Surely, ’tis one step towards acting well, to think worthily of our nature; and as in common life, the way to make a man honest, is, to suppose him soso here, to set some value upon ourselves, enables us to support the characterof generosity and virtue.
Injuries come only from the heart.
The sad vicissitude of things.
We often think ourselves inconsistent creatures, when we are the furthest from it, and all the variety of shapes and contradictory appearances we put on, are in truth but so many different attempts to gratify the same governing appetite.
My father, whose way was to force every event in nature into an hypothesis, by which means never man crucified TRUTH at the rate he did.
I hate set dissertations, – and above all things in the world, ’tis one of the silliest things in one of them, to darken your hypothesis by placing a number of tall, opake words, one before another, in a right line, betwixt your own and your readers conception.
There are few instances of the exercise of particular virtues which seem harder to attain to, or which appear more amiable and engaging in themselves, than those of moderation and the forgiveness of injuries.
The great end of all religionis to purify our hearts – and conquer our passions – and in a word, to make us wiser and better men – better neighbours – better citizens – and better servants of GOD.
The circumstances with which every thing in this world is begirt, give every thing in this world its size and shape; – and by tightening it, or relaxing it, this way or that, make the thing to be, what it is – great – little – good – bad – indifferent or not indifferent, just as the case happens.
The insolence of base minds in success is boundless; and would scarce admit of a comparison, did not they themselves furnish us with one in the degrees of their abjection when evil returns upon them.
The soul and body are joint-sharers in every thing they get: A man cannot dress, but his ideas get cloath’d at the same time; andif he dresses like a gentleman, every one of them stands presented to his imagination, genteelized along with him.
Always carry it in thy mind, and act upon it, as a sure maxim: “That women are timid:” And ’tis well they are – else there would beno dealing with them.
When the precipitancy of a man’s wishes hurries on his ideas ninety times faster than the vehicle he rides in – woe be to truth!
People who drink too much, health, and greedy. Hoard a treasure we do not like.
A man should know something of his own country too, before he goes abroad.
Did ever woman, since the creation of the world, interrupt a man with such a silly question?
It is the nature of an hypothesis, when once a man has conceived it, that it assimilates every thing to itself, as proper nourishment; and, from the first moment of your begetting it, it generally grows the stronger by every thing you see, hear, read, or understand.
The accusing spirit, which flew up to heaven’s chancery with the oath, blushed as he gave it in; and the recording angel as he wrote it down dropped a tear upon the word and blotted it out forever.
Only the brave know how to forgive.
Most of us are aware of and pretend to detest the barefaced instances of that hypocrisy by which men deceive others, but few of us are upon our guard or see that more fatal hypocrisy by which we deceive and over-reach our own hearts.