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To Quote Copiously And Well, Requires Taste, Judgment, And Erudition, A Feeling For The Beautiful, An Appreciation Of The Noble, And A Sense Of The Profound.

-Christian Nestell Bovee

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To Quote Copiously And

Christian Nestell Bovee

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To Quote Copiously And Well, Requires Taste, Judgment, And Erudition, A Feeling For The Beautiful, An Appreciation Of The Noble, And A Sense Of The Profound.

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We Repose Too Much Upon The Actual, When We Should Be Seeking To Develop The Possibilities Of Our Being. It Is True Of Nearly All Of Us, That What We Have Done Is Little Compared With What We Might Have Accomplished, Or May Hereafter Effect.

To Cultivate A Garden Is. . . To Go Hand In Hand With Nature In Some Of Her Most Beautiful Processes, To Learn Something Of Her Choicest Secrets, And To Have A More Intelligent Interest Awakened In The Beautiful Order Of Her Works Elsewhere.

Without Death In The World, Existence In It Would Soon Become, Through Over-population, The Most Frightful Of Curses.

The Busiest Of Living Agents Are Certain Dead Men's Thoughts.

There Is Probably No Hell For Authors In The Next World - They Suffer So Much From Critics And Publishers In This.

Sensitiveness Is Closely Allied To Egotism; And Excessive Sensibility Is Only Another Name For Morbid Self-consciousness. The Cure For Tender Sensibilities Is To Make More Of Our Objects And Less Of Our Selves.

Example Has More Followers Than Reason. We Unconsciously Imitate What Pleases Us, And Approximate To The Characters We Most Admire.

However Much Of Time, Labor, Or Other Means It Takes To Establish A Reputation, It Frequently Happens That It Requires Nearly As Much To Maintain It. One Who Has Written A Good Book, Is Expected On All Occasions To "talk Like A Book." Or, If One Has Achieved An Act Of Heroism, He Is Expected To Perform Acts Of Heroism For The Edification Of All Who Approach Him. There Are People Who Can Never Believe They See A Lion Unless They Hear Him Roar.

Example Has Far More Followers Than Reason.

Very Handsome Women Have Usually Far Less Sensibility To Compliments Than Their Less Beautiful Sisters.

The Loveliest Faces Are To Be Seen By Moonlight, When One Sees Half With The Eye And Half With The Fancy.

Some One Called Sir Richard Steele The "vilest Of Mankind," And He Retorted With Proud Humility, "it Would Be A Glorious World If I Were.

Luminous Quotations, Also, Atone, By Their Interest, For The Dulness Of An Inferior Book, And Add To The Value Of A Superior Work By The Variety Which They Lend To Its Style And Treatment.

The Breath Becomes A Stone; The Stone, A Plant; The Plant, An Animal; The Animal, A Man; The Man, A Spirit; And The Spirit, A God.

Enthusiasm Is The Inspiration Of Everything Great. Without It No Man Is To Be Feared, And With It None Despised.

There Are Some Weaknesses That Are Peculiar And Distinctive To Generous Characters, As Freckles Are To A Fair Skin.

Tearless Grief Bleeds Inwardly.

Losing A Loved One

One Must Have Been, At Some Time Or Other, In A Situation Where A Small Sum Was As Necessary Almost As Life Itself, With No More Ability To Raise It Than To Raise The Dead, Before He Can Fully Appreciate The Value Of Money.

We Make Way For The Man Who Boldly Pushes Past Us.

A Good Thought Is Indeed A Great Boon, For Which God Is To Be First Thanked; Next He Who Is The First To Utter It, And Then, In A Lesser, But Still In A Considerable Degree, The Friend Who Is The First To Quote It To Us. Whoever Adopts And Circulates A Just Thought, Participates In The Merit That Originated It.

Wit, Like Poetry, Is Insusceptible Of Being Constructed Upon Rules Founded Merely In Reason. Like Faith, It Exists Independent Of Reason, And Sometimes In Hostility To It.

Living With A Saint Is More Grueling Than Being One.

Christian Living

Justice, Not The Majority, Should Rule.

Books Are Embalmed Minds.

Beauty Can Afford To Laugh At Distinctions: It Is Itself The Greatest Distinction.

