Great Throughts Treasury

"The mind is ever ingenious in making its own distress."

"The man recover'd of the bite, The dog it was that died."

"The malicious sneer is improperly called laughter."

"The most ignorant nations have always been found to think most highly of themselves. The Deity has ever been thought peculiarly concerned in their glory and preservation; to have fought their battles, and inspired their teachers: their wizards are said to be familiar with heaven; and every hero has a guard of angels as well as men to attend him."

"The nakedness of the indignant world may be clothed from the trimmings of the vain."

"The pictures placed for ornament and use, The twelve good rules, the royal game of goose."

"The poets of the West are as remarkable for their indigence as their genius, and yet among the numerous hospitals designed to relieve the poor, I have heard of but one erected for the benefit of decayed authors."

"The only art her guilt to cover, To hide her shame from every eye, To give repentance to her lover, And wring his bosom, is--to die."

"The rapturous flowings of joy, or the interruptions of indignation, require accents placed entirely different, and a structure consonant to the emotions they would express. Changing passions, and numbers changing with those passions, make the whole secret of Western as well as Eastern poetry. In a word, the great faults of the modern professed English poets are, that they seem to want numbers which should vary with the passion, and are more employed in describing to the imagination than striking at the heart."

"The patriot's boast, where'er we roam, his first, best country ever is at home"

"The reader must not be surprised to find me once more addressing schoolmasters on the present method of teaching the learned languages, which is commonly by literal translations. I would ask such, if they were to travel a journey, whether those parts of the road in which they found the greatest difficulties would not be the most strongly remembered? Boys who, if I may continue the allusion, gallop through one of the ancients with the assistance of a translation can have but a very slight acquaintance either with the author or his language."

"The very pink of perfection."

"The unaffected of every country nearly resemble each other, and a page of Confucius and Tillotson have scarce any material difference, paltry affectation, strained allusions, and disgusting finery are easily attained by those who choose to wear them; they are but too frequently the badges of ignorance or of stupidity whenever it would endeavor to please."

"The watch-dog's voice that bay'd the whispering wind, And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind: There all in sweet confusion sought the shade, And fill'd each pause the nightingale had made."

"The volumes of antiquity, like medals, may very well serve to amuse the curious; but the works of the moderns, like the current coin of a kingdom, are much better for immediate use: the former are often prized above their intrinsic value, and kept with care; the latter seldom pass for more than they are worth, and are often subject to the merciless hands of sweating critics and clipping compilers: the works of antiquity were ever praised, those of the moderns read: the treasures of our ancestors have our esteem, and we boast the passion: those of contemporary genius engage our heart, although we blush to own it: the visits we pay the former resemble those we pay the great: the ceremony is troublesome, and yet such as we would not choose to forego: our acquaintance with modern books is like sitting with a friend; our pride is not flattered in the interview, but it gives more internal satisfaction."

"The weak soul, within itself unblest, leans for all pleasure on another's breast."

"The wisdom of the ignorant somewhat resembles the instinct of animals; it is diffused only in a very narrow sphere, but within the circle it acts with vigor, uniformity, and success."

"The whitewash'd wall, the nicely sanded floor, The varnish'd clock that click'd behind the door; The chest contriv'd a double debt to pay, A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day."

"Their discourses from the pulpit are generally dry, methodical, and unaffecting: delivered with the most insipid calmness; insomuch that should the peaceful preacher lift his head over the cushion, which alone he seems to address, he might discover his audience, instead of being awakened to remorse, actually sleeping over this methodical and laboured composition."

"The wise sometimes condescend to accept of titles; but none but a fool would imagine them of any real importance. We ought to depend upon intrinsic merit, and not on the slender helps of a title."

"There is no arguing with Johnson; for when his pistol misses fire, he knocks you down with the butt end of it."

"There can be no inducement to reveal our wants, except to find pity, and by this means relief; but before a poor man opens his mind in such circumstances, he should first consider whether he is contented to lose the esteem of the person he solicits, and whether he is willing to give up friendship to excite compassion. Pity and friendship are passions incompatible with each other; and it is impossible that both can reside in any breast, for the smallest space, without impairing each other. Friendship is made up of esteem and pleasure; pity is composed of sorrow and contempt: the mind may, for some time, fluctuate between them, but it can never entertain both at once."

"There is no arguing with him, for if his pistol misses fire, he knocks you down with the butt end of it."

