There are only three pleasures in life pure and lasting, and all derived from inanimate things-books, pictures and the face of nature.
Nothing precludes sympathy so much as a perfect indifference to it.
We are governed by sympathy; and the extent of our sympathy is determined by that of our sensibility.
Let a man’s talents or virtues be what they may, he will only feel satisfaction in his society as he is satisfied in himself.
To great evils we submit; yet we resent little provocations.
Malice often takes the garb of truth.
The devil was a great loss in the preternatural world. He was always something to fear and to hate; he supplied the antagonist powers of the imagination, and the arch of true religion hardly stands firm without him.
The ignorance of the world leaves one at the mercy of its malice.
Common sense, to most people, is nothing more than their own opinions.
The most silent people are generally those who think most highly of themselves.
True friendship is self-love at second hand; where, as in a flattering mirror we may see our virtues magnified and our errors softened, and where we may fancy our opinion of ourselves confirmed by an impartial and faithful witness.
We must be doing something to be happy.
We learn to curb our will and keep our overt actions within the bounds of humanity, long before we can subdue our sentiments and imaginations to the same mild tone.
One of the pleasantest things in the world is going on a journey; I can enjoy society in a room; but out of doors, nature is company enough for me. I am then never less alone than when alone.
Poetry is the universal language which the heart holds with nature and itself. He who has a contempt for poetry, cannot have much respect for himself, or for anything else.
The world judge of men by their ability in their profession, and we judge of ourselves by the same test: for it is on that on which our success in life depends.
A nickname is the heaviest stone that the devil can throw at a man. It is a bugbear to the imagination, and, though we do not believe in it, it still haunts our apprehensions.
Anyone who has passed though the regular gradations of a classical education, and is not made a fool by it, may consider himself as having had a very narrow escape.
Dr. Johnson was a lazy learned man who liked to think and talk better than to read or write; who, however, wrote much and well, but too often by rote.
Or have I passed my time in pouring words like water into empty sieves, rolling a stone up a hill and then down again, trying to prove an argument in the teeth of facts, and looking for causes in the dark, and not finding them?