All Power Is Indeed Weak Compared With That Of The Thinker. He Sits Upon The Throne Of His Empire Of Thought, Mightier Far Than They Who Wield Material Sceptres.

Melancholy Sees The Worst Of Things, Things As They May Be, And Not As They Are. It Looks Upon A Beautiful Face, And Sees But A Grinning Skull.

None But Those Who Have Loved Can Be Supposed To Understand The Oratory Of The Eye, The Mute Eloquence Of A Look, Or The Conversational Powers Of The Face. Love's Sweetest Meanings Are Unspoken; The Full Heart Knows No Rhetoric Of Words, And Resorts To The Pantomime Of Sighs And Glances.

Loss Of Sincerity Is Loss Of Vital Power.

Elements Of The Heroic Exist In Almost Every Individual: It Is Only The Felicitous Development Of Them All In One That Is Rare.

Something Of A Person's Character May Be Observed By How They Smile. Some Never Smile They Only Grin.

The Grandest Of All Laws Is The Law Of Progressive Development. Under It, In The Wide Sweep Of Things, Men Grow Wiser As They Grow Older, And Societies Better.

It Is With Charity As With Money--the More We Stand In Need Of It, The Less We Have To Give Away.

What Is Taken From The Fortune, Also, May Haply Be So Much Lifted From The Soul. The Greatness Of A Loss, As The Proverb Suggests, Is Determinable, Not So Much By What We Have Lost, As By What We Have Left.

Genuine Religion Is Matter Of Feeling Rather Than Matter Of Opinion.

Wit Must Be Without Effort. Wit Is Play, Not Work; A Nimbleness Of The Fancy, Not A Laborious Effort Of The Will; A License, A Holiday, A Carnival Of Thought And Feeling, Not A Trifling With Speech, A Constraint Upon Language, A Duress Upon Words.

Vanity In An Old Man Is Charming. It Is A Proof Of An Open, Nature. Eighty Winters Have Not Frozen Him Up, Or Taught Him Concealments. In A Young Person It Is Simply Allowable; We Do Not Expect Him To Be Above It.

The Language Of The Heart--the Language Which "comes From The Heart" And "goes To The Heart"--is Always Simple, Always Graceful, And Always Full Of Power, But No Art Of Rhetoric Can Teach It. It Is At Once The Easiest And Most Difficult Language--difficult, Since It Needs A Heart To Speak It; Easy, Because Its Periods Though Rounded And Full Of Harmony, Are Still Unstudied.

Our Courage Is Greater To Dare A Visible Than An Imagined Danger. A Visible Danger Rouses Our Energies To Meet Or Avert It; A Fancied Peril Appalls From Its Presenting Nothing To Be Resisted. Thus, A Panic Is, Usually, A Sudden Going Over To The Enemy Of Our Imagination. All Is Then Lost, For We Have Not Only To Fight Against That Enemy, But Our Imagination As Well.

There Are Seaons When Our Passions Have Slept So Long That We Know Not Whether They Still Exist In Us. So Does Flax Forget That It Is Combustible When The Fire Is Away From It.

Successful Minds Work Like A Gimlet--to A Single Point.

It May Almost Be Held That The Hope Of Commercial Gain Has Done Nearly As Much For The Cause Of Truth As Even The Love Of Truth.

Hope Is The Best Part Of Our Riches.

The Questions Most Furiously Discussed Are Those Which Have In Them A Basis Of Truth, And Yet A Large Admixture Of Errors. We Inconsiderately Take Hold Of, And Mistakingly Support Or Oppose Them, As Either Wholly True Or Wholly False.

Ideas Are Like Matter, Infinitely Divisible. It Is Not Given To Us To Get Down So To Speak To Their Final Atoms, But To Their Molecular Groupings-the Way Is Never Ending And The Progress Infinitely Delightful And Profitable.

It Is Our Relation To Circumstances That Determines Their Influence Upon Us.

Can That Which Is The Greatest Virtue In Philosophy, Doubt (called By Galileo The Father Of Invention), Be In Religion What The Priests Term It, The Greatest Of Sins?

The Selection Of A Subject Is To The Author What Choice Of Position Is To The General,--once Skilfully Determined, The Battle Is Already Half Won. Of A Few Writers It May Be Said That They Are Popular In Despite Of Their Subjects--but Of A Great Many More It May Be Observed That They Are Popular Because Of Them.

