Noble Quotes - Page 18

• The sublime only paints the true, and that too in noble objects; it paints it in all its phases, its cause and its effect; it is the most worthy expression or image of this truth. Ordinary minds cannot find out the exact expression, and use synonymes.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Expression, Mind, Sublime

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• The election of a deputy to the Legislature offers a noble and majestic spectacle comparable only to the delivery of a child. It involves the same efforts, the same impurities, the same laceration, and the same triumph.

  Honore de Balzac

  Children, Effort, Majestic

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• All genuinely noble women prefer truth to falsehood. As the Russians with their Czar, they are unwilling to see their idol degraded; they want to be proud of the domination they accept.

  Honore de Balzac

  Idols, Want, Proud

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• Noble hearts are neither jealous nor afraid because jealousy spells doubt and fear spells pettiness.

  Honore de Balzac

  Jealousy, Fear, Heart

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• Kindness steers no easy course. Attributing it to character, we seldom recognize the secret efforts of a noble heart, whereas we reward really wicked people for the evil they refrain from committing.

  Honore de Balzac

  Kindness, Heart, Character

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• Noble passions are like vices: the more they are satisfied, the greater they grow, Mothers and gamblers are insatiable.

  Honore de Balzac

  Mother, Passion, Vices

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• Let nothing dupe you! Such is the horrible maxim that acts as a solvent upon every noble feeling man experiences.

  Honore de Balzac

  Men, Stupidity, Feelings

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• Now see what a Christian is, drawn by the hand of Christ. He is a man on whose clear and open brow God has set the stamp of truth; one whose very eye beams bright with honor; in whose very look and bearing you may see freedom, manliness, veracity; a brave man--a noble man--frank, generous, true, with, it may be, many faults; whose freedom may take the form of impetuosity or rashness, but the form of meanness never.

  Frederick William Robertson

  Christian, Eye, Men

  Frederick William Robertson (1873). “ser. 1 God's revelation of heaven [and other sermons]. ser. 2 Christ's judgement respecting inheritance [and other sermons]. ser. 3 The tongue [and other sermons”, p.316

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• The factor in human life provocative of a noble discontent is the gradual emergence of a sense of criticism, founded upon appreciation of beauty, and of intellectual distinction, and of duty.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Appreciation, Intellectual, Criticism

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• Men and women thought and did noble and mean things that would have been impossible to them before or after. A man cannot drink old Bourbon long and remain in his normal condition. We did not drink Bourbon, but blood.

  Rebecca Harding Davis

  Mean, Men, Blood

  Rebecca Harding Davis (1904). “Rebecca Harding Davis: Writing Cultural Autobiography”, p.80, Vanderbilt University Press

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• O blessed bounty, giving ail content!
  The only fautress of all noble arts
  That lend'st success to every good intent.
  A grace that rests in the most godlike hearts,
  By heav'n to none but happy souls infus'd
  Pity it is, that e'er thou wast abus'd.

  Michael Drayton

  Art, Blessed, Giving

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• Money is both the generation and corruption of purchased honor; honor is both the child and slave of potent money: the credit which honor hath lost, money hath found. When honor grew mercenary, money grew honorable. The way to be truly noble is to contemn both.

  Francis Quarles

  Money, Children, Honor

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• I never know why self-sacrifice is noble. Why is it better to sacrifice oneself than someone else?

  Ivy Compton-Burnett

  Sacrifice, Self, Knows

  Ivy Compton-Burnett (2012). “Mother and Son”, p.111, A&C Black

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• It is not so much in buying pictures as in being pictures, that you can encourage a noble school. The best patronage of art is not that which seeks for the pleasures of sentiment in a vague ideality, nor for beauty of form in a marble image, but that which educates your children into living heroes, and binds down the flights and the fondnesses of the heart into practical duty and faithful devotion.

  John Ruskin

  Art, Children, Hero

  John Ruskin, Louisa Caroline Tuthill (1867). “Precious Thoughts: Moral and Religious. Gathered from the Works of John Ruskin, A. M.”, p.77

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• I believe that there is no test of greatness in periods, nations or men more sure than the development, among them or in them, of a noble grotesque, and no test of comparative smallness or limitation, of one kind or another, more sure than the absence of grotesque invention, or incapability of understanding it.

  John Ruskin

  Believe, Greatness, Men

  John Ruskin (2013). “The Stones of Venice -: The Fall”, p.158, Cosimo, Inc.

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• The noble grotesque involves the true appreciation of beauty.

  John Ruskin

  Beauty, Appreciation, Grotesque

  John Ruskin (1853). “The Stones of Venice: The fall”, p.160

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• In mortals there is a care for trifles which proceeds from love and conscience, and is most holy; and a care for trifles which comes of idleness and frivolity, and is most base. And so, also, there is a gravity proceeding from thought, which is most noble; and a gravity proceeding from dulness and mere incapability of enjoyment, which is most base.

  John Ruskin

  Care, Holy, Gravity

  John Ruskin (1867). “Precious Thoughts: Moral and Religious. Gathered from the Works of John Ruskin, A. M.”, p.302

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• To try to stop war by placing before men's eyes the terrible suffering involved will never succeed, because men are willing (in their thoughts and imaginations at least) to face any kind of suffering when motivated by noble aims like the vague and tremendous concept of freedom ... Or, in their humility (or sloth - who knows?) men are quite willing to leave decisions to others 'who know more about it than we do.

  Dorothy Day

  War, Humility, Eye

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• While any one is base, none can be entirely free and noble.

  Margaret Fuller

  Freedom

  Margaret Fuller, Bell Gale Chevigny (1976). “The Woman and the Myth: Margaret Fuller's Life and Writings”, p.243, UPNE

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• Labor is like motherhood to most of our political leaders: a calling so fine and noble that it would be sullied by talk of vulgar, mundane things like pay.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Work, Motherhood, Leader

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• The great lesson of biography is to show what man can be and do at his best. A noble life put fairly on record acts like an inspiration to others.

  Samuel Smiles

  Inspiration, Men, Records

  Samuel Smiles (1872). “Character”, p.269

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• Think that day lost whose descending sun, views from thy hand no noble action done.

  Joseph Joubert

  Thinking, Views, Hands

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• The joy which is caused by truth and noble thoughts shows itself in the words by which they are expressed.

  Joseph Joubert

  Joy, Shows

  Joseph Joubert (1896). “Pensées of Joubert”

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• He who has resolved to conquer or die is seldom conquered; such noble despair perishes with difficulty.

  Pierre Corneille

  Despair, Conquer, Valor

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• I am young, it is true; but in noble souls valor does not wait for years.

  Pierre Corneille

  Years, Waiting, Soul

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