■ — I 'J.,.-,': I ■ .i-lti ■ »>■:.'>:■■ I -, 1»- 41 .*-... i Class 'PH i Afi S' Book , C k ■ GojpghtF- : . CCEHUGHT DEPOSIt PROVERBIAL WISDOM; COMPRISING A COLLECTION OF PRO VERBS, MAXIMS AND ETHICAL SENTENCES, FOR THE GUIDANCE OF ALL CLASSES OF MEN. COLLECTED AND ARRANGED 7 Rev. A. N. COLEMAN. "Precepts or maxims are of great weight ; and a few useful ones at hand do more toward a happy life, than whole volumes that we know not where to find. — Seneca. New York. Published by the Compiler, 1490 Lexington Ave. TWO COPIES RECEIVED ,.< i^cA 1 0432 Copyright, 1897, By Rev. A. N. COLEMAN. D. A. HUEBSCH & CO. PRINTER8 31 RO8E STREET NEW YORK TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, A RACE LIBERAL AND GENEROUS IN THOUGHT AND IN DEED, THIS VOLUME IS, IN TOKEN OF THE TRUEST ESTEEM, RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED BY THE COMPILER. INTRODUCTION. Of the variety of books of this nature that are published most of them are filled with trivial matter, that affords little in- struction or improvement. In this volume it is intended that nothing should find a place that is not fitted to improve the in- tellect or the heart, or both — nothing that will not tend to make the reader both wiser and better. The proverbs, maxims and ethical sen- tences contained in this volume are the best thoughts of the best authors. Many of them are real pearls of beauty and of worth, showing how deeply and thoroughly they studied the problem of life, and the reader will find many a gem of thought, many a wise saying, spoken by wise men. The reader will also readily perceive that they are free from all sectarian bias; and may be read by all classes of men, irrespective of creed or faith. And, as "Proverbial wisdom teaches more in one hour than a large volume of morality in a season," I cannot but hope that good result will follow. May this little volume be judged indul- gently, and meet with favorable reception; and may these gleanings be read with de- light and profit. A. N. COLEMAN. New York, March, 1897. CONTENTS Chapter. Page. I. CHARITY AND BENEFICENCE... 9 II. THE VALUE OF TIME . 18 III. FRIENDSHIP . 23 IV. OLD AGE AND DEATH 28 V. VIRTUE . 35 VI. NOBILITY . 39 VII. CONTENTMENT AND HAPPI NESS 42 VIII. PRECEPT AND EXAMPLE . 47 IX. MARRIAGE . 51 X. THE TONGUE . 56 XI. CONSCIENCE . 62 XII. OBDURACY . 65 XIII. SECRETIVENESS . 68 XIV. WEALTH . 71 XV. TEMPERANCE AND INTEMPER ANCE . 75 XVI. SLANDER . 80 XVII. SELF-CONTROL . 84 XVIII. FALSEHOOD . 90 XIX. FLATTERY . 93 XX. ANGER AND REVENGE . 96 XXI. CIVILITY 101 XXII. TRUTH AND SINCERITY .107 XXIII. PRIDE AND ARROGANCE .110 XXIV. GRATITUDE .116 XXV. LEARNING AND WISDOM .119 XXVI. AVARICE AND COVETOUS NESS 1^ XXVII. VANITY AND PLEASURE .130 MISCELLANIES .137 CHAPTER I. CHARITY AND BENEFICENCE. i. No character is more glorious, none more attractive of universal admiration and respect than that of helping those who are in no condition of helping themselves. 2. Money, like dung, does no good till it is spread. There is no real use of riches, except it be in distribution; the rest is but conceit. 3. That which is given with pride and ostentation is rather an ambition than a bounty. Let a benefit be ever so consid- erable, the manner of conferring it is yet the noblest part. 4. No object is more pleasing to the eye than the sight of a man whom you have obliged; nor any music so agreeable to the ear as the voice of one that owns you for his benefactor. 5. It is a good rule for every one who has a competency of fortune to lay aside a certain proportion of his income for pious 10 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. and charitable uses; he will then always give easily and cheerfully. 6. Those who are unwilling to do us any services are never unprovided of excuses. 7. When we commend good and noble actions, we make them, in some measure, our own. 8. Do good with what thou hast, or it will do thee no good. 9. Reckon upon benefits well placed as a treasure that is laid up; and account thy- self the richer for that which thou givest a worthy person. 10. We may be as good as we please, if we please to be good. 11. We can strike up bargains and make contracts by proxy; but all men must work out their salvation in person. 12. Charity is the salt of riches. .13. Let usefulness and beneficence, not ostentation and vanity, direct the train of your pursuits. 14. Charity, like the sun, brightens every object on which it shines. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 11 15. Art thou poor? — show thyself active and industrious, peaceable and contented. Art thou wealthy? — show thyself benefi- cent and charitable, condescending and hu- mane. 16. It is much better to have your gold in the hand than in the heart. 17. He that does good to another man does also good to himself; not only in the consequence, but in the very act of doing it; for the conscience of well-doing is an ample reward. 18. Constant activity in endeavoring to make others happy is one of the surest ways of making ourselves so. 19. Consider thy property nothing else than a trust in thy hands. 20. It is a part of a charitable man's epi- taph: "What I possessed, is left to others; what I gave away, remains with me." 21. Omission of good is a commission of evil. 22. In judging of others let us always think the best, and employ the spirit of 12 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. charity and candor. But in judging of our- selves we ought to be exact and severe. 23. In doing what we ought we deserve no praise, because it is our duty. 24. The good you do is not lost, though you forget it. 25. Rich people who are covetous are like the cypress tree, they appear well, but are fruitless; so many rich persons have the means to be generous, yet some are not so ; but they should consider that they are only trustees for what they possess, and should show their wealth to be more in doing good than merely in having it. They should not reserve their benevolence for purposes after they are dead, for those who give not till they die show that they would not even then if they could keep it any longer. 26. They who have nothing to give can often afford relief to others by imparting what they feel. 27. Alms are the golden key that opens the gates of heaven. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 13 28. Life is made up, not of great sacri- fices or duties, but of little things, in which smiles and kindness, and small obligations, given habitually, are what win and pre- serve the heart, and secure comfort. 29. As the sword of the best tempered metal is most flexible, so the truly generous are most pliant and courteous. 30. We should give as we would receive, cheerfully, quickly, and without hesitation; for there is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers. 31. The pity of tears only is too water- ish to do any good. 32. Charity is friendship in common, and friendship is charity inclosed. 33. Blemish not thy good deeds, neither use uncomfortable words when thou givest anything; but in all thy gifts show a cheer- ful countenance. 34. Promise not twice to any man the service you may be able to render him ; and be not loquacious, if you wish to be esteemed for your kindness. 14 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 35. He confers a twofold benefit on the needy man who confers it speedily. 36. The sum of morality is give and for- give, bear and forbear. 37. There is little pleasure in the world that is true and sincere besides the pleas- ure of doing our duty and doing good. 38. When we have no pleasure in good- ness, we may with certainty conclude the reason to be that our pleasure is all derived from an opposite quarter. 39. The manner of saying or doing any- thing goes a great way in the value of the thing itself. It was well said of him that called a good office that was done harshly, and with ill-will, a stony piece of bread: "It was necessary for him that is hungry to re- ceive it, but it almost chokes a man in the going down." 40. The highest exercise of charity is charity toward the uncharitable. 41. The root of all benevolent actions is filial piety and fraternal love. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 15 42. That charity which longs to publish itself ceases to be charity. 43. A beneficent person is like a fountain watering the earth, and spreading fertility; it is, therefore, more delightful and more honorable to give than to receive. 44. A woman who wants a charitable heart wants a pure mind. 45. It is an old saying that charity begins at home; but this is no reason it should not go abroad; a man should live with the world as a citizen of the world; he may have a preference for the particular quarter or square, or even alley, in which he lives, but he should have a generous feeling for the welfare of the whole. 46. Kindness is the golden chain by which society is bound together. 47. We are rich only through what we give ; and poor only through what we refuse and keep. 48. Loving kindness is greater than laws ; and the charities of life are more than all ceremonies. 16 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 49. Gold should never be made the god of our idolatry, but the agent of our benev- olence. 50. A vain man's motto is: Win gold and wear it; a generous man's: Win gold and share it; a miser's: Win gold and spare it; a proflligate's : Win gold and spend it; a broker's: Win gold and lend it; a fool's: Win gold and end it; a gambler's: Win gold and lose it; a wise man's: Win gold and use it. 51. He gives not best that gives most; but he gives most who gives best. 52. He who gives what he would readily throw away, gives without generosity; for the essence of generosity is in self-sacrifice. 53. The best thing you can give to your enemy is forgiveness ; to an opponent, toler- ance; to a friend, your heart; to your child, a good example; to a father, deference; to your mother, conduct that will make her proud of you; to yourself, respect; to all men, charity. 54. Do all the good you can, in all the PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 17 ways you can, to all the souls you can, in every place you can, at all times you can, with all the zeal you can, as long as ever you can. 55. He that does good for good's sake seeks neither praise nor reward, but he is sure of both in the end. J& CHAPTER II. THE VALUE OF TIME. i. The advantage of living does not con- sist in length of days, but in the right im- provement of them. As many days as we pass without doing some good, are so many days entirely lost. 2. This day only is ours; we are dead to yesterday, and we are not yet born to the morrow. 3. The ruins of time are the monuments of mortality. 4. Never defer that till to-morrow which you can do to-day. Never do that by proxy which you can do yourself. 