived. So Many Bellows Have Blown The Fire, That One Wonders He Is Not By This Time Become A Cinder.

Exercise Cannot Secure Us From That Dissolution To Which We Are Decreed; But While The Soul And Body Continue United, It Can Make The Association Pleasing, And Give Probable Hopes That They Shall Be Disciplined By An Easy Separation...to Die Is The Fate Of Man; But To Die With Lingering Anguish Is Generally His Folly.

A Little Knowledge Is A Dangerous Thing - It Only Hastens Fools To Rush In Where Angels Fear To Tread.

There Are Goods So Opposed That We Cannot Seize Both, But, By Too Much Prudence, May Pass Between Them At Too Great A Distance To Reach Either.

Life Is Surely Given Us For Higher Purposes Than To Gather What Our Ancestors Have Wisely Thrown Away, And To Learn What Is Of No Value But Because It Has Been Forgotten.

Attainment Is Followed By Neglect, Possession By Disgust, And The Malicious Remark Of The Greek Epigrammatist On Marriage May Be Applied To Many Another Course Of Life, That Its Two Days Of Happiness Are The First And The Last

Shame Arises From The Fear Of Men, Conscience From The Fear Of God.

Tears Are Often To Be Found Where There Is Little Sorrow, And The Deepest Sorrow Without Any Tears.

He Was Dull In A New Way, And That Made Many Think Him Great.

Let Observation With Extensive View, Survey Mankind From China To Peru; Remark Each Anxious Toil, Each Eager Strife, And Watch The Busy Scenes Of Crowded Life.

Men Who Cannot Deceive Others Are Very Often Successful At Deceiving Themselves.

I Look Upon Every Day To Be Lost, In Which I Do Not Make A New Acquaintance.

We All Live Upon The Hope Of Pleasing Somebody, And The Pleasure Of Pleasing Ought To Be Greatest, And At Last Always Will Be Greatest, When Our Endeavours Are Exerted In Consequence Of Our Duty.

He That Would Be Superior To External Influences Must First Become Superior To His Own Passions.

The General Remedy Of Those Who Are Uneasy Without Knowing The Cause Is Change Of Place.

There Are Occasions On Which All Apology Is Rudeness.

Wretched Un-idea'd Girls.

More Knowledge May Be Gained Of A Man's Real Character By A Short Conversation With One Of His Servants Than From A Formal And Studied Narrative, Begun With His Pedigree And Ended With His Funeral.

The Hostility Perpetually Exercised Between One Man And Another, Is Caused By The Desire Of Many For That Which Only Few Can Possess. Every Man Would Be Rich, Powerful, And Famous; Yet Fame, Power, And Riches, Are Only The Names Of Relative Conditions, Which Imply The Obscurity, Dependence, And Poverty Of Greater Numbers.

The Noblest Prospect Which A Scotchman Ever Sees Is The High Road That Leads Him To England.

The Imitator Treads A Beaten Walk, And With All His Diligence Can Only Find A Few Flowers Or Branches Untouched By His Predecessor, The Refuse Of Contempt, Or The Omissions Of Negligence.

Authors And Lovers Always Suffer Some Infatuation, From Which Only Absence Can Set Them Free.

It Is Better To Suffer Wrong Than To Do It, And Happier To Be Sometimes Cheated Than Not To Trust.

All Wonder Is The Effect Of Novelty On Ignorance.

To Revenge Reasonable Incredulity By Refusing Evidence, Is A Degree Of Insolence With Which The World Is Not Yet Acquainted; And Stubborn Audacity Is The Last Refuge Of Guilt.

One Cause, Which Is Not Always Observed, Of The Insufficiency Of Riches, Is That They Very Seldom Make Their Owner Rich.

Let Him That Desires To See Others Happy, Make Haste To Give While His Gift Can Be Enjoyed, And Remember That Every Moment Of Delay Takes Away Something From The Value Of His Benefaction.

Judgment Is Forced Upon Us By Experience

The Mathematicians Are Well Acquainted With The Difference Between Pure Science, Which Has Only To Do With Ideas, And The Application Of Its Laws To The Use Of Life, In Which They Are Constrained To Submit To The Imperfections Of Matter And The Influence Of Accidents.

