The head of dullness, unlike the tail of the torpedo, loses nothing of the benumbing and lethargizing influence by reiterated discharges.
The true motives of our actions, like the real pipes of an organ, are usually concealed; but the gilded and hollow pretext is pompously placed in the front for show.
Cruel men are the greatest lovers of Mercy, avaricious men of generosity, and proud men of humility; that is to say, in other, not in themselves.
It may be observed of good writing, as of good blood, that it is much easier to say what it is composed of than to compose it.
No two things differ more than hurry and dispatch. Hurry is the mark of a weak mind, dispatch of a strong one. A weak man in office, like a squirrel in a cage, is laboring eternally, but to no purpose, and is in constant motion without getting on a job; like a turnstile, he is in everybody's way, but stops nobody; he talks a great deal, but says very little; looks into everything but sees nothing; and has a hundred irons in the fire, but very few of them are hot, and with those few that are, he only burns his fingers.
A coxcomb begins by determining that his own profession is the first; and he finishes by deciding that he is the first of profession.
As a man of pleasure, by a vain attempt to be more happy than any man can be, is often more miserable than most men are, so the sceptic, in a vain attempt to be wise beyond what is permitted to man, plunges into a darkness more deplorable, and a blindness more incurable than that of the common herd, whom he despises, and would fain instruct.
In death itself there can be nothing terrible, for the act of death annihilates sensation; but there are many roads to death, and some of them justly formidable, even to the bravest.
Insults are engendered from vulgar minds, like toadstools from a dunghill.
Genius, when employed in works whose tendency it is to demoralize and to degrade us, should be contemplated with abhorrence rather than with admiration; such a monument of its power, may indeed be stamped with immortality, but like the Coliseum at Rome, we deplore its magnificence because we detest the purposes for which it was designed.
In pulpit eloquence, the grand difficulty lies here--to give the subject all the dignity it so fully deserves, without attaching any importance to ourselves. The Christian messenger cannot think too highly of his prince, nor too humbly of himself.
Wit may do very well for a mistress, but [I] should prefer reason for a wife.
Physical courage, which despises all danger, will make a man brave in one way; and moral courage, which despises all opinion, will make a man brave in another.
The science of legislation is like that of medicine in one respect: that it is far more easy to point out what will do harm than what will do good.
Villains are usually the worst casuists, and rush into crimes to avoid less. Henry VIII. committed murder to avoid the imputation of adultery; and in our times, those who commit the latter crime attempt to wash off the stain of seducing the wife by signifying their readiness to shoot the husband.
Opinions, like showers, are generated in high places, but they invariably descend into lower ones, and ultimately flow down to the people as rain unto the sea.
To look back to antiquity is one thing, to go back to it is another.
Pity a thing often avowed, seldom felt; hatred is a thing often felt, seldom avowed.
True goodness is not without that germ of greatness that can bear with patience the mistakes of the ignorant.
Fortune has been considered the guardian divinity of fools; and, on this score, she has been accused of blindness; but it should rather be adduced as a proof of her sagacity, when she helps those who cannot help themselves.
Most of our misfortunes are more supportable than the comments of our friends upon them.
Envy is the coward side of Hate, And all her ways are bleak and desolate.
Doubt is the vestibule which all must pass before they can enter into the temple of wisdom; therefore, when we are in doubt and puzzle out the truth by our own exertions, we have gained a something that will stay by us, and which will serve us again. But, if to avoid the trouble of the search we avail ourselves of the superior information of a friend, such knowledge will not remain with us; we have not bought but borrowed it.
In order to try whether a vessel be leaky, we first prove it with water before we trust it with wine.
This world cannot explain its own difficulties without the assistance of another.
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