5. In the morning think what thou hast to do, and at night ask thyself what thou hast done. 6. Spend the day well, and thou wilt re- joice at night. 7. He that follows his recreation instead of his business shall, in a little time, have no business to follow. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 19 8. If you make a good use of the present time, you need not be apprehensive as to the future. 9. If we calculate the time of life for sev- enty years, and take from it the time ot our infancy and childhood, sleep and recreation, eating and drinking, sickness and old age, but a very little will remain for service. 10. The man who lives in vain, lives worse than in vain. He who lives to no purpose, lives to a bad purpose. 11. Make the most of your minute; and be good for something while it is in your power. 12. As every thread of gold is valuable, so is every minute of time; and as it would be great folly to shoe horses (as Nero chd) with gold, so it is to spend time in trifles. 13. One should make a serious study of a pastime. 14. Time is the greatest of all tyrants. As we go on towards age, he taxes our health, limbs, faculties, strength and features. 15. Time is the old justice that examines all offenders. 20 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 1 6. None but the wise man can employ leisure well; and he that makes the best use of his time hath none to spare. 17. Time once passed never returns. The moment which is lost is lost forever. 18. Time, with all its celerity, moves slowly on to him whose whole employment is to watch its flight. 19. He that waits for an opportunity to do much at once, may breathe out his life in idle wishes; and regret, in the last hour, his useless intentions and barren zeal. 20. Man, in his highest earthly glory, is but a reed floating on the stream of time, and forced to follow every direction of the current. 21. Have a time and place for every- thing, and do everything in its time and place, and you will not only accomplish more, but have far more leisure than those who are always hurrying, as if in vain, at- tempting to overtake time that had been lost. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 21 22. Nothing is more precious than time, yet nothing less valued. 23. Actions measured by time seldom prove bitter by repentance. 24. Be busy about something, so that Satan may always find you occupied. 25. Idleness is the hot-bed of temptation, the cradle of disease, the waster of time, and the canker-worm of felicity. 26. He is idle that might be better em- ployed. The idle man is more perplexed what to do than the industrious is doing what he ought. 27. There are but very few who know how to be idle and innocent. By doing noth- ing we learn to do ill. 28. "There is a time to be born, and a time to die," says Solomon, and it is the memento of a truly wise man; but there is an interval between these two times of in- finite importance. 29. As nothing truly valuable can be at- tained without industry, so there can be no persevering industry without deep sense of the value of time. 22 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 30. We all complain of the shortness of time, and yet have much more than we know what to do with. Our lives are spent either in doing nothing at all, or in doing nothing to the purpose, or in doing nothing what we ought to do; we are always com- plaining our days are few, and acting as though there would be no end of them. 31. Life, however short, is made still shorter by the waste of time. 32. If you have time, do not wait for time. 33. Those who understand the value of time treat it as prudent people do their money; they make a little go a great way. 34. Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time; for that is the stuff life i? made of. 35. Time consists of two days — one for thee, the other against thee. 36. Delay not till to-morrow to be wise; to-morrow's sun to thee may never rise. 37. He who loses an hour in the morning is looking for it all the rest of the day. CHAPTER III. FRIENDSHIP. 1. Only good wise men can be friends; others are but companions. 2. The friendship of the noble-minded is an inestimable treasure; but that of the worthless is ever attended with regret. 3. A man may have a thousand intimate acquaintances, and not a friend among them all. If you have one friend, think yourself happy. 4. There is some utility in every friend- ship, save in that of the simple-minded. 5. Wealth without friends is like life without health. The one an uncomfortable fortune; the other a miserable being. 6. Without friends the world is but a wilderness. 7. One enemy is one too many; a thou- sand friends are none too many. 8. A man without a fitting companion is like the left hand without the right. 24 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 9. A faithful friend is the medicine of life, and his excellency is invaluable. 10. A true and faithful friend is a living treasure; a comfort in solitude, and a sanctuary in distress. 11. Be not a neighbor of him who wears the cloak of a saint to hide the deformities of a fool. 12. A friend cannot be known in pros- perity, and an enemy cannot be hidden in adversity. 13. A true friend unbosoms freely, ad- vises justly, assists readily, adventures bold- ly, takes all patiently, defends courageous- ly, and continues a friend unchangeably. 14. If a man does not make new ac- quaintance, as he passes through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man should keep his friendship in constant re- pair. 15. The enmity of the wise man is bet- ter than the friendship of the fool. 16. He to whom all men are alike will have no companions. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 25 17. That friendship will not continue to the end which is begun for an end. 18. To have no faithful friends is worse than death. 19. Friends must be preserved with good deeds, and enemies reconciled with fair words. 20. Prosperity gains friends; and ad- versity tries them. 21. Avoid the friendship of those who will neither forgive, nor accept an apology. 22. A broken friendship may be soldered, but will never be sound. 23. A friend that you buy with presents, will be bought from you. 24. It is better to sit with a wise man in prison than with a fool in paradise. 25. Life without a friend, is death with- out a witness. 26. Make not thy friend too cheap to thee; nor thyself to thy friend. 27. He is happy that finds a true friend in extremity; but he is much more so, who findeth not extremity whereby to try his friends. 26 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 28. No man can be happy without a friend, nor sure of his friend till he is un- happy. 29. The society of ladies is the school of politeness. 30. To be every one's friend is to be every one's fool. 31. People will, in a great degree, and not without reason, form their opinion of you upon that which they have of your friends; and there is a Spanish proverb which says, very justly: "Tell me with whom thou goest, and I will tell thee what thou doest." 32. Those beings only are fit for solitude, who like nobody, are like nobody, and are liked by nobody. 33. A father is a treasure, a brother a comfort, but a true friend is both. 34. Adversity does not take from us true friends; it only disperses those who pretended to be so. 35. Make no man your friend before you have ascertained how he has behaved to- ward his former friend. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 27 36. Friendship is the most sacred of all moral bonds. 37. Where there is room in the heart, there is always room in the house. 38. If men wish to be held in esteem they must associate with those only who are estimable. 39. He who slights a friend will soon have no friend to slight. 40. False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade. 41. Never contract friendship with a man that is not better than thyself. 42. No man can be provident of his time who is not prudent in the choice of his company. 43. Be more prompt to go to a friend in adversity than in prosperity. 44. Be not the fourth friend of him who had three before and lost them. 45. The only way to have a friend is to be one. CHAPTER IV. OLD AGE AND DEATH. i. Few take care to live well, but many to live long; though it is in a man's power to do the former, but in no man's power to do the latter. 2. He that dies well, has lived long enough. So soon as death enters upon the stage, the tragedy of life is done. 3. When our vices leave us, we flatter ourselves that we leave them. 4. Some are old in their youth; others young in their old age. 5. When we were children, we deemed ourselves men; now that we are old, we are deemed children. 6. Youth is a crown of roses; old age is a crown of thorns. 7. Old age has deformities enough of its own; do not add to it the deformities of vice. 8. When we are young, we are slavishly PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 29 employed in procuring something whereby we may live comfortably when we grow old; and when we are old, we perceive it too late to live as we proposed. 9. There cannot live a more unhappy creature than an ill-natured old man, who is neither capable of receiving pleasures nor sensible of doing them to others. 10. We hope to grow old, yet we fear old age; that is, we are willing to live, and afraid to die. 11. A comfortable old age is the reward of a well-spent youth. 12. All the joys in the world cannot take one gray hair out of our heads. 13. An honorable death is better than an inglorious life. 14. If death be terrible, the fault is not in death, but in thee. 15. In childhood be modest, in youth temperate, in manhood just, in old age prudent. 16. Six feet of earth make all men equal. The end of a dissolute life is commonly a desperate death, 30 PROVERBIAL, WISDOM. 17. The first breath is the beginning of death. 18. The follies of youth are food for re- pentance in old age. 19. The grave is the general meeting- place. 20. The old man's staff is the rapper at death's door. 21. We are born crying, live complain- ing, and die disappointed. 22. He who thinks often of death, does things worthy of life. 23. There is but this difference between the death of old men and young men; that old men go to death, and death comes to young men. 24. The grave is the common treasury to which we must all be taxed. 25. There appears to exist a greater de- sire to live long than to live well ! Measure by man's desires, he cannot live long enough; measure by his good deeds, and he has not lived long enough; measure by his evil deeds, and he has lived too long. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 31 26. Though we seem grieved at the shortness of life in general, we are wishing every period of it at an end. The minor longs to be at age, then to be a man of business, then to make up an estate, then to arrive at honors, then to retire. 