Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Poverty, when it is voluntary, is never despicable, but takes an heroical aspect.
To impress the idea of power on others, they must be made in some way to feel it.
The more we do, the more we can do; the more busy we are, the more leisure we have.
Grace has been defined as the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul.
Honesty is one part of eloquence. We persuade others by being in earnest ourselves.
An orator can hardly get beyond commonplaces: if he does he gets beyond his hearers.
Every man, in his own opinion, forms an exception to the ordinary rules of morality.
There is nothing more to be esteemed than a manly firmness and decision of character.
It is better to be able neither to read nor write than to be able to do nothing else.
The look of a gentleman is little else than the reflection of the looks of the world.
We find many things to which the prohibition of them constitutes the only temptation.
The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.
Every one in a crowd has the power to throw dirt; none out of ten have the inclination.
It is hard for any one to be an honest politician who is not born and bred a Dissenter.
The humblest painter is a true scholar; and the best of scholars the scholar of nature.
Man is a make-believe animal: he is never so truly himself as when he is acting a part.
The chain of habit coils itself around the heart like a serpent, to gnaw and stifle it.
I have a much greater ambition to be the best racket player than the best prose writer.
The way to secure success is to be more anxious about obtaining than about deserving it.
The most fluent talkers or most plausible reasoners are not always the justest thinkers.
They are the only honest hypocrites, their life is a voluntary dream, a studied madness.
Of all eloquence a nickname is the most concise; of all arguments the most unanswerable.
It is not fit that every man should travel; it makes a wise man better, and a fool worse.
I do not think there is anything deserving the name of society to be found out of London.
A knave thinks himself a fool, all the time he is not making a fool of some other person.
A gentle word, a kind look, a good-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles.
The greatest grossness sometimes accompanies the greatest refinement, as a natural relief.
A woman's vanity is interested in making the object of her choice the god of her idolatry.
The soul of a journey is liberty, perfect liberty, to think, feel, do just as one pleases.
When a thing ceases to be a subject of controversy, it ceases to be a subject of interest.
To think ill of mankind and not wish ill to them, is perhaps the highest wisdom and virtue.
The true barbarian is he who thinks everything barbarous but his own tastes and prejudices.
To-day kings, to-marrow beggars, it is only when they are themselves that they are nothing.
Love turns, with a little indulgence, to indifference or disgust; hatred alone is immortal.
Liberty is the only true riches: of all the rest we are at once the masters and the slaves.
Taste is nothing but an enlarged capacity for receiving pleasure from works of imagination.
Wrong dressed out in pride, pomp, and circumstance has more attraction than abstract right.
Our contempt for others proves nothing but the illiberality and narrowness of our own views.
Cunning is the art of concealing our own defects, and discovering other people's weaknesses.
Learning is, in too many cases, but a foil to common sense; a substitute for true knowledge.
A proud man is satisfied with his own good opinion, and does not seek to make converts to it.
Without the aid of prejudice and custom, I should not be able to find my way across the room.
Gracefulness has been defined to be the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul.
The truth is, we pamper little griefs into great ones, and bear great ones as well as we can.
Those who are fond of setting things to rights, have no great objection to seeing them wrong.
Religion either makes men wise and virtuous, or it makes them set up false pretenses to both.
An honest man speaks the truth, though it may give offence; a vain man, in order that it may.
One of the pleasantest things in the world is going on a journey; but I like to go by myself.
Our repugnance to death increases in proportion to our consciousness of having lived in vain.
A scholar is like a book written in a dead language. It is not every one that can read in it.