Samuel Butler Quotes

Quotes about:

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  Let us be grateful to the mirror for revealing to us our appearance only.

  Samuel Butler

  Integrity, Grateful, Character

  Sir Francis Bacon, Samuel Butler, William Morris (2014). “The Utopia MEGAPACK ®: 20 Classic Utopian and Dystopian Works”, p.31, Wildside Press LLC

  57 Copy quote

• Don't learn to do, but learn in doing.

  Samuel Butler

  Motivational

  Samuel Butler (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Samuel Butler (Illustrated)”, p.4163, Delphi Classics

  78 Copy quote

• Books are like imprisoned souls till someone takes them down from a shelf and frees them.

  Samuel Butler

  Freedom, Book, Soul

  Samuel Butler (1951). “Notebooks”

  38 Copy quote

• All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.

  Samuel Butler

  Life, Motivational, Happiness

  Way of All Flesh (1903) ch. 19

  33 Copy quote

• The truest characters of ignorance are vanity and pride and arrogance.

  Samuel Butler

  Ignorance, Character, Pride

  Samuel Butler (1827). “The genuine poetical remains of Samuel Butler, with notes by R. Thyer. With a selection from the author's Characters in prose”, p.225

  48 Copy quote

• If you follow reason far enough it always leads to conclusions that are contrary to reason.

  Samuel Butler

  Logic, Reason, Enough

  Samuel Butler (1970). “A critical and annotated edition of Samuel Butler's Erewhon”

  12 Copy quote

• If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do.

  Samuel Butler

  Long, Littles, Remains

  Samuel Butler (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Samuel Butler (Illustrated)”, p.4161, Delphi Classics

  4 Copy quote

• Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.

  Samuel Butler

  Life, Educational, Learning

  Speech at the Somerville Club, 27 Feb. 1895, in R. A. Streatfield Essays on Life, Art and Science (1904) p. 69

  106 Copy quote

• Every man's work, whether it be literature, or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself.

  Samuel Butler

  Inspirational, Motivational, Music

  Samuel Butler (2016). “The Way of All Flesh”, p.57, Samuel Butler

  26 Copy quote

• God cannot alter the past, though historians can.

  Samuel Butler

  Education, Past, History

  13 Copy quote

• The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing is to be taken too seriously.

  Samuel Butler

  Life, Happiness, Fear

  Samuel Butler (1951). “Samuel Butler's notebooks”

  31 Copy quote

• Life is like music; it must be composed by ear, feeling, and instinct, not by rule.

  Samuel Butler

  Life, Success, Music

  Samuel Butler (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Samuel Butler (Illustrated)”, p.4082, Delphi Classics

  66 Copy quote

• Life is one long process of getting tired.

  Samuel Butler

  Love, Life, Tired

  Notebooks (1912) ch. 1

  31 Copy quote

• Lying has a kind of respect and reverence with it. We pay a person the compliment of acknowledging his superiority whenever we lie to him.

  Samuel Butler

  Lying, Pay, Kind

  Samuel Butler (2008). “The Note-books of Samuel Butler: Easyread Super Large 18pt Edition”, p.197, ReadHowYouWant.com

  21 Copy quote

• Brigands demand your money or your life; women require both.

  Samuel Butler

  Love, Funny, Marriage

  12 Copy quote

• Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises.

  Samuel Butler

  Life, Wisdom, Art

  Notebooks "Life" (1912)

  14 Copy quote

• Life is a quarry, out of which we are to mold and chisel and complete a character.

  Samuel Butler

  Love, Life, Character

  13 Copy quote

• Death is only a larger kind of going abroad.

  Samuel Butler

  Sympathy, Kind, Death Sympathy

  Samuel Butler (1950). “The Essential Samuel Butler”, London : J. Cape

  9 Copy quote

• Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.

  Samuel Butler

  Funny, Friendship, Sarcastic

  Samuel Butler (2008). “The Note-books of Samuel Butler: Easyread Comfort Edition”, p.126, ReadHowYouWant.com

  39 Copy quote

• One of the first businesses of a sensible man is to know when he is beaten, and to leave off fighting at once.

  Samuel Butler

  Sunset, Fighting, Men

  Samuel Butler (1951). “Samuel Butler's notebooks”

  9 Copy quote

• You can do very little with faith, but you can do nothing without it.

  Samuel Butler

  Faith, Motivation, Littles

  Samuel Butler (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Samuel Butler (Illustrated)”, p.4356, Delphi Classics

  20 Copy quote

• Our minds want clothes as much as our bodies.

  Samuel Butler

  Clothes, Mind, Body

  Samuel Butler (1951). “Notebooks: Selections Edited by Geoffrey Keynes and Brian Hill”

  22 Copy quote

• Words are like money; there is nothing so useless, unless when in actual use.

  Samuel Butler

  Money, Silence, Use

  Samuel Butler (2014). “The Notebooks of Samuel Butler”, p.128, The Floating Press

  8 Copy quote

• To live is like to love - all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct for it.

  Samuel Butler

  Love, Life, History

  Notebooks (1912) ch. 14

  36 Copy quote

• The worst thing that can happen to a man is to lose his money, the next worst his health, the next worst his reputation.

  Samuel Butler

  Health, Men, Next

  4 Copy quote

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