2.J. He who increases the endearments of life, increases, at the same time, the ter- rors of death. 28. When we think of death, a thousand sins, which we have trodden as worms be- neath our feet, rise up against us as flam- ing serpents. 29. He who would like to act like a wise man, and build his house on the rock, and not on the sand, should contemplate human life, not only in the sunshine, but in the shade. 30. The veil which covers from our sight the events of succeeding years, is a veil woven by the hand of mercy. 31. The excesses of youth are bills drawn by time, payable thirty years after date with interest. 32 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 32. This world is a stage and life your walk across ; you have come, you have seen, you are gone. 33. What you leave at your death, let it be without controversy, else the lawyers will be your heirs. 34. He dies like a beast who has done no good while he lived. 35. The free man thinks of nothing so little as of death, and his wisdom is a medi- tation, not of death, but of life. 36. Let us respect gray hairs, especially our own. 37. Old men's eyes are like old men's memories; they are strongest for things a long way off. 38. This world is a dream within a dream; and as we grow older, each step is awakening. The youth awakes, as he thinks, from childhood ; the full-grown man despises the pursuits of youth as visionary; and the old man looks on manhood as a feverish dream. Death, the last sleep? No! it is the last and final awakening. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 33 39. Flesh is but the glass which holds the dust that measures all our time, which shall be crumbled into dust. 40. Pleasure has its time; so, too, has wisdom. Make love in thy youth, and in old age attend to thy salvation. 41. There is nothing more disgraceful than that an old man should have nothing to produce as a proof that he has lived long except his years. 42. An honest death is better than a dis- honest living. 43. Oh! how small a portion of earth will hold us when we are dead, who am- bitiously seek after the whole world while we are living. 44. Time's chariot wheels make their car- riage road in the fairest faces. 45. No snow falls lighter than the snow of age; but none lies heavier, for it never melts. 46. To live long it is necessary to live slowly. 34 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 47. Death brings to the righteous rest, and the death of the wicked brings rest to mankind. 48. All die who have lived; all have not lived who die. 49. "When I am a man," is the poetry of childhood; "When I was young," is the poetry of old age. CHAPTER V. VIRTUE. i. A virtuous and well-disposed person is like good metal; the more he is fired, the more he is fined; the more he is opposed, the more he is approved. Wrongs may well try him and touch him, but cannot imprint in him a false stamp. 2. A man of virtue is an honor to his country, a glory to humanity, a satisfaction to himself, and a benefactor to the whole world. He is rich without oppression or dishonesty; charitable without ostentation; courteous without deceit, and brave with- out vice. 3. Genuine virtue has a language that speaks to every heart throughout the world. It is a language which is under- stood by all. In every region, every climate, the homage paid to it is the same. In no one sentiment were ever mankind more generally agreed. 36 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 4. Sell not virtue to purchase wealth. 5. There is no glory, no true greatness without virtue. 6. A man that hath no virtue in himself envieth it in another. 7. It is difficult to convince mankind that the love of virtue is the love of themselves. 8. The first step to virtue is to love vir- tue in another. 9. Virtue and happiness are mother and daughter. 10. Virtue dwells not in the tongue, but in the heart. 11. Virtue maketh men on earth famous, in their graves illustrious, in the heavens immortal. 12. True merit, like a river, the deeper it is, the less noise it makes. 13. Vice stings us even in our pleasures, but virtue consoles us even in our pains. 14. To be innocent is to be not guilty; but to be virtuous is to overcome our evil intentions. 15. Be a father to virtue, but a father- in-law to vice. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 37 1 6. Love virtue, without austerity; pleas- ure, without effeminacy, and life, without fearing its end. 17. Every virtue gives a man a degree of felicity in some kind; honesty gives a man a good report; justice, estimation; prudence, respect; courtesy and liberality, affection; temperance gives health; forti- tude, a quiet mind, not to be moved by any adversity. 18. Be not ashamed of thy virtues; hon- or is a good brooch to wear in a man's hat at all times. 19. The four cardinal virtues are, pru- dence, fortitude, temperance and justice. 20. The virtue of young persons consists chiefly in not doing anything to an excess. 21. Everything great is not always good, but all good things are great. 22. Live virtuously, and you cannot die too soon, nor live too long. 23. Virtue, like a dowerless beauty, has more admirers than followers. 38 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 24. If you can be well without health, you can be happy without virtue. 25. The most virtuous of all men is he that contents himself with being virtuous without seeking to appear so. 26. Virtue by calculation is the virtue of vice. Jfe> CHAPTER VI. NOBILITY. 1. Of all vanities and fopperies, the van- ity of high birth is the greatest. True nobility is derived from virtue, not from birth. Titles, indeed, may be purchased; but virtue is the only coin that makes the bargain valid. 2. He who has no intrinsic nobility, will derive no benefit from the noble pedigree of his ancestors. 3. What is birth to man, if it shall be a stain to his dead ancestors to have left such an offspring? 4. The original of all men is the same; and virtue is the only nobility. 5. Title and ancestry, render a good man more illustrious; but an ill one, more contemptible. Vice is infamous, though in a prince; and virtue, honorable, though in a peasant. 6. To be of noble parentage, and not to 40 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. be endowed with noble qualities, is rather a defamation than a glory. 7. He that boasteth of his ancestors, confesseth he hath no virtue of his own. No other person hath lived for our honor; nor ought that to be reputed ours which was long before we had a being. For what advantage can it be to a blind man that his parents had good eyes? Does he see one whit the better? 8. The wise man replied to the fool, who despised him on account of the lowness of his family: "Thou are the blemish of thy family; and my family is the blemish in me. 9. True glory consists in doing what de- serves to be written; in writing what de- serves to be read, and in so living as to make the world happier and better for our living in it. 10. Some men by ancestry are only the shadow of a mighty name. 11. Nobility without virtue is a fine set- ting without a gem. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 41 12. Nobility does not com.st in magnifi- cence of dress or eminence of rank. Art thou virtuous? Thou art sufficiently noble. 13. It is better to be nobly remembered, than nobly born. 14. The man who has nothing to boast of but his illustrious ancestry is like the potato — the best part under ground. 15. No man is nobler born than another, unless he is born with better abilities and a more amiable disposition; they who make such a parade with their family pictures and pedigrees are, properly speaking, rather to be called noted or notorious than noble persons. gfe* CHAPTER VII. CONTENTMENT AND HAPPINESS. i. He who loseth wealth, loseth much; he who loseth a friend, loseth more; but he who loseth his spirits, loseth all. 2. A good' man, whether he be rich or poor, shall at all times rejoice with a cheer- ful countenance. 3. To live, nature affordeth; to live con- tent, wisdom teacheth. 4. The greatest misfortune of all is nor to be able to bear misfortunes. 5. In order to acquire a capacity for happiness, it must be our first study to rectify inward disorders. 6. The happiness of every man depends more upon the state of his own mind than upon any one external circumstance; nay, more upon all external things put to- gether. 7. There is no greater riches than health, and no greater pleasure than a cheerful heart. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 43 8. Whoever is desirous of prolonging his days must prepare himself with a strong heart to meet casualties. 9. Contentment is a pearl of great price, and whoever procures it at the expense of ten thousand desires makes a wise and a happy purchase. 10. A temperate spirit and moderate ex- pectations are excellent safeguards of the mind, in this uncertain and changing state. 11. A contented mind is a continual feast. 12. The man of fortitude may be com- pared to a castle built on a rock, which de- fies the attacks of the surrounding waters; the man of a feeble and timorous spirit, to a hut placed on the shore, which every wind shakes and every wave overflows. 13. A poor spirit is poorer than a poor purse. 14. Misfortunes that cannot be avoided, must be sweetened. 15. He is happy whose circumstances suit his temper; but he is more excellent, 44 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. who can suit his temper to any circum- stances. 1 6. Men of the noblest dispositions think themselves happiest when others share their happiness with them. 17. We take more pains to persuade others that we are happy than in endeav- oring to think so ourselves. 18. When those things befall us which by no prudence we can avoid we shall, by calling to memory what has happened to others, be able to reflect that nothing new has befallen ourselves. 19. If two angels were sent down from heaven, one to conduct an empire and the other to sweep a street, they would feel no inclination to change employments. 20. Is it not strange that some persons should be so delicate as not to bear a dis- agreeable picture in the house, and yet, by their behavior, force every face they see about them to wear the gloom of uneasi- ness and discontent? 21. To think well of every other man's PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 45 condition, and to dislike our own, is one ot the misfortunes of human nature. 22. The best physicians are Dr. Diet, Dr. Quiet and Dr. Merryman. 23. Cheerfulness is an excellent quality. It has been called the bright weather of the heart. 24. We are no longer happy so soon as we wish to be happier. 