The Mind Is Seldom Quickened To Very Vigorous Operations But By Pain, Or The Dread Of Pain. We Do Not Disturb Ourselves With The Detection Of Fallacies Which Do Us No Harm.

The Luster Of Diamonds Is Invigorated By The Interposition Of Darker Bodies; The Lights Of A Picture Are Created By The Shades; The Highest Pleasure Which Nature Has Indulged To Sensitive Perception Is That Of Rest After Fatigue.

Whatever You Have Spend Less.

Riches Seldom Make Their Owners Rich.

Catch, Then, Oh! Catch The Transient Hour, Improve Each Moment As It Flies; Life's A Short Summer-man A Flower; He Dies-alas! How Soon He Dies!

Timidity Is A Disease Of The Mind, Obstinate And Fatal; For A Man Once Persuaded That Any Impediment Is Insuperable Has Given It, With Respect To Himself, That Strength And Weight Which It Had Not Before.

We Have Less Reason To Be Surprised Or Offended When We Find Others Differ From Us In Opinion, Because We Very Often Differ From Ourselves.

The Mental Disease Of The Present Generation Is Impatience Of Study, Contempt Of The Great Masters Of Ancient Wisdom, And A Disposition To Rely Wholly Upon Unassisted Genius And Natural Sagacity. The Wits Of These Happy Days Have Discovered A Way To Fame, Which The Dull Caution Of Our Laborious Ancestors Durst Never Attempt; They Cut The Knots Of Sophistry, Which It Was Formerly The Business Of Years To Untie, Solve Difficulties By Sudden Irradiations Of Intelligence, And Comprehend Long Processes Of Argument By Immediate Intuition.

The Resolution Of The Combat Is Seldom Equal To The Vehemence Of The Charge.

When First The College Rolls Receive His Name, The Young Enthusiast Quilts His Ease For Fame; Through All His Veins The Fever Of Renown Burns From The Strong Contagion Of The Gown

The Specualtist, Who Is Not Content With Superficial Views, Harasses Himself With Fruitless Curiosity; And Still, As He Inquires More, Perceives Only That He Knows Less.

The Natural Flights Of The Human Mind Are Not From Pleasure To Pleasure, But From Hope To Hope.

It Is Better To Suffer Wrong Than To Do It.

He That Hopes To Look Back Hereafter With Satisfaction Upon Past Years Must Learn To Know The Present Value Of Single Minutes, And Endeavour To Let No Particle Of Time Fall Useless To The Ground.

The Superiority Of Some Men Is Merely Local. They Are Great Because Their Associates Are Little.

Criticism, As It Was First Instituted By Aristotle, Was Meant As A Standard Of Judging Well.

If A Man Begins To Read In The Middle Of A Book, And Feels An Inclination To Go On, Let Him Not Quit It To Go To The Beginning. He May Perhaps Not Feel Again The Inclination.

Money And Time Are The Heaviest Burdens Of Life, And... The Unhappiest Of All Mortals Are Those Who Have More Of Either Than They Know How To Use.

Between Falsehood And Useless Truth There Is Little Difference. As Gold Which He Cannot Spend Will Make No Man Rich, So Knowledge Which Cannot Apply Will Make No Man Wise.

Whoever Commits A Fraud Is Guilty Not Only Of The Particular Injury To Him Who He Deceives, But Of The Diminution Of That Confidence Which Constitutes Not Only The Ease But The Existence Of Society.

Nothing Has So Exposed Men Of Learning To Contempt And Ridicule As Their Ignorance Of Things Which Are Known To All But Themselves. Those Who Have Been Taught To Consider The Institutions Of The Schools As Giving The Last Perfection To Human Abilities Are Surprised To See Men Wrinkled With Study, Yet Wanting To Be Instructed In The Minute Circumstances Of Propriety, Or The Necessary Form Of Daily Transaction; And Quickly Shake Off Their Reverence For Modes Of Education Which They Find To Produce No Ability Above The Rest Of Mankind.

Solitude Is Dangerous To Reason, Without Being Favourable To Virtue. Remember That The Solitary Mortal Is Certainly Luxurious, Probably Superstitious, And Possibly Mad.

When There Is No Hope, There Can Be No Endeavor.