In Ambition, As In Love, The Successful Can Afford To Be Indulgent Toward Their Rivals. The Prize Our Own, It Is Graceful To Recognize The Merit That Vainly Aspired To It.

There Is No Tyrant Like Custom, And No Freedom Where Its Edicts Are Not Resisted.

Common Sense, Alas In Spite Of Our Educational Institutions, Is A Rare Commodity.

It Is In Vain That He Seeks Dominion Abroad, Who Is Not Kingly At Home.

Wit Is Better As A Seasoning Than As A Whole Dish By Itself.

The Knowledge Beyond All Other Knowledge Is The Knowledge How To Excuse.

A Particular Disappointment Is Seldom More Than An Excrescence Upon The Trunk Of A General Good--a Shower That Spoils The Pleasure Party, But Refreshes And Enriches The Earth.

The Heart Contracts As The Pocket Expands.

The Great Artist Is A Slave To His Ideals.

Motives Are Better Than Actions. Men Drift Into Crime. Of Evil They Do More Than They Contemplate, And Of Good They Contemplate More Than They Do.

Youth Is Too Tumultuous For Felicity; Old Age Too Insecure For Happiness. The Period Most Favorable To Enjoyment, In A Vigorous, Fortunate, And Generous Life, Is That Between Forty And Sixty.

Dignity Of Position Adds To Dignity Of Character, As Well As To Dignity Of Carriage. Give Us A Proud Position, And We Are Impelled To Act Up To It.

Besides The Five Senses, There Is A Sixth Sense, Of Equal Importance--the Sense Of Duty.

Genius Makes Its Observations In Short-hand; Talent Writes Them Out At Length.

He Presents Me With What Is Always An Acceptable Gift Who Brings Me News Of A Great Thought Before Unknown. He Enriches Me Without Impoverishing Himself. The Judicious Quoter, Too, Helps On What Is Much Needed In The World, A Freer Circulation Of Good Thoughts, Pure Feelings, And Pleasant Fancies.

A Mother Is The Best Friend God Ever Gave.

Funny Inspirational

Better Freedom With A Crust, Than Slavery With Every Luxury.

The Highest Excellence Is Seldom Attained In More Than One Vocation. The Roads Leading To Distinction In Separate Pursuits Diverge, And The Nearer We Approach The One, The Farther We Recede From The Other.

Complaint Is. More Contemptible Than Pitiful.

There Are None So Low But They Have Their Triumphs. Small Successes Suffice For Small Souls.

It Is Seldom That We Find Out How Great Are Our Resources Until We Are Thrown Upon Them.

Every War Involves A Greater Or Less Relapse Into Barbarism. War, Indeed, In Its Details, Is The Essence Of Inhumanity. It Dehumanizes. It May Save The State, But It Destroys The Citizen.

The Finest Compliment That Can Be Paid To A Woman Of Sense Is To Address Her As Such.

Nothing Is So Fragile As Thought In Its Infancy; An Interruption Breaks It: Nothing Is So Powerful, Even To Overturning Empires, When It Reaches Its Maturity.

Most Books Fail, Not So Much From A Want Of Ability In Their Authors, As From An Absence In Their Productions Of A Thorough Development Of Their Ability.

The Natural Wants Are Few, And Easily Gratified: It Is Only Those Which Are Artificial That Perplex Us By Their Multiplicity.

Honesty Is Not Only "the First Step Toward Greatness," - It Is Greatness Itself.

There Is Something In The Character Of Every Man Which Cannot Be Broken In--the Skeleton Of His Character; And To Try To Alter This Is Like Training A Sheep For Draught Purposes. Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, The Reflections Of Lichtenberg We Become Familiar With The Outsides Of Men, As With The Outsides Of Houses, And Think We Know Them, While We Are Ignorant Of So Much That Is Passing Within Them.

Love Delights In Paradoxes. Saddest When It Has Most Reason To Be Gay, Sighs Are The Signs Of Its Deepest Joy, And Silence Is The Expression Of Its Yearning Tenderness.

A Sound Discretion Is Not So Much Indicated By Never Making A Mistake As By Never Repeating It.

Poverty Is Only Contemptible When It Is Felt To Be So. Doubtless The Best Way To Make Our Poverty Respectable Is To Seem Never To Feel It As An Evil.