25. Happiness is where we find it, but rarely where we seek it. 26. To carry care to bed is to sleep with a pack on your back. 2*j. Since we cannot get what we like, let us like what we can get. 28. Contentment is natural wealth, lux- ury is artificial poverty. 29. There is this difference between hap- piness and wisdom, that he who thinks himself the happiest man really is so; but he that thinks himself the wisest, is gener- ally the greatest fool. 30. Put off thy cares with thy clothes; so shall thy rest strengthen thy labor, and so thy labor sweeten thy rest. 46 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 31. Fixed to no place is happiness; it is nowhere to be found, or everywhere. 32. There is a German proverb which says that "Take it easy," and "Live long," are brothers. 33. He is great who can do what he wishes; he is wise who wishes to do what he can. CHAPTER VIII. PRECEPT AND EXAMPLE. 1. It is the common custom of the world to follow example rather than precept; but it would be the safer course to learn by precept rather than example. 2. Examples do not authorize a fault. Vice must never plead prescription. 3. Whatever parent gives his children good instruction, and sets them at the same time a bad example, may be consid- ered as bringing them food in one hand and poison in the other. 4. A good example is the best sermon. 5. He that gives good advice, builds with one hand; he that gives good counsel and example, builds with both; but he that gives good admonition and bad example, builds with one hand and pulls down with the other. 6. Parents who wish to train up their children in the way they should go, must 48 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. go in the way in which they would train up their children. 7. The example of good men is visible philosophy. 8. Be a pattern to others, and then all will go well; for as a whole city is infected by the licentious passions and vices of great men, so it is likewise reformed by their moderation. 9. No man is so insignificant as to be sure his example can do no hurt. 10. Ill examples are like contagious dis- eases. 11. A man of words and not of deeds is like a garden full of weeds. 12. One watch set right will do to try many by; but, on the other hand, one going wrong may be the means of misleading a whole neighborhood; and the same may be said of the example we individually set to those around us. - 13. Custom without reason is but an an- cient error. 14. Custom is the plague of wise men and the idol of fools. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 49 15. Noble examples stir us up to noble actions, and the very history of large and public souls inspires a man with generous thoughts. 16. We must speak well and act well. Brave actions are the substance of life, and good sayings are the ornament of it. 17. We ought not to judge of men's mer- its by their qualifications, but by the use they make of them. 18. He whose wisdom exceeds his deeds is like a tree having many branches and few roots. 19. It is easier to make the indigent wealthy, and the arrogant meek, than to make a rebel loyal, lawyers preach what they practice, or parsons practice what they preach. 20. Such as have virtue always in their mouths, and neglect it in practice, are like a harp which emits a sound pleasing to others, while itself is insensible to the music. 21. Precept is instruction written in the sand; the tide flows over it and the record 50 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. is gone; example is graven on the rock, and the lesson is not soon lost. 22. He that gives good precepts, and fol- lows them by a bad example, is like a fool- ish man who should take great pains to kindle a fire, and when it is kindled, throw cold water upon it to quench it. 23. You can preach a better sermon with your life than with your lips. 24. Be not of those who publicly curse the devil and secretly serve him. 25. He that cleanses a blot with blotted fingers makes a greater blur. 26. None can pray well but he that lives well. 27. One may understand like an angel and vet be a devil. CHAPTER IX. MARRIAGE. i. He who gets a good husband for his daughter hath gained a son, and he who meets with a bad one hath lost a daughter. 2. Like blood, like good, and like ages make the happiest marriages. 3. In marriage prefer the person before wealth, virtue before beauty, and the mind before the body; then you have a wife, a friend, and a companion. 4. Take a vine of good soil, and a daugh- ter of a good mother. 5. The best dowry to advance the mar- riage of your daughter with one who will render her happy is that she have in her countenance sweetness and gentleness, in her speech wisdom, in her behavior mod- esty, and in her life virtue. 6. The reason why so few marriages are happy is because young ladies spend their time in making nets, not in making cages. 52 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 7. Marriage, with peace, is the world's paradise; with strife, this life's purgatory. 8. Man is the glory of the creation; but the woman is the glory of the man. 9. The family is the heart's fatherland! Hold, then, the family sacred! Look upon it as one of the indestructible conditions of life, and reject every attempt made to undermine it. 10. A poor man who takes a rich wife has a ruler, not a wife. 11. Of all the actions of a man's life, his marriage does least concern other people; yet of all actions of our life, it is most med- dled with by other people. 12. Love that has nothing but beauty to keep it in good health is short-lived and apt to have ague fits. 13. Marry your sons when you will, your daughters when you can. 14. Be not jealous over the wife of thy bosom, and teach her not an evil lesson against thyself. 15. Women have more strength in their looks than we have in our laws, and more PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 53 power by their tears than we have by our arguments. 1 6. Rather have a man without an es- tate than have an estate without a man. 17. The reputation of a statesman, the credit of a merchant, and the modesty of a woman, prevail more than their power, riches, or beauty. 18. Solid love, whose root is virtue, can no more die than virtue itself. 19. Marry but for love; but see that thou lovest what is lovely. 20. Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them they want every- thing. 21. When a man and a woman are mar- ried their romance ceases and their history commences. 22. There is more of good nature than of good sense at the bottom of most mar- riages. 23. If you would have the nuptial union last, let virtue be the bond that ties it fast. 24. A man finds himself seven years old- er the day after his marriage. 54 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 25. If a man is happily married, his "rib" is worth all the other bones of his body. 26. Ride not post for your marriage; if you do, you may, in the period of your journey, take sorrow for your inn and make repentance your host. 2J. It is in vain for a man to be born fortunate, if he be unforunate in his mar- riage. 28. In choosing a wife, a nurse, or a school-teacher look to the breed. There is as'much in blood in men as in horses. 29. Wedlock is like wine, not properly judged of till the second glass. 30. For a young man to marry a young woman is of heaven; for an old man to marry a young woman is of man; for a young man to marry an old woman is of the devil. 31. Men should keep their eyes wide open before marriage, and half shut after- ward. 32. Two opposite opinions should not lie on the same bolster. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 55 33. Marriage with a good woman is a harbor in the tempest of life; with a bad woman it is a tempest in the harbor. CHAPTER X. THE TONGUE. i. Never hold any one by the button or the hand, in order to be heard out; for if people are unwilling to hear you, you had better hold your tongue. 2. If you think twice before you speak once, you will speak twice the better for it. 3. The tongue is, at the same time, the best part of man, and his worst. With good government, none is more useful; and without it, none is more mischievous. 4. The tongue is as a wild beast, very difficult to be chained again when once let loose. 5. Zeno, hearing a young man speaking too freely, told him: "For this reason we have two ears, two eyes, and but one tongue, that we should hear and see much, and speak little." 6. As men of sense say a great deal in a few words, so the half-witted have a talent of talking much and yet saying nothing. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 57 7. A tale out of season is as music in mourning. 8. Confine your tongue, lest it will con- fine you. 9. There is a time when nothing, a time when something, but no time when all things are to be spoken. 10. Accustom thy tongue to say: "I know not." 11. Be sparing with thy tongue, as thou art with thy wealth. 12. A wound from a tongue is worse than a wound from the sword; for the lat- ter affects only the body, the former the spirit — the soul. 13. Speech is the messenger of the heart. 14. In the assembly of the wise be more disposed to listen than to speak. 15. A narrow mind has a broad tongue. 16. A slip of the tongue is more dan- gerous than the slip of the foot; for the slip of the tongue may cost thy head, whilst the slip of the foot may easily be cured. 17. Give not thy tongue too great liberty, lest it take thee a prisoner. A word un- 58 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. spoken is, like the sword in the scabbard, thine. If vented, thy sword is in another's hand. If thou desirest to be held wise, be so wise as to hold thy tongue. 1 8. Speak not in the ears of a fool; for he will despise the wisdom of thy words. Cast not your pearls before a swine. 19. Think before you speak, and con- sider before you promise. Take time to de- liberate and advise, but lose no time in ex- ecuting your resolutions. 20. He that shoots an arrow in jest may kill a man in earnest. 21. He who says what he likes will hear what he does not like. 22. A fool's tongue is long enough to cut his own throat. 23. Let not your tongue run away with your brains. 24. A good word is an easy obligation; but not to speak ill requires only our si- lence, which costs us nothing. 25. Fire and sword are but slow engines of destruction in comparison with the bab- bler. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 59 26. There are a set of malicious, prating, prudent gossips, both male and female, who murder characters to kill time; and will rob a young fellow of his good name before he has years to know the value of it. 27. The tongue of idle persons is never idle. 28. The pen of the tongue should be dipped in the ink of the heart. 29. The greatest wisdom of speech is to know when, and what, and where to speak; the time, matter, and manner. The next to it is silence. 