Book of Wise Sayings - W. A. Clouston (smallest ebook reader TXT) 📗
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Who wrongful deeds with kind requites.*
Panchatantra.
* Matt. V, 43, 44.
Death comes, and makes a man his prey,
A man whose powers are yet unspent;
Like one on gathering flowers intent,
Whose thoughts are turned another way.
Begin betimes to practise good,
Lest fate surprise thee unawares
Amid thy round of schemes and cares;
To-morrow’s task to-day conclude.*
Mahābhārata.
* Eccles. IX, 10; XII, 1.
Let a man’s talents or virtues be what they may, we feel satisfaction in his society only as he is satisfied in himself. We cannot enjoy the good qualities of a friend if he seems to be none the better for them.
Hazlitt.
It was a false maxim of Domitian that he who would gain the people of Rome must promise all things and perform nothing. For when a man is known to be false in his word, instead of a column, which he might be by keeping it, for others to rest upon, he becomes a reed, which no man will vouchsafe to lean upon. Like a floating island, when we come next day to seek it, it is carried from the place we left it in, and, instead of earth to build upon, we find nothing but inconstant and deceiving waves.
Feltham.
He is not dead who departs this life with high fame; dead is he, though living, whose brow is branded with infamy.
Tieck.
In the height of thy prosperity expect adversity, but fear it not. If it come not, thou art the more sweetly possessed of the happiness thou hast, and the more strongly confirmed. If it come, thou art the more gently dispossessed of the happiness thou hadst, and the more firmly prepared.
Quarles.
A prudent man will not discover his poverty, his self-torments, the disorders of his house, his uneasiness, or his disgrace.
Hitopadesa.
Men are of three different capacities: one understands intuitively; another understands so far as it is explained; and a third understands neither of himself nor by explanation. The first is excellent, the second, commendable, and the third, altogether useless.
Machiavelli.
It is difficult to understand men, but still harder to know them thoroughly.
Schiller.
Worldly fame and pleasure are destructive to the virtue of the mind; anxious thoughts and apprehensions are injurious to the health of the body.
Chinese.
Alas, for him who is gone and hath done no good work! The trumpet of march has sounded, and his load was not bound on.
Persian.
Human experience, like the stern-lights of a ship at sea, illumines only the path which we have passed over.
Coleridge.
Man is an actor who plays various parts:
First comes a boy, then out a lover starts;
His garb is changed for, lo! a beggar’s rags;
Then he’s a merchant with full money-bags;
Anon, an aged sire, wrinkled and lean;
At last Death drops the curtain on the scene.*
Bhartrihari.
* Cf. Shakspeare:
“All the world’s a stage,” etc.—As You Like It, Act II, sc. 7.
Through avarice a man loses his understanding, and by his thirst for wealth he gives pain to the inhabitants of both worlds.
Hitopadesa.
Men soon the faults of others learn,
A few their virtues, too, find out;
But is there one—I have a doubt—
Who can his own defects discern?
Sanskrit.
In learning, age and youth go for nothing; the best informed take the precedence.
Chinese.
Mention not a blemish which is thy own in detraction of a neighbour.
Talmud.
Affairs succeed by patience, and he that is hasty falleth headlong.
Sa’dī.
A man who has learnt little grows old like an ox: his flesh grows, but his knowledge does not grow.
Dhammapada.
Unsullied poverty is always happy, while impure wealth brings with it many sorrows.
Chinese.
Both white and black acknowledge women’s sway,
So much the better and the wiser too,
Deeming it most convenient to obey,
Or possibly they might their folly rue.*
Persian.
* Cf. Pope:
Would men but follow what the sex advise,
All things would prosper, all the world grow wise.
We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.
Hazlitt.
No one is more profoundly sad than he who laughs too much.
Richter.
The heaven that rolls around cries aloud to you while it displays its eternal beauties, and yet your eyes are fixed upon the earth alone.
Dante.
This world is a beautiful book, but of little use to him who cannot read it.
Goldoni.
Sorrows are like thunder-clouds: in the distance they look black, over our heads, hardly gray.
Richter.
The gem cannot be polished without friction, nor man perfected without trials.
Chinese.
Health is the greatest gift, contentedness the best riches.
Dhammapada.
Great and unexpected successes are often the cause of foolish rushing into acts of extravagance.
Demosthenes.
Let none with scorn a suppliant meet,
Or from the door untended spurn
A dog; an outcast kindly treat;
And so thou shalt be blest in turn.
Mahābhārata.
