All Quotes

"I don't kno az i want tew bet enny money, and giv odds, on the man, who iz alwus anxious tew pray out loud, every chance he kan git."

"It iz a darned sight eazier tew find six men who kan tell exactly how a thing ought tew be did than tew find one who will do it."

"If we giv up our minds tew little things we never shall be fit for big ones. I knew a man once who could ketch more flies with one swoop ov his hand than enny boddy else could, and he want good at ennything else."

"The man who pitys everyboddy, wants watching, for the chances are that he iz gitting phatt slily on other peoples misfortunes."

"Thare iz but phew people in this world underrated."

"There iz no more real satisfackshun, in laying up in yure buzzum an injury than thare iz in stuffing a dead hornet, who haz stung you, and keeping him tew look at."

"If we would all ov us take kare ov our own souls, and let our nabors alone, thare would be less time lost, and more souls saved."

"If thare iz enny human being that i thoroughly loath, it iz the one who haz nothing tew boast ov but hiz money--a mere pimp tew hiz welth."

"And sport, sweet maid, in season of these years, And learn to gather flowers before they wither"

"Care-Charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night, Brother to Death, in silent darkness born, Relieve my languish, and restore the light; With dark forgetting of my care return. And let the day be time enough to mourn The shipwreck of my ill adventured youth"

"Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night, Brother to Death, in silent darkness born."

"But her will must be obeyed,"

"Sweet, silent rhetoric of persuading eyes, Dumb eloquence, whose power doth move the blood More than the words or wisdom of the wise."

"Jewels, orators of Love."

"Shame leaves us by degrees."

"When better choices are not to be had, We needs must take the seeming best of bad."

"Might, That makes a title where there is no right."

"The thing possessed is not the thing it seems."

"Who reproves the lame must go upright."

"The bounds once overgone that hold men in, They never stay; but on from bad to worse. Wrongs do not leave off there where they begin, But still beget new mischiefs in their course."

"He hath nothing done that doth not all."

"As that the walls worn thin, permit the mind To look out thorough, and his frailty find. 1"

"Devotion, mother of obedience."

"The stars that have most glory have no rest."

"O blessed letters that combine in one All ages past, and make one live with all, By you we do confer with who are gone, And the dead living unto counsel call: By you th'unborn shall have communion Of what we feel, and what doth us befall."

"Sacred religion! mother of form and fear."

"And for the few that only lend their ear, That few is all the world."

"This is the thing that I was born to do."

"And who (in time) knows whither we may vent The treasure of our tongue? To what strange shores This gain of our best glory shall be sent T' enrich unknowing nations with our stores? What worlds in the yet unformed Occident May come refin'd with th' accents that are ours?"

"For ever by Adversity are wrought The greatest Works of Admiration; And all the Fair Examples of Renown, Out of Distress and Misery are grown."

"He that of such a height hath built his mind, And rear'd the dwelling of his thoughts so strong, As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame Of his resolved powers; nor all the wind Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong His settled peace, or to disturb the same; What a fair seat hath he, from whence he may The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey? And with how free an eye doth he look down Upon these lower regions of turmoil? Where all the storms of passions mainly beat On flesh and blood: where honour, power, renown, Are only gay afflictions, golden toil; Where greatness stands upon as feeble feet, As frailty doth; and only great doth seem To little minds, who do it so esteem."

"Unless above himself he can Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!"

"Custom, that is before all law; Nature, that is above all art."

"Discretion has been termed the better part of valour, and it is more certain, that diffidence is the better part of knowledge."

"If we can advance any propositions that are both true and new, these are indisputably our own, by right of discovery; and if we can repeat what is old more briefly and brightly than others, this also becomes our own, by right of conquest."

"We should have a glorious conflagration, if all who cannot put fire into their works would only consent to put their works into the fire."

"Style is indeed the valet of genius, and an able one too; but as the true gentleman will appear, even in rags, so true genius will shine, even through the coarsest style."

"That author, however, who has thought more than he has read, read more than he has written, and written more than he published, if he does not command success, has at least deserved it."

"A volume, therefore, that contains more words than ideas, like a tree that has more foliage than fruit, may suit those to resort to, who want not to feast, but to dream and to slumber."

"With books, as with companions, it is of more consequence to know which to avoid, than which to choose; for good books are as scarce as good companions."

"That writer does the most, who gives his reader the most knowledge, and takes from him the least time."

"It is almost as difficult to make a man unlearn his errors as his knowledge. Mal-information is more hopeless than non-information; for error is always more busy than ignorance. Ignorance is a blank sheet, on which we may write; but error is a scribbled one, on which we must first erase. Ignorance is contented to stand still with her back to the truth; but error is more presumptuous, and proceeds in the same direction. Ignorance has no light, but error follows a false one. The consequence is, that error, when she retraces her footsteps, has further to go, before she can arrive at the truth, than ignorance."

"Great minds had rather deserve contemporaneous applause, without obtaining it, than obtain, without deserving it; if it follow them, it is well, but they will not deviate to follow it. With inferior minds the reverse is observable."

"From the preponderance of talent, we may always infer the soundness and vigour of the commonwealth; but from the preponderance of riches, its dotage and degeneration."

"How commentators each dark passage shun, And hold their farthing candle to the sun."

"Many a man may thank his talent for his rank, but no man has ever been able to return the compliment by thanking his rank for his talent."

"Cicero observed to a degenerate patrician, "I am the first of my family, but you are the last of yours" And since his time, those who value themselves merely on their ancestry, have been compared to potatoes, all that is good of them is under the ground."

"The first consideration with a knave, is how to help himself, and the second, how to do it, with an appearance of helping you. Dionysius the tyrant, stripped the statue of Jupiter Olympius, of a robe of massy gold, and substituted a cloak of wool, saying, gold is too cold in winter, and too heavy in summer; — It behoves us to take care of Jupiter"

"Instead of exhibiting talent in the hope that the world would forgive their eccentricities, they have exhibited only their eccentricities, in the hope that the world would give them credit for talent."

"Men will wrangle for religion, write for it, fight for it, die for it; anything but live for it."