Great Throughts Treasury

"Quotation is a good thing, there is a community of thought in it."

"Quotation is the highest compliment you can pay to an author"

"Quotation, sir, is a good thing; there is a community of mind in it: classical quotation is the parole of literary men all over the world."

"Rash oaths, whether kept or broken, frequently lead to guilt."

"Read over your compositions, and wherever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out."

"Reason is like the sun, of which the light is constant, uniform, and lasting; fancy, a meteor of bright, but transitory luster, irregular in its motion, and delusive in its direction."

"Remarriage: A triumph of hope over experience."

"Reflect that life, like every other blessing, derives its value from its use alone."

"Revenge is an act of passion; vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged; crimes are avenged."

"Riches exclude only one inconvenience, and that is poverty."

"Resentment gratifies him who intended an injury, and pains him unjustly who did not intend it."

"Resentment is a union of sorrow with malignity; a combination of a passion which all endeavor to avoid with a passion which all concur to detest."

"Secrets are so seldom kept, that it may be with some reason doubted, whether the quality of retention be generally bestowed, and whether a secret has not some subtile volatility by which it escapes imperceptibility, at the smallest vent, or some power of fermentation, by which it expands itself, so as to burst the heart that will not give it away."

"Round numbers are always false."

"Shakespeare never has six lines together without a fault. Perhaps you may find seven: but this does not refute my general assertion."

"Sir, a woman preaching is like a dog's walking on his hind legs. It is not done well: but you are surprised to find it done at all."

"Slavery is now nowhere more patiently endured, than in countries once inhabited by the zealots of liberty."

"Silence propagates itself, and the longer talk has been suspended, the more difficult it is to find anything to say."

"Small debts are like small shot; they are rattling on every side, and can scarcely be escaped without a wound: great debts are like cannon; of loud noise, but little danger."

"Shame arises from the fear of man; conscience from the fear of God."

"Slander is the revenge of the coward, and dissimulation of his defense."

"So many objections may be made to everything, that nothing can overcome them but the necessity of doing something."

"So willing is every man to flatter himself, that the difference between approving laws, and obeying them, is frequently forgotten; he that acknowledges the obligations of morality and pleases his vanity with enforcing them to others, concludes himself zealous in the cause of virtue."

"So far is it from being true that men are naturally equal, that no two people can be half an hour together, but one shall acquire an evident superiority over the other."

"Solitude is dangerous to reason, without being favorable to virtue."

"Social sorrow loses half its pain."

"Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion, and he whose real wants are supplied must admit those of fancy."

"Some men relate what they think, as what they know; some men of confused memories, and habitual inaccuracy, ascribe to one man what belongs to another; and some talk on without thought or care. A few men are sufficient to broach falsehoods, which are afterwards innocently diffused by successive relaters."

"Some men weave their own sophistry till their own reason is entangled."

"Sorrow is a kind of rust of the soul which every new idea contributes in its passage to scour away. It is the putrefaction of stagnant life, and is remedied by exercise and motion."

"Sorrow is properly that state of the mind in which our desires are fixed upon the past without looking forward to the future."

"Sorrow is the mere rust of the soul. Activity will cleanse and brighten it."

"Spite and ill-nature are among the most expensive luxuries in life."

"Success produces confidence, confidence relaxes industry, and negligence ruins that reputation which accuracy had raised."

"Such are the vicissitudes of the world, through all its parts, that day and night, labor and rest, hurry and retirement, endear each other. Such are the changes that keep the mind in action; we desire, we pursue, we obtain, we are satiated; we desire something else, and begin a new pursuit."

"Subordination tends greatly to human happiness. Were we all upon an equality, we should have no other enjoyment than mere animal pleasure."

"Such is our desire of abstraction from ourselves, that very few are satisfied with the quantity of stupefaction which the needs of the body force upon the mind. Alexander himself added intemperance to sleep, and solaced with the fumes of wine the sovereignty of the world. And almost every man has some art, by which he steals his thought away from his present state."

"Such is the common process of marriage. A youth and maiden exchange meeting by chance, or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home, and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention, or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together. They marry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blindness had before concealed; they wear out life in altercations, and charge nature with cruelty."

"Such is the constitution of man, that labor may be styled its own reward. - Nor will any external incitements be requisite if it be considered how much happiness is gained, and how much misery escaped, by frequent and violent agitation of the body."

"Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself is nothing; when we have made it, the next wish is to change again."

"Tears are often to be found where there is little sorrow, and the deepest sorrow without any tears."

"Suspicion is no less an enemy to virtue than to happiness. He that is already corrupt is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes suspicious will quickly be corrupt."

"Such seems to be the disposition of man, that whatever makes a distinction produces rivalry."

"Surely a long life must be somewhat tedious, since we are forced to call in so many trifling things to help rid us of our time, which will never return."

"Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest."

"Terrestrial happiness is of short duration. The brightness of the flame is wasting its fuel; the fragrant flower is passing away in its own odors."

"That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one."

"Testimony is like an arrow shot from a long bow; the force of it depends on the strength of the hand that draws it. Argument is like an arrow from a cross-bow, which has equal force though shot by a child."

"That all who are happy are equally happy is not true. A peasant and a philosopher may be equally satisfied, but not equally happy."

"That fortitude which has encountered no dangers, that prudence which has surmounted no difficulties, that integrity which has been attacked by no temptation, can at best be considered but as gold not yet brought to the test, of which therefore the true value cannot be assigned."