I Never Take A Nap After Dinner But When I Have Had A Bad Night, And Then The Nap Takes Me.

The Vanity Of Being Known To Be Trusted With A Secret Is Generally One Of The Chief Motives To Disclose It.

There Is A Certain Degree Of Temptation Which Will Overcome Any Virtue. Now, In So Far As You Approach Temptation To A Man, You Do Him An Injury; And, If He Is Overcome, You Share His Guilt.

That Eminence Of Learning Is Not To Be Gained Without Labour, At Least Equal To That Which Any Other Kind Of Greatness Can Require, Will Be Allowed By Those Who Wish To Elevate The Character Of A Scholar; Since They Cannot But Know That Every Human Acquisition Is Valuable In Proportion To The Difficulty Of Its Attainment.

He That Can Swim Needs Not Despair To Fly; To Swim Is To Fly In A Grosser Fluid, And To Fly Is To Swim In A Subtler. We Are Only To Proportion Our Power Of Resistance To The Different Density Of Matter Through Which We Are To Pass. You Will Be Necessarily Upborne By The Air If You Can Renew Any Impulse Upon It Faster Than The Air Can Recede From The Pressure.

Don't Tell Me Of Deception; A Lie Is A Lie, Whether It Be A Lie To The Eye Or A Lie To The Ear.

He Who Writes Much Will Not Easily Escape A Manner, Such A Recurrence Of Particular Modes As May Be Easily Noted.

The Business Of Life Summons Us Away From Useless Grief, And Calls Us To The Exercise Of Those Virtues Of Which We Are Lamenting Our Deprivation.

I Doubt If There Ever Was A Man Who Was Not Gratified By Being Told That He Was Liked By The Women.

What We Hope Ever To Do With Ease, We Must Learn First To Do With Diligence.

Self-love Is A Busy Prompter.

Few Things Are Impossible To Diligence And Skill.

No Wise Man Will Go To Live In The Country, Unless He Has Something To Do Which Can Be Better Done In The Country. For Instance, If He Is To Shut Himself Up For A Year To Study Science, It Is Better To Look Out To The Fields, Than To An Opposite Wall. Then, If A Man Walks Out In The Country, There Is Nobody To Keep Him From Walking In Again: But If A Man Walks Out In London, He Is Not Sure When He Will Walk In Again. A Great City Is, To Be Sure, The School For Studying Life.

Life Has No Pleasure Higher Or Nobler Than That Of Friendship.

The Business Of The Biographer Is Often To Pass Slightly Over Those Performances And Incidents Which Produce Vulgar Greatness, To Lead The Thoughts Into Domestic Privacies, And Display The Minute Details Of Daily Life, Were Exterior Appendages Are Cast Aside, And Men Excel Each Other Only By Prudence And Virtue.

I Am Very Fond Of The Company Of Ladies. I Like Their Beauty, I Like Their Delicacy, I Like Their Vivacity, And I Like Their Silence.

I Do Not Care To Speak Ill Of A Man Behind His Back, But I Believe He Is An Attorney.

Many Leave The Labours Of Half Their Life To Their Executors And To Chance, Because They Will Not Send Them Abroad Unfinished, And Are Unable To Finish Them, Having Prescribed To Themselves Such A Degree Of Exactness As Human Diligence Can Scarcely Ontain.

Friendship, Like Love, Is Destroyed By Long Absence, Though It May Be Increased By Short Intermissions.

Ignorance, When It Is Voluntary, Is Criminal.

If The Man Who Turnips Cries, Cry Not When His Father Dies, 'tis Proof That He Had Rather Have A Turnip Than His Father.

A Fishing Rod Is A Stick With A Hook At One End And A Fool At The Other.

Where There Is Emulation, There Will Be Vanity; Where There Is Vanity, There Will Be Folly.

The Joy Of Life Is Variety; The Tenderest Love Requires To Be Rekindled By Intervals Of Absence.

I Am Willing To Love All Of Mankind, Except An American.

Scarcely Any Degree Of Judgment Is Sufficient To Restrain The Imagination From Magnifying That On Which It Is Long Detained

Great Abilities Are Not Requisite For An Historian; For In Historical Composition, All The Greatest Powers Of The Human Mind Are Quiescent.