30. A bridle for the tongue is a neces- sary piece of furniture. 31. To talk without thinking is to shoot without aiming. 32. Let not thy tongue be a thorny bush, pricking and hurting those who are around thee; not altogether a barren tree, yielding nothing; but a fruitful tree, a tree of life to thy neighbor. 33. A good tongue has seldom need to beg attention. 60 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 34. The deepest waters are most silent; empty vessels make the greatest sound, and tinkling crystals the worst music. They who think least commonly speak most. 35. Be not too brief in conversation, lest you be not understood; nor too diffuse, lest you be troublesome. 36. Men are born with two eyes and but one tongue, in order that they should see twice as much as they say. But from their conduct one would suppose they were born with two tongues and one eye; for those talk the most who have observed the least, and they obtrude their remarks upon everything who have seen into nothing. 37. By examining the tongue of a pa- tient, physicians find out the disease of the body and wise men the diseases of the mind. 38. Let the tongue speak the language of the heart. 39. The tongue is but three inches long, yet it can kill a man six feet high. 40. It is the wise head that makes the tongue still. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. $1 41. If you would pass for more than your value, say little. It is easier to look wise than to talk wisely. 42. Think all you speak, but speak not all you think. 43. A vicious dog, an aching tooth, and an unruly tongue are three things which a man can only possess to his own damage. 44. A foul breath is a calamity; a foul mouth a criminality. 45. Most men speak when they do not know how to be silent. He is wise who knows when to hold his peace. Tie your tongue, lest it be wanton and luxuriate; keep it within banks; a rapidly flowing river soon collects mud. CHAPTER XI. CONSCIENCE. 1. A firm faith is the best divinity; a good life the best philosophy; a clear conscience the best law; honesty the best policy, and temperance the best physic. 2. A wicked man can never be happy though he had the riches of Croesus, the empire of Cyrus, and the glory of Alexan- der. Wealth and honor can never cure a wounded conscience. 3. A clear conscience laughs at false ac- cusations. 4. A good conscience is to the soul what health is to the body; it preserves constant ease and serenity within us, and more than countervails all the calamities and afflic- tions which can befall us without. 5. It is always term-time in the court of conscience. 6. Most men are afraid of a bad name, but few fear their conscience. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 63 J. Man always prosperous would be giddy and insolent; always afflicted, would be sullen or despondent. Hopes and fears, joys and sorrows, are, therefore, so blended in his life as both to give room for worldly pursuits, and to recall, from time to time, the admonitions of conscience. 8. A heart without secrecy is an open letter for every one to read. 9. Our conscience is a fire within us, and our sins, as the fuel, instead of warming it, will scorch us, unless the fuel be removed or the heat of it be allayed by penitential tears. 10. Conscience is a great ledger book in which all our offenses are written and regis- tered, and which time reveals to the sense and feeling of the offender. n. A man had better be poisoned in his blood than in his principles. 12. Money dishonestly acquired is never worth its cost, while a good conscience never costs as much as it is worth. 13. A man who sells his conscience for his interest will sell it for his pleasure. A 64 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. man who will betray his country will betray his friend. 14. He that loses his conscience has nothing left that is worth keeping. 15. Trust that man in nothing who has not a conscience in everything. 16. Cowardice asks, "Is it safe?" Expe- diency asks, "Is it politic?" Vanity asks, "Is it popular?" Conscience asks, "Is it right?" 17. There is no witness so terrible, no accuser so powerful as conscience which dwells within us. CHAPTER XII. OBDURACY. i. Opinionative men will believe nothing but what they can comprehend, and there are but a few things that they are able to comprehend. 2. No men are so often in the wrong as those who pretend to be always in the right. 3. The strongest heads are commonly the weakest. 4. He who will take no advice, but be al- ways his own counsellor, shall be sure to have a fool for his client. 5. Man should not be stubborn as the cedar, but pliant as a reed. 6. Man, at the best, is but a composition of good and evil. Diamonds have flaws, and roses have prickles; the sun has its shade, and the moon her spots. 7. He who cannot bear one word of re- proof will have to bear many. 8. The obstinate man does not hold opin- ions, but they hold him. 66 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 9. No man should be confident of his own merit; the best err, and the wisest are deceived. 10. The wisest of men have their follies, the best have their failings, and the most temperate have, now and then, their ex- cesses. 11. The weakest spot in every man is where he thinks himself to be the wisest. 12. A headstrong man and a fool may wear the same cap. 13. A wise man may change his opinion; but the fool changes as often as the moon. 14. We must not contradict, but instruct him that contradicts us; for a madman is not cured by another running mad also. 15. When you obey your superior you instruct your inferior. 16. A too great credulity is a great sim- plicity, and to believe nothing, because our narrow capacities cannot comprehend it, is great stupidity. 17. No persons are more frequently wrong than those who will not admit they are wrong. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 67 1 8. A man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser to- day than he was yesterday. 19. Obstinate people are the lawyer's de- light. 20. We should never be positive; forget not that we are mortal, and always liable to err. 21. Rogues differ little. Each began first as a disobedient son. 22. They that will not be counselled can- not be helped. If you do not hear reason, she will rap you on the knuckles. 23. The worst of deafness is in the will. 24. A blockhead will deny more in a single hour than a hundred doctors have proved in a hundred years. 25. A blockhead cannot come in, nor go away, nor sit, nor rise, nor stand like a man of sense. 26. No man has a right to do as he pleases, except when he pleases to do right. CHAPTER XIII. SECRETIVENESS. 1. Never reveal your secrets to any, ex- cept it is as much "their" interest to keep them as it is yours they should be kept. Only trust thyself, and another shall not betray thee. 2. That which is known to three persons is no secret. 3. Reveal none of the secrets of thy friend. Be faithful to his interest. For- sake him not in time of danger. Abhor the thought of acquiring any advantage by his prejudice. 4. Thy secret is thy slave. If thou let it loose thou becomest its slave. 5. There are many who inquire after thy welfare; yet only to one of a thousand re- veal thy secret. 6. None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them; such per- sons covet secrets as a spendthrift does money, for the purpose of circulation. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 69 7. A proper secrecy is the only mystery of able men ; mystery is the only secrecy of weak and cunning ones. 8. Avoid the inquisitive person, for he is a babbler; nor do ears which are always open faithfully retain what is intrusted to their keeping. 9. Do not speak of secret matters in a field that is full of little hills. 10. If a fool knows a secret, he tells it because he is a fool; if a knave knows one, he tells it whenever it is his interest to tell it. But women and young men are very apt to tell what secrets they know from the vanity of having been trusted. Trust none of these whenever you can help it. 11. To tell our own secrets is generally folly, but that folly is without guilt; to com- municate those with which we are intrusted is always treachery, and treachery for the most part combined with folly. 12. It is a misfortune to be exposed; but folly for a man to expose himself. 13. To keep your own secrets is wisdom, 70 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. but to expect others to keep them is folly. 14. Trust not him with secrets who, when left alone in your room, turns over your papers. 15. When two friends part they should lock up one another's secrets and inter- change keys. 16. To know how to keep a secret is the greatest of all secrets. 17. He who trusts secrets to a servant makes him his master. 18. A secret is too little for one, enough' for two, and too much for three. 19. There is as much responsibility in imparting your own secrets as in keeping those of your neighbor. 20. The public affairs of the prudent is a secret; the secret of the fool is a public af- fair. %*$> CHAPTER XIV. WEALTH. i. He that will not permit his wealth to do any good to others while he is living prevents it from doing any good to himself when he is dead, and by an egotism that is suicidal and has a double edge, cuts himself off from the truest pleasure here and the highest happiness hereafter. 2. A great fortune in the hands of a fool is a great misfortune. The more riches a fool has, the greater fool he is. 3. He is a great simpleton who imagines that the chief power of wealth is to supply wants. In ninety-nine cases out of a hun- dred it creates more wants than it supplies. 4. Moderate riches will carry you; if you have more, you must carry them. 5. Riches have made more men covetous than covetousness hath made men rich. 6. The greatest pleasure wealth can af- ford us is that of doing good. It is a happy 72 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. thing when a man's pleasure is also his perfection. 7. The rich follow wealth, and the poor the rich. 8. Physicians' faults are covered with earth, and rich men's with money. 9. Some people are nothing else but money, pride, and pleasure. These three things engross their thought and take up the whole soul of them. 10. Our wealth is often a snare to our- selves, and always a temptation to others. 11. If you make money your god, it will plague you like a devil. 12. Be not penny-wise; riches have wings, and sometimes they fly away of themselves, sometimes they must be set fly- ing to bring in more. 13. When we have gold, we are in fear; when we have none, we are in danger. 14. The gaining of wealth is a work of great labor; the possession, a source of great apprehension; the loss, a source of great grief. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 73. 