Great Throughts Treasury

"Half a fact is a whole falsehood. He who gives the truth a false coloring by his false manner of telling it, is the worst of liars."

"Existence was given us for action. Our worth is determined by the good deeds we do, rather than by the fine emotions we feel."

"Religion to be permanently influential must be intelligent."

"The practice of perseverance is the discipline of the noblest virtues. To run well, we must run to the end. It is not the fighting but the conquering that gives a hero his title to renown."

"In what a delightful communion with God does that man live who habitually seeketh love! With the same mantle thrown over him from the cross--with the same act of amnesty, by which we hope to be saved--injuries the most provoked, and transgressions the most aggravated, are covered in eternal forgetfulness."

"It is not the placidity of stupid ease that we should covet, but the repose that is requisite for the renewal of exhausted strength, the serenity that succeeds the storm, and the salubrity that repays its ravages."

"Nothing so contemptible as habitual contempt."

"Child of earth and earthly sorrows--child of God and immortal hopes--arise from thy sadness, gird up the loins of thy mind, and with unfaltering energy press toward thy rest and reward on high."

"He is always the severest censor on the merits of others who has the least worth of his own."

"Our worth is determined by the good deeds we do, rather than by the fine emotions we feel."

"Plutarch tells us of an idle and effeminate Etrurian who found fault with the manner in which Themistocles had conducted a recent campaign. "What," said the hero in reply, "have you, too, something to say about war, who are like the fish that has a sword, but no heart?" He is always the severest censor on the merits of others who has the least worth of his own."

"It is good policy to strike while the iron is hot; it is still better to adopt Cromwell's procedure, and make the iron hot by striking. The masterspirit who can rule the storm is great, but he is much greater who can both raise and rule it."

"Industry is a Christian obligation, imposed on our race to develop the noblest energies, and insures the highest reward."

"Language the most forcible proceeds from the man who is most sincere. The way to speak with power, or to write words that pierce mankind to the quick, is to speak and write honestly."

"The kiss of the apostate was the most bitter earthly ingredient in the agonies which Christ endured."

"There is no policy like politeness, since a good manner often succeeds where the best tongue has failed."

"Under the assumption of profound esteem, the flatterer wears an outward expression of fidelity, as foreign to his heart as the smile upon the face of the dead."

"Unjustifiable detraction always proves the weakness as well as meanness of the one who employs it.—To be constantly carping at, and exaggerating petty blemishes in the characters of others, putting an unfavorable construction on their language, or "damning with faint praise "their deeds, betrays, on the part of the detractor, a conscious inability to maintain a reputable standing on legitimate and honorable ground."

"The advent of truth, like the dawn of day, agitates the elements, while it disperses the gloom."

"Providence has clearly ordained that the only path fit and salutary for man on earth is the path of persevering fortitude--the unremitting struggle of deliberate self-preparation and humble but active reliance on divine aid."