Waste Cannot Be Accurately Told, Though We Are Sensible How Destructive It Is. Economy, On The One Hand, By Which A Certain Income Is Made To Maintain A Man Genteelly; And Waste, On The Other, By Which On The Same Income Another Man Lives Shabbily, Cannot Be Defined. It Is A Very Nice Thing; As One Man Wears His Coat Out Much Sooner Than Another, We Cannot Tell How.

The Mind Is Never Satisfied With The Objects Immediately Before It, But Is Always Breaking Away From The Present Moment, And Losing Itself In Schemes Of Future Felicity... The Natural Flights Of The Human Mind Are Not From Pleasure To Pleasure, But From Hope To Hope.

Consider What Importance To Society The Chastity Of Women Is. Upon That All The Property In The World Depends. We Hang A Thief For Stealing A Sheep; But The Unchastity Of A Woman Transfers Sheep And Farm And All From The Right Owner.

Patron: One Who Countenances, Supports Or Protects. Commonly A Wretch Who Supports With Insolence, And Is Repaid In Flattery.

No Estimate Is More In Danger Of Erroneous Calculations Than Those By Which A Man Computes The Force Of His Own Genius.

A Man Should Be Careful Never To Tell Tales Of Himself To His Own Disadvantage. People May Be Amused At The Time, But They Will Be Remembered, And Brought Out Against Him Upon Some Subsequent Occasion.

My Diseases Are An Asthma And A Dropsy And, What Is Less Curable, Seventy-five.

To Hear Complaints With Patience, Even When Complaints Are Vain, Is One Of The Duties Of Friendship.

A Man Has No More Right To Say An Uncivil Thing Than To Act One; No More Right To Say A Rude Thing To Another Than To Knock Him Down.

A Cow Is A Very Good Animal In The Field; But We Turn Her Out Of A Garden.

A Country Gentleman Should Bring His Lady To Visit London As Soon As He Can, That They May Have Agreeable Topicks For Conversation When They Are By Themselves.

He That Reads And Grows No Wiser Seldom Suspects His Own Deficiency, But Complains Of Hard Words And Obscure Sentences, And Asks Why Books Are Written Which Cannot Be Understood.

If He Does Really Think That There Is No Distinction Between Virtue And Vice, Why, Sir, When He Leaves Our Houses Let Us Count Our Spoons.

An Exotic And Irrational Entertainment, Which Has Been Always Combated, And Always Has Prevailed.

The Great End Of Prudence Is To Give Cheerfulness To Those Hours Which Splendour Cannot Gild, And Acclamation Cannot Exhilarate; Those Soft Intervals Of Unbended Amusement, In Which A Man Shrinks To His Natural Dimensions, And Throws Aside The Ornaments Or Disguises Which He Feels In Privacy To Be Useless Incumbrances, And To Lose All Effect When They Become Familiar. To Be Happy At Home Is The Ultimate Result Of All Ambition, The End To Which Every Enterprise And Labour Tends, And Of Which Every Desire Prompts The Prosecution.

I Am Always For Getting A Boy Forward In His Learning, For That Is Sure Good. I Would Let Him At First Read Any English Book Which Happens To Engage His Attention; Because You Have Done A Great Deal When You Have Brought Him To Have Entertainment From A Book. He'll Get Better Books Afterwards.

All The Performances Of Human Art, At Which We Look With Praise Or Wonder, Are Instances Of The Resistless Force Of Perseverance.

It Seems Not More Reasonable To Leave The Right Of Printing Unrestrained, Because Writers May Be Afterwards Censured, Than It Would Be To Sleep With Doors Unbolted, Because By Our Laws We Can Hang A Thief.

He Who Would Have Fine Guests, Let Him Have A Fine Wife.

Every Old Man Complains Of The Growing Depravity Of The World, Of The Petulance And Insolence Of The Rising Generation.

Fear Is Implanted In Us As A Preservative From Evil.

The Drama's Laws The Drama's Patrons Give. For We That Live To Please Must Please To Live.

To Build Is To Be Robbed.

A Man Is Not Obliged Honestly To Answer A Question Which Should Not Properly Be Put.