15. He is rich whose income is more than his expenses, and he is poor whose ex- penses exceed his income. 16. A little house well filled, a little land well tilled, and a little life well willed, are great riches. 17. The love of money is the root of all evil. 18. How strangely are the opinions of men altered by a change in their condition ! 19. Money and time are the heaviest burdens of life, and the unhappiest of all mortals are those who have more of either than they know how to use. 20. It is not sinful to be poor, but to be dishonest; neither is it sinful to be rich, but to be sordid. 21. Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can. 22. Without a rich heart wealth is an ugly beggar. 23. A wealthy man who obtains his wealth honestly, and uses it rightly, is a great blessing to the community. 24. If thou desire to purchase honor with 74 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. thy wealth, consider first how that wealth became thine; if thy labor got it, let thy wisdom keep it; if oppression found it, let repentance restore it; if thy parent left it, let thy virtue deserve it; so shall thy honor be safer, better, and cheaper. 25. To acquire wealth is difficult; to pre- serve it, more difficult; but to spend it wise- ly, most difficult of all. 26. The accumulation of wealth is fol- lowed by an increase of care and by an ap- petite for more. 27. The man who possesses wealth pos- sesses power, but it is a power to do evil as well as good. 28. It is far more easy to acquire a for- tune like a knave than to expend it like a gentleman. 29. There is a vast difference in one's re- spect for the man who has made himself and the man who has only made his money. 30. Riches should be admitted into our houses, but not into our hearts; we may take them into our possession, but not into our affections. CHAPTER XV. TEMPERANCE AND INTEMPER- ANCE. 1. Temperance, by fortifying the mind and body, leads to happiness; intemperance, by enervating them, ends generally in mis- ery. 2. The luxurious live to eat and drink; but the wise and temperate eat and drink to live. 3. Never expect assistance or consolation in thy necessities from a drinking compan- ion. 4. Those men who destroy a healthful constitution of body by intemperance and an irregular life do as manifestly kill them- selves as those who hang, or poison, or drown themselves. 5. A man is known by his cup, by his purse, and by his temperament. 6. When wine goes in the secret goes out. 76 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 7. When Satan cannot come himself, he sends wine as a messenger. 8. Wise men mingle innocent mirth with their cares as a help either to forget or overcome them; but to resort to intoxica- tion for the ease of one's mind is to cure melancholy with madness. 9. The smaller the drink, the cooler the blood, and the clearer the head, which are great benefits in temper and business. 10. The first draught serveth for health, the second for pleasure, the third for shame, and the fourth for madness. 11. Drunkenness is a pair of spectacles to see the devil and all his works. 12. Temperance puts wood on the fire, meal in the barrel, flour in the tub, money in the purse, credit in the country, con- tentment in the house, clothes on the bairns, vigor in the body, intelligence in the brain, and spirit in the whole constitution. 13. For drunkenness drink cold water; for health, rise early; to be happy, be hon- est; to please all, mind your own business. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 77 14. Drunkenness makes some men fools, some beasts, and some devils. 15. When your companions get drunk and fight, take up your hat and wish them "Good night." 16. In the bottle discontent seeks for comfort; cowardice for courage; bashful- ness for confidence; sadness for joy; and all find ruin. 17. Drunkenness turns a man out of himself, and leaves a beast in his room. 18. Drinking water neither makes a man sick, nor in debt, nor his wife a widow. 19. Every moderate drinker could aban- don the intoxicating cup if he would ; every inebriate would if he could. 20. As smoke drives away the bees from their hive, so gluttony expelleth all spiritual gifts and excellent endowments of the mind. 21. Strong drinks are like wars, making cripples of some men, and sending others to the grave. 22. The contrast which exists between the abstemious man and the drunkard is 78 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. this — the former governs his affairs, but the affairs of the latter govern him. 23. The use of strong drinks, to many persons, is as pills of arsenic disguised in honeycomb ; although palatable at first, it is ruin at last. 24. Of the glutton it is said that the kitchen is his shrine, the cook his priest, the table his altar, and his belly his god. 25. The sight of a drunkard is a better sermon against that vice than the best that was ever preached upon that subject. 26. Temperance in eating, as well as in drinking, is a cardinal virtue; the great ma- jority of mankind saturate their death war- rants with their cups and dig their graves with their teeth. 27. Let the poor hang up the amulet of temperance in their homes. 28. Wine and youth are fire upon fire. 29. The Japanese say: "A man takes a drink, then the drink takes a drink, and the next drink takes the man." 30. Whisky is a good tning in its place. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 79 There is nothing like it for preserving a man when he is dead. If you want to keep a dead man, put him in whisky; if you want to kill a live man, put whisky in him. 31. Choose rather to punish your appe- tites than to be punished by them. 32. An epicure has no sinecure; he is un- made, and eventually dished by unmade dishes. 33. He that is a drunkard is qualified for all vice. 34. The youth who stands with a glass of liquor in his hand would do well to con- sider which he had best throw away — the liquor or himself. 35. Joy, temperance, and repose, slam the door on the doctor's nose. 36. Wine is a turncoat; first, a friend; then, a deceiver; then, an enemy. CHAPTER XVI. SLANDER. 1. Slanderers are like flies, that pass all over a man's good parts to light only on his sores. 2. The most dangerous of wild beasts is a slanderer; of tame ones, the flatterer. 3. They who slander the dead are like envious dogs that bark and bite at bones. 4. Never scald your lips in other people's broth. 5. No one sees the wallet on his own back, though every one carries two packs, one before, stuffed with the faults of his neighbors; the other behind, filled with his own. 6. If you slander a dead man, you stab him in the grave. 7. No one loves to tell a tale of scandal but to him that loves to hear it. Learn, then, to rebuke and silence the detracting tongue by refusing to hear. Never make PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 81 your ear the grave of another's good name. 8. Some people write, and others talk themselves out of their reputation. 9. There are men of prey as well as beasts of prey. 10. Slander is a vice that strikes a double blow, wounding both him that commits, and him against whom it is committed. 11. In the business of tale-bearing a liar hath as much credit as any; for slander hath more power to persuade than either reason or eloquence. 12. Believe nothing against another but on good authority; nor report what may hurt another, unless it be a greater hurt to another to conceal it. 13. In ancient days the most celebrated precept was, "Know thyself;" in modern times it has been supplanted by the more fashionable maxim, "Know thy neighbor and everything about him." 14. Never does a man portray his own character more vividly than in his manner of portraying another. 82 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 15. Slander issuing from red and beauti- ful lips are like the foul and ugly spiders crawling from the blushing heart of a rose. 16. Whoever lends a greedy ear to slan- derous reports is either himself of a radi- cally bad disposition, or a mere child in sense. 17. If slander be a snake, it is a winged one;- it flies as well as creeps. 18. There would not be so many open mouths if there were not so many open ears. 19. If there is any person to whom you feel a dislike, that is the person of whom you ought never to speak. 20. No greater damage can be done to a man than to damage his character. 21. Praise is life in death; vituperation is death in life. 22. Great numbers of moderately good people think it fine to talk scandal; they regard it as a sort of evidence of their own goodness. 23. The tale-bearer and the tale-hearer PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 83 should be both hanged up, back to back, one by the tongue, the other by the ear. 24. He who attacks another's reputation abandons his own. 25. Scandal-mongers are the spiders of society. CHAPTER XVII. SELF-CONTROL. 1. Most men spend their lives in the service of their passions, instead of em- ploying their passions in the service of their lives. 2. Our passions are like convulsive fits, which, though they make us stronger for the time, leave us weaker ever after. 3. Human frailty is no excuse for crim- inal immorality. 4. It is a miserable folly to be wise in wickedness. 5. Do nothing to-day that thou wilt re- pent to-morrow. 6. The external misfortunes of life, dis- appointments, poverty and sickness, are light in comparison of those inward dis- tresses of mind occasioned by folly, by pas- sion, and by guilt. 7. In no station, in no period, let us think ourselves secure from the dangers which PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 85 spring from our passions. Every age and every station they beset, from youth to gray hairs, and from the peasant to the prince. 8. Let pleasure be ever so innocent, the excess is always criminal. 9. No person who has once yielded up the government of his mind, and given loose rein to his desires and passions, can tell how far they may carry him. 10. The slave of passions is lower than the slave of a master. 11. Passion may not unfitly be termed the mob of the man that commits a riot on his reason. 12. He submits to be seen through a mi- croscope who suffers himself to be caught in a fit of passion. 13. He is the best accountant who casts up correctly the sum of his own errors. 14. Fly from a tempting object for thy safety as thou wouldst fly from an enemy for thy life. 15. He who indulges his sense in any 86 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. excesses renders himself obnoxious to his own reason; and to gratify the brute in him, displeases the man and sets his two natures at variance. 1 6. Never open the door to a little vice lest a great one enter with it. 17. What avails the show of external lib- erty to one who has lost the government of himself? 