FridayFeb 20, 2026
Quotes: 53419 Authors: 9969
Something of a person's character may be discovered by observing when and how he smiles. Some people never smile; they merely grin.
The very cunning conceal their cunning; the indifferently shrew boast of it.
Many children, many cares; no children, no felicity.
It is some compensation for great evils that they enforce great lessons.
Men, like musical instruments, seem made to be played upon.
It is ever the invisible that is the object of our profoundest worship. With the lover it is not the seen But the unseen that he muses upon.
Mind unemployed is mind unenjoyed.
Partial culture runs to the ornate; extreme culture to simplicity.
The grandest of all laws is the law of progressive development. Under it, in the wide sweep of things, men grow wiser as they grow older, and societies better.
The greatest events of an age are its best thoughts. Thought finds its way into action.
The highest excellence is seldom attained in more than one vocation. The roads leading to distinction in separate pursuits diverge, and the nearer we approach the one, the farther we recede from the other.
Hope is the best part of our riches. What sufficeth it that we have great wealth in our pockets, if we have not the hope of heaven in our souls?
The use we make of our fortune determines as to its sufficiency.- A little is enough if used wisely, and too much if expended foolishly.
Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.
There is great beauty in going through life without anxiety or fear. Half our fears are baseless, and the other half discreditable.
There is probably no hell for authors in the next world-they suffer so much from critics and publishers in this.
Truth, like the sun, submits to be obscured; But like the sun, only for a time.
The sweetest pleasure is in imparting it.
An eager pursuit of fortune is inconsistent with a severe devotion to truth. The heart must grow tranquil before the thought can become searching.
Doubt is the opposite of belief.
When all else is lost, the future still remains.
A book should be luminous, but not voluminous.
A failure establishes only this, that our determination to succeed was not strong enough.
A panic is sudden desertion of us, and a going over to the enemy of our imagination.
A sound discretion is not so much indicated by never making a mistake as by never repeating it.
False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade.
All men are alike in their lower natures; it is in their higher characters that they differ.
Good men have the fewest fears. He has but one great fear who fears to do wrong; he has a thousand who has overcome it.
Can that which is the greatest virtue in philosophy, doubt, be in religion what the priests term it, the greatest of sins?
Courage enlarges, cowardice diminishes resources. In desperate straits the fears of the timid Aggravate the dangers that imperil the brave.
Dishonesty is a forsaking of permanent for temporary Advantages.
Enthusiasm is the inspiration of everything great. Without it no man is to be feared, and with it none despised.
Fame - a few words upon a tombstone, and the truth of those not to be depended on.
Few minds wear out; more rust out.
Genius makes its observations in short-hand; talent writes them out at length.
Active natures are rarely melancholy. Activity and sadness are incompatible.
Discretion is the salt, and fancy the sugar of life; the one preserves, the other sweetens it.
The small courtesies sweeten life; the greater ennoble it.
The legitimate aim of criticism is to direct attention to the excellent. The bad will dig its own grave, and the imperfect may safely be left to that final neglect from which no amount of present undeserved popularity can rescue it.
To cultivate a garden is to walk with God.
Example has more followers than reason. We unconsciously imitate what pleases us, and approximate to the characters we most admire. A generous habit of thought and action carries with it an incalculable influence.
Galileo called doubt the father of invention; it is certainly the pioneer.
A great thought is a great boon, for which God is to be first thanked, then he who is the first to utter it, and then in a lessor, but still in a considerable degree, the man who is the first to quote it to us.
Great warriors, like great earthquakes, are principally remembered for the mischief they have done.
Next to God, we are indebted to women, first for life itself, and then for making it worth having.
Kindness a language which the dumb can speak, and the deaf can understand.
It is the passion that is in a kiss that gives to it its sweetness; it is the affection in a kiss that sanctifies it.
Music is the fourth great material want of our natures, first food, then raiment, then shelter, then music.
The method of the enterprising is to plan with audacity, and execute with vigor; to sketch out the map of possibilities; and then to treat them as probabilities.
There is no tyrant like custom, and no freedom where its edicts are not resisted.
We make way for the man who boldly pushes past us.
Our first and last love is self-love.
Sensitiveness is closely allied to egotism. Indeed, excessive sensitiveness is only another name for morbid self-consciousness. The cure for it is to make more of our objects, and less of ourselves.
The body of a sensualist is the coffin of a dead soul.
A panic is a sudden desertion of us, and a going over to the enemy, of our imagination.
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