A Few Men Are Sufficient To Broach Falsehoods, Which Are Afterwards Innocently Diffused By Successive Relaters.

Bashfulness May Sometimes Exclude Pleasure, But Seldom Opens Any Avenue To Sorrow Or Remorse.

Superfluous Lags The Veteran On The Stage, Till Pitying Nature Signs The Last Release, And Bids Afflicted Worth Retire To Peace.

Mutual Complacency Is The Atmosphere Of Conjugal Love.

Gaiety Is To Good-humor As Animal Perfumes To Vegetable Fragrance. The One Overpowers Weak Spirits, The Other Recreates And Revives Them. Gaiety Seldom Fails To Give Some Pain; Good-humor Boasts No Faculties Which Every One Does Not Believe In His Own Power, And Pleases Principally By Not Offending.

Bachelors Have Consciences, Married Men Have Wives.

For Life Affords No Higher Pleasure, Than That Of Surmounting Difficulties, Passing From One Step Of Success To Another, Forming New Wishes And Seeing Them Gratified. He That Labours In Any Great Or Laudable Undertaking, Has His Fatigues First Supported By Hope, And Afterwards Rewarded By Joy... To Strive With Difficulties, And To Conquer Them, Is The Highest Human Felicity.

There Is No Observation More Frequently Made By Such As Employ Themselves In Surveying The Conduct Of Mankind, Than That Marriage, Though The Dictate Of Nature, And The Institution Of Providence, Is Yet Very Often The Cause Of Misery, And That Those Who Enter Into That State Can Seldom Forbear To Express Their Repentance, And Their Envy Of Those Whom Either Chance Or Caution Hath Withheld From It.

Virtue Is Too Often Merely Local.

Many Things Difficult To Design Prove Easy To Performance.

He That Would Travel For The Entertainment Of Others, Should Remember That The Great Object Of Remark Is Human Life. Every Nation Has Something Peculiar In Its Manufactures, Its Works Of Genius, Its Medicines, Its Agriculture, Its Customs, And Its Policy. He Only Is A Useful Traveller, Who Brings Home Something By Which His Country May Be Benefited; Who Procures Some Supply Of Want, Or Some Mitigation Of Evil, Which May Enable His Readers To Compare Their Condition With That Of Others, To Improve It Whenever It Is Worse, And Whenever It Is Better To Enjoy It.

Life Is Short. The Sooner That A Man Begins To Enjoy His Wealth The Better.

What Is Twice Read Is Commonly Better Remembered That What Is Transcribed.

It Is Justly Considered As The Greatest Excellency Of Art To Imitate Nature; But It Is Necessary To Distinguish Those Parts Of Nature Which Are Most Proper For Imitation: Greater Care Is Still Required In Representing Life, Which Is So Often Discoloured By Passion Or Deformed By Wickedness. If The World Be Promiscuously Described, I Cannot See Of What Use It Can Be To Read The Account; Or Why It May Not Be As Safe To Turn The Eye Immediately Upon Mankind, As Upon A Mirror Which Shows All That Presents Itself Without Discrimination.

Who Left Nothing Of Authorship Untouched, And Touched Nothing Which He Did Not Adorn. [lat., Qui Nullum Fere Scribendi Genus Non Tetigit; Nullum Quod Tetigit Non Ornavit.]

Do Not ... Hope Wholly To Reason Away Your Troubles; Do Not Feed Them With Attention, And They Will Die Imperceptibly Away. Fix Your Thoughts Upon Your Business, Fill Your Intervals With Company, And Sunshine Will Again Break In Upon Your Mind.

Disease Generally Begins That Equality Which Death Completes.

Studious To Please, Yet Not Ashamed To Fail.

Sir, He Throws Away His Money Without Thought And Without Merit. I Do Not Call A Tree Generous That Sheds Its Fruit At Every Breeze.

Never Believe Extraordinary Characters Which You Hear Of People. Depend Upon It, They Are Exaggerated. You Do Not See One Man Shoot A Great Deal Higher Than Another.

Deviation From Nature Is Deviation From Happiness.

Health Is So Necessary To All The Duties, As Well As Pleasures Of Life, That The Crime Of Squandering It Is Equal To The Folly.