18. If we would put a stop to the begin- ning of sin, we must begin where sins be- gin — in the heart and thoughts. 1.9. Never adventure on too near an ap- proach to what is evil. Familiarize not yourself with it, in the slightest instances, "without fear. Listen with reverence to every reprehension of conscience, and pre- serve the most quick and accurate sensi- bility to right and wrong. If ever your moral impressions begin to decay, and your natural abhorrence of guilt to lessen, you have ground to dread that the ruin of virtue is fast approaching. 20. Ill qualities are catching as well as PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 87 diseases; and the mind is at least as much, if not a great deal more, liable to infection than the body. 21. A great part of mankind employ their first years to make their last misera- ble. 22. He that cannot live well to-day will be less qualified to live well to-morrow. 23. Moderation of passions, judgment in counsel, and dexterity in affairs are the most eminent parts of wisdom. 24. No man is master of himself so long as he is a slave to anything else. 25. A man's strongest passion is gen- erally his weaker side. 26. A man must first govern himself ere he be fit to govern a family and his family, ere he be fit to bear the government in the commonwealth. 27. He that overcomes his passions con- quers his greatest enemies. 28. The eye strays not while under the guidance of reason. 29. Small transgressions become great 88 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. by frequent repetition, as small expenses multiplied insensibly waste a large revenue. 30. A joyful evening may follow a sor- rowful morning. 31. It is easier to prevent ill habits than to break them. 32. The most precious of all possessions is power over ourselves; power to with- stand trial, to bear sufferings, to front dan- ger; power over pleasure and pain; power to follow our convictions, however resisted by menace and scorn; the power of calm reliance in scenes of darkness and storms. 33. Our passions, like heavy bodies down steep hills, once in motion, move them- selves, and know no ground but the bot- tom. 34. Most powerful is he who has himself in his own power. 35. Who to himself is law, no law doth need. 36. Do you want to know the man against whom you have most reason to guard yourself? Your looking-glass will give you a fair likeness of his face. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 89 37. If a man does not control his pas- sions they will control him. 38. Not he who can extricate himself from difficulties is the prudent; but he who cautiously bewares not to intricate himself. 39. One of the very best of all earthly possessions is self-possession. Jt CHAPTER XVIII. FALSEHOOD. i . Tricks and trickery are the practice of fools that have not sense enough to be honest. 2. There are lying looks as well as lying words; dissembling smiles, deceiving signs, and even a lying silence. 3. We must not always speak all that we know; that were folly. But what a man says should be what he thinks; otherwise it is knavery. All a man can get by lying and dissembling is that he shall not be be- lieved when he speaks truth. 4. Hypocritical piety is double iniquity. 5. Lying is a vice so very infamous that the greatest liars cannot bear it in other men. 6. Never carry two faces under one hood. 7. He who tells a lie is not sensible how great a task he undertakes; for he must be forced to invent twenty more to maintain that one. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 91 8. A liar begins with making falsehood appear like truth, and ends with making truth appear like falsehood. 9. He who has not a good memory should never take upon him the trade of lying. 10. Falsehood has no legs, but a scandal has wings. n. If a man deceives you once, shame on him; if he deceives you twice, shame on you. 12. A liar is subject to two misfortunes; neither to believe, nor to be believed. 13. There was never a hypocrite so dis- figured but he had some mark or other to be known by. 14. Not to intend what thou speakest is to give thine heart the lie with thy tongue ; not to perform what thou promisest is to give thy tongue the lie with thine actions. 15. There is no vice that doth cover a man with shame as to be found false and perfidious. 16. There cannot be a greater treachery than first to raise a confidence and deceive it. 92 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 17. Although the devil be the father of lies, he seems, like other great inventors, to have lost much of his reputation by the continual improvements that have been made upon him. 18. A hypocrite is under perpetual con- straint. And what a torment must it be for a man always to appear different from what he really is! 19. A lie is like a snowball; the longer it is rolled the larger it is. 20. Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all. 21. It is better to have a heart without words than words without a heart. 22. White lies are but the ushers to black ones. 23. It is a shameful and unseemly thing to think one thing and speak another, but how odious to write one thing and think another. 24. You may deceive all the people part of the time, and part of the people all the time, but not all the people all the time. CHAPTER XIX. FLATTERY. 1. It is better to fall among crows than flatterers; for those only devour the dead, these the living. 2. Flatter not, nor be thou flattered. Follow the dictates of your reason, and you are safe. 3. The coin that is most current among mankind is flattery; the only benefit of which is that by hearing what we are not we may be instructed what we ought to be. 4. Flattery is a sort of bad money to which our vanity gives currency. 5. Love those who reprove thee, and hate those who flatter thee. 6. It is base to be praised by those who are undeserving of praise. 7. Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver ; and adulation is not of more service to the people than to kings. 8. Flattery, though a base coin, is the 94 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. necessary pocket-money at court, where, by custom and consent, it has obtained such a currency that it is no longer a fraudulent, but a legal payment. 9. Crows devour the eyes of the dead when the dead have no longer need of them. But flatterers destroy the souls of the living and blind their eyes. 10. Flattery is like friendship in show, but not in fruit. 11. Just praise is only a debt; flattery, a present. 12. Wherever there is flattery, there is a fool in the case. 13. A flatterer is said to be a beast that biteth smiling. But it is hard to know them from friends, they are so obsequious and full of protestations; for as a wolf re- sembles a dog, so doth a flatterer a friend. 14. When flatterers meet the devil goes to dinner. 15. Flattery is like champagne; it soon goes to the head. 16. The wise man is affable, but not adu- PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 95 latory; the low man is adulatory, but not affable. 17. We always love those who admire us, but do not always love those we admire. 18. Do not praise thy friend too much; for in speaking of his good qualities thou wilt touch upon his bad ones. 19. Praise no man too liberally before his presence, nor censure him too lavishly behind his back: the one savors of flattery, the other of malice, and both are reprehen- sive. if if H sit CHAPTER XX. ANGER AND REVENGE. 1. The passionate are like men standing on their heads; they see all things the wrong way. 2. He that will be angry for anything will be angry for nothing. 3. Do you wish not to be angry? be not inquisitive. He who inquires what has been said of him torments himself. 4. Nothing is more inconsistent with self-possession as violent anger. It over- powers reason, confounds our ideas, dis- torts the appearance, and blackens the color of every object. By the storms which it raises within, and by the mischiefs which it occasions without, it generally brings on the passionate and revengeful man greater misery than he can bring on the object of his resentment. 5. To do evil for evil is human corrup- tion; to do good for good is civil retribu- PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 97 tion; to do good for evil is human perfec- tion. 6. If we do not subdue our anger it will subdue us. It is the second word that makes the quarrel. 7. Good temper is like a sunny day; it sheds its brightness on everything. 8. By taking revenge a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing over it he is superior. 9. An angry man who suppresses his passions thinks worse than he speaks; and an angry man that will chide speaks worse than he thinks. 10. Better to prevent a quarrel before- hand than to revenge it afterward. 11. A passionate temper renders a man unfit for advice, deprives him of his reason, robs him of all that is great and noble in his nature; it makes him unfit for conver- sation, destroys friendship, changes justice into cruelty, and turns all order into con- fusion. 12. He who cannot control his anger does not possess perfect wisdom. 98 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 13. Anger begins with folly and ends with repentance. 14. Discord is everywhere a troublesome companion; but when it is shut up within a family, and happens among relations that cannot easily part, it is harder to deal with. 15. It is better to reprove than to be angry secretly. 16. He that waits for an opportunity of acting his revenge watches to do himself a mischief. \ 17. He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass him- self; for every man has need to be for- given. 18. A vindictive temper is not only un- easy to others, but to them that have it. 19. Two things a man should never be angry at: what he can help, and what he cannot help. 20. He that would be angry and sin not must not be angry with anything but sin. 21. Keep yourself from the anger of a great man, from the tumult of a mob, from a man of ill-fame, from a widow that has PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 99 been thrice married, from a wind that comes in at a hole, and from a reconciled enemy. 22. Anger may glance into the breast of a wise man, but rests only in the bosom of fools. 23. To be angry is to revenge the faults of others upon ourselves. 24. Angry and choleric men are as un- grateful and unsociable as thunder and lightning, being in themselves all storm and tempests; but quiet and easy natures are like fair weather, welcome to all, and acceptable to all men. 25. When angry count ten before you speak; if very angry, a hundred. 26. An angry man is again angry with himself when he returns to reason. 27. A man can as easily be intoxicated with anger as with wine; both produce a temporary insanity, and during the parox- ysm he should be avoided as a madman. 