Men Were Created For Something Better Than Merely To Make Money. A Close Application To Business, Until A Competence Is Gained, Is One Of The Chief Virtues; But To Continue In Trade Long After This Result Is Obtained, Is One Of The Signs, Not To Be Mistaken, Of A Sordid And Ignoble Nature.

He Must Put His Whole Life Into His Work, Who Would Do It Well, And Make It Potential To Influence Other Lives.

To Death We Owe Our Life; The Passing Of One Generation Opens A Way For Another.

Excessive Sensibility Is Only Another Name For Morbid Self-consciousness.

Passion Looks Not Beyond The Moment Of Its Existence. Better, It Says, The Kisses Of Love To Day, Than The Felicities Of Heaven Afar Off.

To Quote Copiously And Well, Requires Taste, Judgment, And Erudition, A Feeling For The Beautiful, An Appreciation Of The Noble, And A Sense Of The Profound.

Enthusiasm Is The Inspiration Of Everything Great.

Enthusiasm For Life

The Extent Of Poverty In The World Is Much Exaggerated. Our Sensitiveness Makes Half Our Poverty; Our Fears--anxieties For Ills That Never Happen--a Greater Part Of The Other Half.

The Worth Of A Book Is A Matter Of Expressed Juices.

Discretion Is The Salt, And Fancy The Sugar Of Life; The One Preserves, The Other Sweetens It.

The Less The Difference, The Greater The Quarrel Over It.

Woman's Power Is Over The Affections. A Beautiful Dominion Is Hers; But She Risks Its Forfeiture When She Seeks To Extend It.

In Secluding Himself Too Much From Society, An Author Is In Danger Of Losing That Intimate Acquaintance With Life Which Is The Only Sure Foundation Of Power In A Writer.

We Should Not So Much Esteem Our Poverty As A Misfortune, Were It Not That The World Treats It So Much As A Crime

Hunger And Poverty

Winter Is The Night Of Vegetation.

Dishonesty Is A Forsaking Of Permanent For Temporary Advantages.

Economy Is For The Poor; The Rich May Dispense With It.

We Give Our Best Affections To The Beautiful, Only Our Second Best To The Useful.

God Has Created Too Few Unmixed Evils To Warrant The Belief That Death Is One Of Them. In All Things Else In Nature, Goodness So Abounds That We Are Authorized To Infer That It Does Not Stop Even At The Grave. It Is Only That Her Footprints Have Become Invisible.

He Has But One Great Fear That Fears To Do Wrong.

The Legitimate Aim Of Criticism Is To Direct Attention To The Excellent. The Bad Will Dig Its Own Grave, And The Imperfect May Safely Be Left To That Final Neglect From Which No Amount Of Present Undeserved Popularity Can Rescue It.

The Method Of The Enterprising Is To Plan With Audacity And Execute With Vigor.

The Passions Are Like Fire, Useful In A Thousand Ways And Dangerous Only In One, Through Their Excess.

Weakness Ineffectually Seeks To Disguise Itself,--like A Drunken Man Trying To Show How Sober He Is.

When We Get Tired Of Enjoying All The Pleasures Within Our Reach, We Have Still A Resource In Thinking Of Others That Are Not.

There Is A German Proverb Which Says That Take-it-easy And Live-long Are Brothers.

It Is Some Compensation For Great Evils, That They Enforce Great Lessons.

It Is The Life Of Democracy To Favor Equality.

Out Of Politics Comes More Uproar Than Progress. It Is Indeed Surprising How Little, Comparatively, This Noisy Department Of Human Affairs Contributes To The World's Prosperity. Political Commotions Upon The Grandest Scale, Political Events Of Astounding Suddenness, Political Characters Of The Greatest Ability, Abound, But Still, Permanent Results Are Rare, And We Look In Vain For A Measure Of Public Good Corresponding In Extent To The Hideous Rout Which Ushers It In. Progress But Turns Upon Its Pillow, And Goes To Sleep Again.

The Opinions Of The Misanthropical Rest Upon This Very Partial Basis, That They Adopt The Bad Faith Of A Few As Evidence Of The Worthlessness Of All.

We Take Life Too Seriously: The Office Of Wit Is To Correct This Tendency.