The Blaze Of Reputation Cannot Be Blown Out, But It Often Dies In The Socket; A Very Few Names May Be Considered As Perpetual Lamps That Shine Unconsumed.

Of Those That Spin Out Trifles And Die Without A Memorial, Many Flatter Themselves With High Opinions Of Their Own Importance, And Imagine That They Are Every Day Adding Some Improvement To Human Life.

Much Is Due To Those Who First Broke The Way To Knowledge, And Left Only To Their Successors The Task Of Smoothing It.

There Are Few Minds To Which Tyranny Is Not Delightful.

He To Whom Many Objects Of Pursuit Arise At The Same Time, Will Frequently Hesitate Between Different Desires Till A Rival Has Precluded Him, Or Change His Course As New Attractions Prevail, And Harass Himself Without Advancing.

To Get A Name Can Happen But To Few. A Name, Even In The Most Commercial Nation, Is One Of The Few Things Which Cannot Be Bought . It Is The Free Gift Of Mankind, Which Must Be Deserved Before It Will Be Granted, And Is At Last Unwillingly Bestowed.

Wheresoe'er I Turn My View, All Is Strange, Yet Nothing New: Endless Labor All Along, Endless Labor To Be Wrong: Phrase That Time Has Flung Away; Uncouth Words In Disarray, Trick'd In Antique Ruff And Bonnet, Ode, And Elegy, And Sonnet.

Happiness Is Enjoyed Only In Proportion As It Is Known; And Such Is The State Or Folly Of Man, That It Is Known Only By Experience Of Its Contrary.

Attention And Respect Give Pleasure, However Late, Or However Useless. But They Are Not Useless, When They Are Late, It Is Reasonable To Rejoice, As The Day Declines, To Find That It Has Been Spent With The Approbation Of Mankind.

The Truly Strong And Sound Mind Is The Mind That Can Embrace Equally Great Things And Small.

Life Is A Progress From Want To Want, Not From Enjoyment To Enjoyment.

Curiosity Is One Of The Permanent And Certain Characteristics Of A Vigorous Intellect. Every Advance Into Knowledge Opens New Prospects, And Produces New Incitements To Farther Progress.

He Who Waits To Do A Great Deal Of Good At Once Will Never Do Anything.

He That Resigns His Peace To Little Casualties, And Suffers The Course Of His Life To Be Interrupted For Fortuitous Inadvertencies Or Offences, Delivers Up Himself To The Direction Of The Wind, And Loses All That Constancy And Equanimity Which Constitutes The Chief Praise Of A Wise Man.

The Cure For The Greatest Part Of Human Miseries Is Not Radical, But Palliative.

Modern Writers Are The Moons Of Literature; They Shine With Reflected Light, With Light Borrowed From The Ancients.

Yet It Is Necessary To Hope, Though Hope Should Always Be Deluded, For Hope Itself Is Happiness, And Its Frustrations, However Frequent, Are Yet Less Dreadful Than Its Extinction.

Curiosity Is, In Great And Generous Minds, The First Passion And The Last.

There Is Something In Obstinacy Which Differs From Every Other Passion. Whenever It Fails, It Never Recovers, But Either Breaks Like Iron, Or Crumbles Sulkily Away, Like A Fractured Arch. Most Other Passions Have Their Periods Of Fatigue And Rest, Their Sufferings And Their Cure; But Obstinacy Has No Resource, And The First Wound Is Mortal.

Social Sorrow Loses Half Its Pain.

Care That Is Once Enter'd Into The Breast Will Have The Whole Possession Ere It Rest.

Nobody Can Write The Life Of A Man But Those Who Have Eat And Drunk And Lived In Social Intercourse With Him.

The Finest Landscape In The World Is Improved By A Good Inn In The Foreground.

It Is Not Possible To Be Regarded With Tenderness, Except By A Few. That Merit Which Gives Greatness And Renown Diffuses Its Influence To A Wide Compass, But Acts Weakly On Every Single Breast; It Is Placed At A Distance From Common Spectators, And Shines Like One Of The Remote Stars, Of Which The Light Reaches Us, But Not The Heat.

The Habit Of Looking On The Bright Side Of Every Event Is Worth More Than A Thousand Pounds A Year.

