Great Throughts Treasury

"In the country of the blind the one-eyed man is king."

"It is more philosophical to put our relations with things and men on such a footing as to treat the world as the common country of us all."

"The main hope of a nation lies in the proper education of its youth."

"The most disadvantageous peace is better than the most just war."

"The soul, mindful of its ethereal nature, presses upward with exceedingly great force, and struggles with its weight. It distrusts things seen… It seeks those things which truly and everlastingly are."

"Many times what cannot be refuted by arguments can be parried by laughter."

"There are some passions so close to virtues that there is danger lest we be deceived by the doubtful distinction between them."

"Those are none more silly, or nearer their wits end, than those who are too superstitiously religious."

"Visible worship is not condemned, but God is leased by invisible piety."

"War is so cruel a business that it befits beasts and not men… so pestilential that it brings with it general blight upon morals, so iniquitous that is usually conducted by the worst bandits, so impious that it has no accord with Christ."

"Help with deeds, not words. "

"It is the chiefest point of happiness that a man is willing to be what he is."

"A fat belly does not breed a subtle mind. "

"Before supper walk a little; after supper do the same."

"Concealed talent brings no reputation. "

"Experience is the common school-house of fools and ill men. Men of wit and honesty be otherwise instructed. "

"I have no patience with the stupidity of the average teacher of grammar who wastes precious years in hammering rules into children's heads. For it is not by learning rules that we acquire the powers of speaking a language, but by daily intercourse with those accustomed to express themselves with exactness and refinement and by copious reading of the best authors. "

"If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires. "

"His eloquent tongue so well seconds his fertile invention that no one speaks better when suddenly called forth. His attention never languishes; his mind is always before his words; his memory has all its stock so turned into ready money that, without hesitation or delay, it supplies whatever the occasion may require."

"In the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king. "

"No one respects talent that is concealed."

"It is the worst of madness to learn what has to be unlearnt."

"It is useless to gather virtues without humility, for the spirit of the Lord delighteth to dwell in the hearts of the humble. "

"Prevention is better than cure. "

"Success leads to insolence. "

"Over-feeding breeds ferocity."

"There is no age which religion does not become. "

"The wedlock of minds will be greater than that of bodies."

"The chiefest point of happiness is that a man should be willing to be what he is. "

"This I always religiously observed, as a rule, never to chide my husband before company nor to prattle abroad of miscarriages at home. What passes between two people is much easier made up than when once it has taken air."

"War is delightful to those who have had no experience of it. "

"To know nothing is the happiest life. "

"Time brings everything to light. "

"Where fear is, shame is."

"A constant element of enjoyment must be mingled with our studies, so that we think of learning as a game rather than a form of drudgery, for no activity can be continued for long if it does not to some extent afford pleasure to the participant."

"A good portion of speaking will consist in knowing how to lie."

"Almost all Christians being wretchedly enslaved to blindness and ignorance, which the priests are so far from preventing or removing, that they blacken the darkness, and promote the delusion: wisely foreseeing that the people (like cows, which never give down their milk so well as when they are gently stroked), would part with less if they knew more..."

"An idea launched like a javelin in proverbial form strikes with sharper point on the hearer's mind and leaves implanted barbs for meditation."

"A nail is driven out by another nail. Habit is overcome by habit."

"A good prince will tax as lightly as possible those commodities which are used by the poorest members of society: grain, bread, beer, wine, clothing, and all other staples without which human life could not exist."

"Apothegms are, in history, the same as the pearls in the sand, or the gold in the mine."

"Among the blind, the squinter rules."

"As a looking-glass, if it is a true one, faithfully represents the face of him that looks in it, so a wife ought to fashion herself to the affection of her husband, not to be cheerful when he is sad, nor sad when he is cheerful."

"An angelic boyhood becomes a Satanic old age."

"And what is all this life but a kind of comedy, wherein men walk up and down in one another's disguises and act their respective parts, till the property-man brings them back to the attiring house. And yet he often orders a different dress, and makes him that came but just now off in the robes of a king put on the rags of a beggar. Thus are all things represented by counterfeit, and yet without this there was no living."

"As Plato entertained some friends in a room where there was a couch richly ornamented, Diogenes came in very dirty, as usual, and getting upon the couch, and trampling on it, said, "I trample upon the pride of Plato." Plato mildly answered, "But with greater pride, Diogenes!""

"Be careful not to be the first to put your hands in the dish. What you cannot hold in your hands you must put on your plate. Also it is a great breach of etiquette when your fingers are dirty and greasy, to bring them to your mouth in order to lick them, or to clean them on your jacket. It would be more decent to use the tablecloth."

"Believe that you have it, and you have it!"

"At last concluded that no creature was more miserable than man, for that all other creatures are content with those bounds that nature set them, only man endeavors to exceed them."

"Between the victim and the stone knife."