The Cheerful Live Longest In Years, And Afterwards In Our Regards. Cheerfulness Is The Off-shoot Of Goodness.

Alas, The Transports Beauty Can Inspire!

Youth Is The Season Of Receptivity, And Should Be Devoted To Acquirement; And Manhood Of Power--that Demands An Earnest Application. Old Age Is For Revision.

Life Being Full Of Harsh Realities, We Seek Relief From Them In A Variety Of Pleasing Delusions.

Too Much Society Makes A Man Frivolous; Too Little, A Savage.

The Most Brilliant Flashes Of Wit Come From A Clouded Mind, As Lightning Leaps Only From An Obscure Firmament.

A Better Principle Than This, That "the Majority Shall Rule," Is This Other, That Justice Shall Rule. "justice," Says The Code Of Justinian, "is The Constant And Perpetual Desire To Render Every Man His Due.

By His Provocations To Good-natured Merriment, A Humorist Of The First Water Contributes As Much To The Sum Of Happiness As The Gravest Philosopher.

I Once Asked A Distinguished Artist What Place He Gave To Labor In Art. "labor," He In Effect Said, "is The Beginning, The Middle, And The End Of Art." Turning Then To Another--"and You," I Inquired, "what Do You Consider As The Great Force In Art?" "love," He Replied. In Their Two Answers I Found But One Truth.

Marriage, By Making Us More Contented, Causes Us Often To Be Less Enterprising.

The Great Obstacle To Progress Is Prejudice

The Scope Of An Intellect Is Not To Be Measured With A Tape-string, Or A Character Deciphered From The Shape Or Length Of A Nose.

Mortal Beauty Stings While It Delights.

Dishonest People Conceal Their Faults From Themselves As Well As Others, Honest People Know And Confess Them.

Our First And Last Love Is Self-love.

Funny Valentines Day

Silence, When Nothing Need Be Said, Is The Eloquence Of Discretion.

Six Traits Of Effective Leaders: 1. Make Others Feel Important 2. Promote A Vision 3. Follow The Golden Rule 4. Admit Mistakes 5. Criticize Others Only In Private 6. Stay Close To The Action Example Has More Followers Than Reason. We Unconsciously Imitate What Pleases Us, And Approximate To The Characters We Most Admire.

It Is Invidious To Distinguish Particular Men As Adventurers: We Are All Such.

In Art There Are Two Principal Schools Between Which Each Aspirant Has To Choose--one Distinguished By Its Close Adherence To Nature, And The Other By Its Strenuous Efforts To Get Above It.

Cheerfulness Is An Offshoot Of Goodness And Of Wisdom.

When We Have The Means To Pay For What We Desire, What We Get Is Not So Much What Is Best, As What Is Costliest.

He Half Retrieves A Defeat Who Yields To It Gracefully.

It Is Of Very Little Use In Trying To Be Dignified, If Dignity Is No Part Of Your Character.

Kindred Weaknesses Induce Friendships As Often As Kindred Virtues.

The Next Best Thing To Being Witty One's Self, Is To Be Able To Be Able To Quote Another's Wit.

Many Children, Many Cares; No Children, No Felicity.

A Woman's Love, Like Lichens Upon A Rock, Will Still Grow Where Even Charity Can Find No Soil To Nurture Itself.

Age, That Acquaints Us With Infirmities In Ourselves, Should Make Us Tender In Our Reprehension Of Weakness Elsewhere.

Life Is Indeed Either A Rich Possession Or A Poor, According As It Is Made Subservient To Noble Aims Or Ignoble Pleasures.

Truth, Like The Sun, Submits To Be Obscured; But, Like The Sun, Only For A Time.

The Small Courtesies Sweeten Life; The Greater Ennoble It.

The Language Denotes The Man. A Coarse Or Refined Character Finds Its Expression Naturally In A Coarse Or Refined Phraseology.

Whether One Talks Well Depends Very Much Upon Whom He Has To Talk To.

A Profusion Of Fancies And Quotations Is Out Of Place In A Love-letter. True Feeling Is Always Direct, And Never Deviates Into By-ways To Cull Flowers Of Rhetoric.

Like The Withered Roses Of A Once Gay Garland, The Feelings Of Youth Command In Age A Melancholy Interest.