Positive Thinking

Men Know That Women Are An Overmatch For Them, And Therefore They Choose The Weakest Or The Most Ignorant. If They Did Not Think So, They Never Could Be Afraid Of Women Knowing As Much As Themselves.

To Purchase Heaven Has Gold The Power? Can Gold Remove The Mortal Hour? In Life Can Love Be Bought With Gold? Are Friendship's Pleasures To Be Sold? No--all That's Worth A Wish--a Thought, Fair Virtue Gives Unbribed, Unbought. Cease Then On Trash Thy Hopes To Bind, Let Nobler Views Engage Thy Mind.

When Speculation Has Done Its Worst, Two And Two Still Make Four.

When I Was As You Are Now, Towering In The Confidence Of Twenty-one, Little Did I Suspect That I Should Be At Forty-nine, What I Now Am.

Of All Noises, I Think Music Is The Least Disagreeable.

A Writer Who Obtains His Full Purpose Loses Himself In His Own Lustre.

Whatever Enlarges Hope Will Also Exalt Courage.

To Be Of No Church Is Dangerous. Religion, Of Which The Rewards Are Distant, And Which Is Animated Only By Faith And Hope, Will Glide By Degrees Out Of The Mind Unless It Be Invigorated And Reimpressed By External Ordinances, By Stated Calls To Worship, And The Salutary Influence Of Example.

As To The Christian Religion, Besides The Strong Evidence Which We Have For It, There Is A Balance In Its Favor From The Number Of Great Men Who Have Been Convinced Of Its Truth After A Serious Consideration Of The Question. Grotius Was An Acute Man, A Lawyer, A Man Accustomed To Examine Evidence, And He Was Convinced. Grotius Was Not A Recluse, But A Man Of The World, Who Certainly Had No Bias On The Side Of Religion. Sir Isaac Newton Set Out An Infidel, And Came To Be A Very Firm Believer.

All Censure Of A Man's Self Is Oblique Praise. It Is In Order To Show How Much He Can Spare.

When Men Come To Like A Sea-life, They Are Not Fit To Live On Land.

There Are Few Ways In Which A Man Can Be More Innocently Employed Than In Getting Money.

So Many Objections May Be Made To Everything, That Nothing Can Overcome Them But The Necessity Of Doing Something.

As Long As One Lives He Will Have Need Of Repentance.

The Business Of Life Is To Go Forward; He Who Sees Evil In Prospect Meets It In His Way, And He Who Catches It By Retrospection Turns Back To Find It. That Which Is Feared May Sometimes Be Avoided, But That Which Is Regretted To-day May Be Regretted Again To-morrow.

We Love To Expect, And When Expectation Is Either Disappointed Or Gratified, We Want To Be Again Expecting.

It Is As Foolish To Make Experiments Upon The Constancy Of A Friend, As Upon The Chastity Of A Wife.

Tea's Proper Use Is To Amuse The Idle, And Relax The Studious, And Dilute The Full Meals Of Those Who Cannot Use Exercise, And Will Not Use Abstinence.

The Love Of Fame Is A Passion Natural And Universal, Which No Man, However High Or Mean, However Wise Or Ignorant, Was Yet Able To Despise.

Poetry Is The Art Of Uniting Pleasure With Truth.

How Few Of His Friends' Houses Would A Man Choose To Be At When He Is Sick.

If Useless Thoughts Could Be Expelled From The Mind, All The Valuable Parts Of Our Knowledge Would More Frequently Recur.

When A Language Begins To Teem With Books, It Is Tending To Refinement; As Those Who Undertake To Teach Others Must Have Undergone Some Labour In Improving Themselves, They Set A Proportionate Value On Their Own Thoughts, And Wish To Enforce Them By Efficacious Expressions; Speech Becomes Embodied And Permanent; Different Modes And Phrases Are Compared, And The Best Obtains An Establishment. By Degrees One Age Improves Upon Another.

If A Man Is In Doubt Whether It Would Be Better For Him To Expose Himself To Martyrdom Or Not, He Should Not Do It. He Must Be Convinced That He Has A Delegation From Heaven.

I Would Be Loath To Speak Ill Of Any Person Who I Do Not Know Deserves It, But I Am Afraid He Is An Attorney.

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Deborah Norville

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