Choose knowledge, if thou desirest a blessing from the Universal Provider; for the ignorant man cannot raise himself above the earth, and it is by knowledge that thou must render thy soul praiseworthy.
Firdausī.
Good fortune is a benefit to the wise, but a curse to the foolish.
Chinese.
In this thing one man is superior to another, that he is better able to bear adversity and prosperity.
Philemon.
The rays of happiness, like those of light, are colourless when unbroken.
Longfellow.
There are three things which, in great quantity, are bad, and, in little, very good: leaven, salt, and liberality.
Talmud.
Who aims at excellence will be above mediocrity; who aims at mediocrity will be far short of it.
Burmese.
Keep thy heart afar from sorrow, and be not anxious about the trouble which is not yet come.
Firdausī.
If thy garments be clean and thy heart be foul, thou needest no key to the door of hell.
Sa’dī.
We ought never to mock the wretched, for who can be sure of being always happy?
La Fontaine.
To those who err in judgment, not in will, anger is gentle.
Sophocles.
Not only is the old man twice a child, but also the man who is drunk.
Plato.
Wrapt up in error is the human mind,
And human bliss is ever insecure;
Know we what fortune yet remains behind?
Know we how long the present shall endure?
Pindar.
A wise man adapts himself to circumstances, as water shapes itself to the vessel that contains it.
Chinese.
He who formerly was reckless and afterwards became sober brightens up this world like the moon when freed from clouds.
Dhammapada.
When a base fellow cannot vie with another in merit he will attack him with malicious slander.
Sa’dī.
If a man be not so happy as he desires, let this be his comfort—he is not so wretched as he deserves.
R. Chamberlain.
In conversation humour is more than wit, easiness, more than knowledge; few desire to learn, or to think they need it; all desire to be pleased, or, if not, to be easy.
Sir W. Temple.
The greatest men sometimes overshoot themselves, but then their very mistakes are so many lessons of instruction.
Tom Browne.
We may be as good as we please, if we please to be good.
Barrow.
The round of a passionate man’s life is in contracting debts in his passion which his virtue obliges him to pay. He spends his time in outrage and acknowledgment, injury and reparation.
Johnson.
To reprehend well is the most necessary and the hardest part of friendship. Who is it that does not sometimes merit a check, and yet how few will endure one? Yet wherein can a friend more unfold his love than in preventing dangers before their birth, or in bringing a man to safety who is travelling on the road to ruin? I grant there is a manner of reprehending which turns a benefit into an injury, and then it both strengthens error and wounds the giver. When thou chidest thy wandering friend do it secretly, in season, in love, not in the ear of a popular convention, for oftentimes the presence of a multitude makes a man take up an unjust defence, rather than fall into a just shame.
Feltham.
I put no account on him who esteems himself just as the popular breath may chance to raise him.
Goethe.
He who seeks wealth sacrifices his own pleasure, and, like him who carries burdens for others, bears the load of anxiety.
Hitopadesa.
Circumspection in calamity; mercy in greatness; good speeches in assemblies; fortitude in adversity: these are the self-attained perfections of great souls.
Hitopadesa.
The best preacher is the heart; the best teacher is time; the best book is the world; the best friend is God.
Talmud.
A woman will not throw away a garland, though soiled, which her lover gave: not in the object lies a present’s worth, but in the love which it was meant to mark.
Bhāravi.
Men who have not observed discipline, and have not gained treasure in their youth, perish like old herons in a lake without fish.
Dhammapada.
As drops of bitter medicine, though minute, may have a salutary force, so words, though few and painful, uttered seasonably, may rouse the prostrate energies of those who meet misfortune with despondency.
Bhāravi.
There are three whose life is no life: he who lives at another’s table; he whose wife domineers over him; and he who suffers bodily affliction.
Talmud.
Let thy words between two foes be such that if they were to become friends thou shouldst not be ashamed.
Sa’dī.
An indiscreet man is more hurtful than an ill-natured one; for as the latter will only attack his enemies, and those he wishes ill to, the other injures indifferently both his friends and foes.
Addison.
A man of quick and active wit
For drudgery is more unfit,
Compared to those of duller parts,
Than running nags are to draw carts.
Butler.
All affectation is the vain and ridiculous attempt of poverty to appear rich.
Lavater.
There never was, there never will be, a man who is always praised, or a man who is always blamed.
Dhammapada.
A good man’s intellect is piercing, yet inflicts no wound; his actions are deliberate, yet bold; his heart is warm, but never burns; his speech is eloquent, yet ever true.
Māgha.
He who can feel ashamed will not readily do wrong.
Talmud.
A stranger who
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