The Activity Of The Young Is Like That Of Railcars In Motion--they Tear Along With Noise And Turmoil, And Leave Peace Behind Them. The Quietest Nooks, Invaded By Them, Lose Their Quietude As They Pass, And Recover It Only On Their Departure.

Intellectually, As Politically, The Direction Of All True Progress Is Towards Greater Freedom, And Along An Endless Succession Of Ideas.

The Very Cunning Conceal Their Cunning; The Indifferently Shrewd Boast Of It.

In The Assurance Of Strength There Is Strength; And They Are The Weakest, However Strong, Who Have No Faith In Themselves Or Their Powers.

No Work Deserves To Be Criticized That Has Not Much In It That Deserves To Be Applauded.

There Will Always Be Romance In The World So Long As There Are Young Hearts In It.

A Genuine Passion Is Like A Mountain Stream; It Admits Of No Impediment; It Cannot Go Backward; It Must Go Forward.

In General, Inquiry Ceases When We Adopt A Theory. After That, We Overlook Whatever Makes Against It, And See And Think, And Talk And Write, Only In Its Favor. Indeed, When We Have A Snug, Comfortable Theory, To Which We Are Much Attached, They Appear To Us As A Very Mean Set Of Facts That Will Not Square With It.

Words Of Praise, Indeed, Are Almost As Necessary To Warm A Child Into A Genial Life As Acts Of Kindness And Affection. Judicious Praise Is To Children What The Sun Is To Flowers.

We Cannot Reason Ourselves Into Love, Nor Can We Reason Ourselves Out Of It, Which Suggests That Love And Reason Have Little To Do With Each Other.

It Is One Of The Arts Of A Great Beauty To Heighten The Effect Of Her Charms By Affecting To Be Sweetly Unconscious Of Them.

The Reveries Of The Dreamer Advance His Hopes, But Not Their Realization. One Good Hour Of Earnest Work Is Worth Them All.

The Loss Of A Beloved Connection Awakens An Interest In Heaven Before Unfelt.

What We Call Conscience In Many Instances, Is Only A Wholesome Fear Of The Law.

Hope Is The Best Part Of Our Riches. What Sufficeth It That We Have The Wealth Of The Indies In Our Pockets, If We Have Not The Hope Of Heaven In Our Souls?

The Cure For Tender Sensibilities Is To Make More Of Our Objects And Less Of Our Selves.

A Strong Will Deals With The Hard Facts Of Life As A Sculptor With His Marbles, Making Them Facile And Yielding To His Purposes, And Conquering Their Stubbornness By A Greater Stubbornness In Himself.

Love Makes A Few Weeks So Rich That All The Rest Of Our Lives Seems Poor In Comparison.

The Trouble With Men Of Sense Is That They Are So Dreadfully In Earnest All The While.

Fame - A Few Words Upon A Tombstone, And The Truth Of Those Not To Be Depended On.

Perhaps The Heroic Element In Our Natures Is Exhibited To The Best Advantage, Not In Going From Success To Success, And So On Through A Series Of Triumphs, But In Gathering, On The Very Field Of Defeat Itself, The Materials For Renewed Efforts, And In Proceeding, With No Abatement Of Heart Or Energy, To Form Fresh Designs Upon The Very Ruins And Ashes Of Blasted Hopes. Yes, It Is This Indomitable Persistence In A Purpose, Continued Alike Through Defeat And Success, That Makes, More Than Aught Else, The Hero.

Many An Honest Man Practices Upon Himself An Amount Of Deceit Sufficient, If Practised Upon Another, And In A Little Different Way, To Send Him To The State Prison.

The Best Evidence Of Merit Is A Cordial Recognition Of It Whenever And Wherever It May Be Found.

No Single Character Is Ever So Great That A Nation Can Afford To Form Itself Upon It. Imitation Belittles. This Appears In The Instance Of The Chinese. The Chinese Are So Many Confucii; In Miniature. And So With The Jews. Moses, The Lawgiver, Is Poorly Represented By Moses, The Old Clothesman ; Or Even By Dives, The Hanker.

Repose Without Stagnation Is The State Most Favorable To Happiness. "the Great Felicity Of Life," Says Seneca, "is To Be Without Perturbations.

A Failure Establishes Only This, That Our Determination To Succeed Was Not Strong Enough.