"There are but few talents requisite to become a popular preacher; for the people are easily pleased if they perceive any endeavors in the orator to please them; the meanest qualifications will work this effect if the preacher sincerely sets about it. Perhaps little, indeed very little, more is required than sincerity and assurance; and a becoming sincerity is always certain of producing a becoming assurance. ?Si vis me flere, dolendum est primum tibi ipsi?, is so trite a quotation that it almost demands an apology to repeat it; yet though all allow the justice of the remark, how few do we find put it in practice! Our orators, with the most faulty bashfulness, seem impressed rather with an awe of their audience, than with a just respect for the truths they are about to deliver: they, of all professions, seem the most bashful, who have the greatest right to glory in their commission."

"Their wants but few, their wishes all confin'd."

"There is no work whatsoever but he can criticize, replied the bookseller; even though you wrote in Chinese he would have a pluck at you."

"There is nothing so absurd or ridiculous that has not at some time been said by some philosopher. Fontenelle says he would undertake to persuade the whole public of readers to believe that the sun was neither the cause of light or heat, if he could only get six philosophers on his side."

"They liked the book the better the more it made them cry."

"They may talk of a comet, or a burning mountain, or some such bagatelle; but to me a modest woman, dressed out in all her finery, is the most tremendous object of the whole creation."

"There is probably no country so barbarous, that would not disclose all it knew, if it received equivalent information; and I am apt to think that a person who was ready to give more knowledge than he received would be welcome wherever he came. All his care in travelling should only be, to suit his intellectual banquet to the people with whom he conversed: he should not attempt to teach the unlettered Tartar astronomy, nor yet instruct the polite Chinese in the arts of subsistence: he should endeavor to improve the barbarian in the secrets of living comfortably, and the inhabitant of a more refined country in the speculative pleasures of science."

"They please, are pleas'd, they give to get esteem till, seeming blest, they grow to what they seem."

"They say women and music should never be dated."

"They shall knaw a file, and flee unto the mountains of Hepsidam whar the lion roareth and the Wang Doodle mourneth for its first born--ah!"

"This same philosophy is a good horse in the stable, but an arrant jade on a journey."

"Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe, that found me poor at first, and keep me so."

"Thus love is the most easy and agreeable, and gratitude the most humiliating affection of the mind: we never reflect on the man we love, without exulting in our choice, while he who has bound us to him by benefits alone, rises to our ideas as a person to whom we have in some measure forfeited our freedom."

"This dissolute and fearless conduct foreigners are apt to attribute to climate and constitution: may not the vulgar being pretty much neglected in our exhortations from the pulpit be a conspiring cause? Our divines seldom stoop to their mean capacities; and they who want instruction most, find least in our religious assemblies."

"They would talk of nothing but high life and high-lived company, with other fashionable topics, such as pictures, taste, Shakespeare, and the musical glasses."

"Thus idly busy rolls their world away."

"To embarrass justice by a multiplicity of laws, or hazard it by a confidence in our judges, are, I grant, the opposite rocks on which legislative wisdom has ever split; in one case the client resembles that emperor who is said to have been suffocated with the bedclothes, which were only designed to keep him warm; in the other, that town which let the enemy take possession of its walls, in order to show the world how little they depended upon aught but courage for safety."

"Thus, whichever way we look, the prospect is disagreeable. Behind, we have left pleasures we shall never enjoy, and therefore regret; and before, we see pleasures which we languish to possess, and are consequently uneasy till we possess them."

"To divest either politics or religion of ceremony, is the most certain method of bringing either into contempt. - The weak must have their inducements to admiration as well as the wise; and it is the business of a sensible government to impress all ranks with a sense of subordination, whether this be effected by a diamond buckle, a virtuous edict, a sumptuary law, or a glass necklace."

"Thus 'tis with all; their chief and constant care is to seem everything but what they are."

"To make a fine gentleman, several trades are required, but chiefly a barber."

"To pursue trifles is the lot of humanity; and whether we bustle in a pantomime, or strut at a coronation, or shout at a bonfire, or harangue in a senate-house; whatever object we follow, it will at last conduct us to futility and disappointment. The wise bustle and laugh as they walk in the pageant, but fools bustle and are important; and this probably, is all the difference between them."

"To what fortuitous occurrence do we not owe every pleasure and convenience of our lives."

"To the last moment of his breath on hope the wretch relies; and e'en the pang preceding death bids expectation rise. Hope, like the gleaming taper's light, adorns and cheers our way; and still, as darker grows the night, emits a brighter ray."

"To what happy accident is it that we owe so unexpected a visit?"

"Trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay."

"Travelers, George, must pay in all places: the only difference is, that in good inns, you pay dearly for your luxuries, and in bad inns you are fleeced and starved."