Within The Sacred Walls Of Libraries We Find The Best Thoughts, The Purest Feelings, And The Most Exalted Imaginings Of Our Race.

It Is So Natural For Us To Consider Our Presence As Indispensable In The World, So Long As We Have Much To Do In It, That The Wisdom Of Retiring Wholly From Employments In Advanced Life May Be Questioned. Certainly, He Who Does So Is In Danger Of Finding, Before Long, That He Has Only Given Up The Occupation To Which He Has Been Accustomed, For The New Business Of Calculating The Period Of His Decease.

Partial Culture Runs To The Ornate, Extreme Culture To Simplicity.

Next To Being Witty, The Best Thing Is Being Able To Quote Another's Wit.

The Method Of The Critic Is To Balance Praises With Censure, And Thus To Do Justice To The Subject And--his Own Discrimination.

Few Minds Wear Out; More Rust Out.

As Threshing Separates The Wheat From The Chaff, So Does Affliction Purify Virtue.

There Are Ceremonious Bows That Repel One Like A Cudgel.

Contentment Is Not Happiness. An Oyster May Be Contented. Happiness Is Compounded Of Richer Elements.

Even When We Fancy We Have Grown Wiser, It Is Only, It May Be, That New Prejudices Have Displaced Old Ones.

It Is Our Relation To Circumstances That Determine Their Influence Over Us. The Same Wind That Blows One Ship Into Port May Blow Another Off Shore.

Our Opinions Partake, More Or Less, Of The Prejudices Of Our Class, Party, Or Sect. We Are All Largely Pledged, Through Interest, Affection, Or Passion, To Particular Classes Of Opinion, And The Strength Of Efforts To Get Released From These Pledges, Is The Measure Of Our Advancement.

It Is The Nature Of Thought To Find Its Way Into Action.

An Eager Pursuit Of Fortune Is Inconsistent With A Severe Devotion To Truth. The Heart Must Grow Tranquil Before The Thought Can Become Searching.

How Like A Railway Tunnel Is The Poor Man's Life, With The Light Of Childhood At One End, The Intermediate Gloom, And Only The Glimmer Of A Future Life At The Other Extremity!

All Good Writing Leaves Something Unexpressed.

Tranquil Pleasures Last The Longest; We Are Not Fitted To Bear The Burden Of Great Joys.

It Is Difficult To Say Which Is The Greatest Evil--to Have Too Violent Passions, Or To Be Wholly Devoid Of Them. Controlled With Firmness, Guided By Discretion, And Hallowed By The Imagination, The Passions Are The Vivifiers And Quickeners Of Our Being. Without Passion There Can Be No Energy Of Character. Indeed, The Passions Are Like Fire, Useful In A Thousand Ways, And Dangerous Only In One--through Their Excess.

Examples Are Few Of Men Ruined By Giving.

To Be Without Sympathy Is To Be Alone In The World--without Friends Or Country, Home Or Kindred.

The Past Is The Sepulchre Of Our Dead Emotions.

Fortune, Like A Coy Mistress, Loves To Yield Her Favors, Though She Makes Us Wrest Them From Her.

An Ambition To Excel In Petty Things Obstructs The Progress To Nobler Aims.

"there Is Nothing," Says A Correspondent Of The New York Times, "which The Business World Discards As Unpractical And Useless So Much As The Quiet, Thinking Scholar. But This Is The Man Who Makes Revolutions. Politicians Are Mere Puppets In The Hands Of Men Of Thought.

Melancholy Sees The Worst Of Things...[rather Than The Best]

It Is Safer To Quote What Is Written Than What Is Spoken. What A Man Writes It Is Fair To Presume He Believes As A Matter Of General Conviction, But It Is Not So With What He Utters In The Freedom Of Conversation. In That He May Only Express The Feeling Of The Moment, And Not His Settled Judgment, Or Matured Opinion.

Passion Doesn't Look Beyond The Moment Of Its Existence.

The Lively And Mercurial Are As Open Books, With The Leaves Turned Down At The Notable Passages. Their Souls Sit At The Windows Of Their Eyes, Seeing And To Be Seen.

Pleasure And Pain Spring Not So Much From The Nature Of Things, As From Our Manner Of Considering Them. Pleasure, Especially, Is Never An Invariable Effect Of Particular Circumstances.

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