28. To be angry about trifles is mean and childish; to rage and be furious is brutish, and to maintain perpetual wrath 100 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. is akin to the practice and temper of devils ; but to prevent and suppress rising resent- ment is wise and glorious, is manly and divine. 29. Consider how much more you always suffer from your anger and grief than from those very things for which you are angry and grieved. 30. An angry man opens his mouth and shuts up his eyes. 31. He who can suppress a moment's anger may prevent a day of sorrow. 32. The fire you kindle for your enemy often burns yourself more than him. 33. He that studies revenge keepeth his own wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well. 34. Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot that it do singe thyself. dfr CHAPTER XXI. CIVILITY. i. Fine sense and exalted sense are not half so useful as common sense. 2. A man endowed with great perfec- tions, without good breeding, is like one who has his pockets full of gold, but al- ways wants change for his ordinary occa- sions. 3. Some are so very studious of learning what was done by the ancients that they know not how to live with the moderns. 4. The first step to a good name is a good life, and the next is good behavior. 5. If a civil word or two will render a man happy, he must be a wretch who will not give them to his fellow-being. Such a disposition is like lighting another man's candle by one's own, which loses none of its brilliancy by what the other gains. 6. Deference is the most delicate, the most indirect, and the most elegant of all compliments. 102 PROVERBIAL, WISDOM. 7. It is a sin against hospitality to open the doors and shut up the countenance. 8. There are braying men in the world as well as braying asses; for what is loud and senseless talking, huffing, and swear- ing any other than a more fashionable way of braying? 9. Good manners are the small coin of virtue. 10. The scholar without good breeding is a pedant; the philosopher, a cynic; the soldier, a brute; and every man disagree- able. 11. Politeness is a real kindness kindly expressed. 12. A jest, told in a grave manner, has the better effect; but you extinguish the appetite of laughter in others if you pre- vent them by your own. 13. A jest is no argument, nor a loud laughter a demonstration. 14. The only way to be amiable is to be affable. 15. Let not a man be merry among mourners, nor mourn among the merry. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 103 1 6. He that makes himself the common jester of a company has but just wit enough to be a fool. 17. Make yourself agreeable as much as possible to all; for there is no person so contemptible but that it may be in his pow- er to be your best friend or worst enemy. 18. Excessive laughter denotes folly, and he who exposes his teeth lessens his re- spect. 19. Gentle reply to scurrilous language is the most severe revenge. 20. Respect to age and kindness to chil- dren are among the tests of an amiable dis- position. Undeviating civility to those of inferior station and courtesy to all are the emanations of a well-educated mind and finely balanced feelings. 21. Disparage and depreciate no one; an insect has feelings, and an atom a shadow. 12. Politeness is like an air-cushion; there may be nothing in it, but it eases our jolts wonderfully. 23. Coolness and absence of heat and 104 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. haste indicate fine qualities. A gentleman makes not noise; a lady is serene. 24. He who sedulously attends, pointed- ly asks, cooly answers, and ceases when he has no more to say, is in possession of some of the best requisites of man. 25. The great business of man is to im- prove his mind and govern his manners. 26. Our conversation should be such that youth may therein find improvement, women modesty, the aged respect, and all men civility. 27. To one you find full of questions it is best to make no answers at all. 28. Nothing is more silly than an ill- timed laugh. Many are seen to laugh at their own imperfections in another. 29. A man has no more right to say an uncivil thing than to act one; no more right to say a rude thing to another than to knock him down. 30. The best rules to form a young man are to talk little, to hear much, to reflect alone what has passed in company, to dis- PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 105 trust one's own opinion, and to value oth- ers that deserve it. 31. Our principal point of good-breed- ing is to suit our behavior to the three sev- eral degrees of men — our superiors, our equals, and those below us. 32. Complaisance pleases all; adorns wit; renders humor agreeable; augments friend- ship; redoubles love; and, united with jus- tice and generosity, becomes the secret chain of the society of mankind. 33. We cannot always oblige, but we can always speak obligingly. 34. Good manner and good morals are sworn friends and firm allies. 35. What is becoming is honorable, and what is honorable is becoming. 36. The great secret of life is never to be in the way of others. 37. The manner of a vulgar man has freedom without ease, and the manner of a gentleman has ease without freedom. 38. Civility costs nothing, and is worth everything. 39. If you wish to appear agreeable in 106 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. society, you must consent to be taught many things which you already know. 40. A person's address in society should be like the address on a letter, plain, neat and without too many flourishes. 41. Dress is much, address more. 42. Behavior is a mirror in which every one displays his image. 43. There can be no greater rudeness than to interrupt another in the current of his discourse. 44. Fine manners are a stronger bond than a beautiful face. The former binds; the latter attracts. CHAPTER XXII. TRUTH AND SINCERITY. 1. Truth is the foundation of all knowl- edge, and the cement of all societies. 2. Sincerity is to speak as we think; be- lieve as we perform; act as we profess; per- form as we promise, and really be what we would seem and appear to be. 3. It is necessary to the happiness of man that he be mentally faithful to him- self. Infidelity does not consist in believ- ing, or in disbelieving; it consists in pro- fessing to believe what he does not believe. 4. There is a kind of a magic in truth, which forcibly carries the mind along with it. Men readily embrace the dictates of sincere reason. 5. Truth may be expressed without art or affectation; but a lie stands in need of both. 6. Sincerity and truth form the basis of every virtue. 108 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 7. Plain truth must have plain words; she is innocent, and accounts it no shame to be seen naked; whereas the hypocrite or double-dealer shelters and hides himself in ambiguities and reserves. 8. Truth establishes all things, falsehood overthrows them. 9. Truth is always consistent with itself, and needs nothing to help it out; it is al- ways near at hand and sits upon our lips, and is ready to drop out before we are aware; whereas a lie is troublesome, and sets a man's invention on the rack, and one needs a great many more of the same kind to make it good. 10. One of the sublimest things in the world is plain truth. 11. It is not enough that we swallow trrih. We must feed upon it, as insects do on the leaf, till the whole heart be colored by its qualities, and show its food in every fibre. j 2. It would be an unspeakable advant- age, both to the public and private, if men PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 109 would consider that great truth, that no man is wise or safe but he that is honest. 13. He that finds truth, without loving her, is like a bat; which, though it have eyes to discern that there is a sun, yet hath so evil eyes that it cannot delight in the sun. 14. Nature loves truth so well that it hardiy ever admits of flourishing. Con- ceit is to nature what paint is to beauty; it is not only needless, but impairs what it would improve. is. Nothing is more noble, nothing more venerable, than truth. Faithfulness and truth are the most sacred excellencies and endowments of the human mind. 16. The greatest homage we can pay to trr.th is to use it. i/. Every violation of truth is a stab at the health of human society. CHAPTER XXVIII. PRIDE AND ARROGANCE. 1. To be proud of knowledge is to be blind in the light; to be proud of virtue is to poison yourself with antidote; to be proud of authority is to make your rise your downfall. 2. Proud men never have friends, neither in prosperity, because they know nobody; nor in adversity, because then nobody knows them. 3. A proud man is always hard to be pleased, because he hath too great expecta- tions from others. 4. As liberality makes friends of enemies, so pride makes enemies of friends. 5. Pride, like the magnet, constantly points to one object, self; but unlike the magnet, it has no attractive pole, but at all points repels. 6. He who praises himself, will soon find some one to laugh at him. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. Ill 7. Four persons are intolerable: A poor man who is proud; a rich man who is a lir-.r; a old man who is incontinent, and a leader who behaves haughtily toward a community for whom he has done nothing. 8. He who thinks his place below him, will certainly be below his place. 9. Vain-glorious men are the scorn of the wise men, the admiration of fools, the idols of parasites, and the slaves of their own vaunts. 10. A sound head, an honest heart, and an humble spirit are the three best guides through time and to eternity. 11. It is always a sign of poverty of mind where men are ever aiming to ap- pear great; for they who are really great never seem to know it. 12. Arrogance is a kingdom without a crown. 13. It is not the height to which men are advanced that makes them giddy; it is the looking down with contempt upon those below them. 112 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 14. He who swells in prosperity will shrink in adversity. 15. Arrogance is a weed that grows mostly on a dunghill. 16. Pride is increased by ignorance; those assume most who know the least. 17. A man inflated with pride is equal to an idolator. 18. Pride and ill-nature will be hated in spite of all the wealth and greatness in the woild. Civility is always safe; but pride creates us enemies. 19. To live above our station shows a proud heart; and to live under it discovers a narrow soul. 20. Likeness begets love, yet proud men ha-«: one another. 21. Of all human actions, pride seldom- est obtains its end; for, aiming at honor and reputation, it reaps contempt and derision. 22. Whoever gives way to pride, if he is a wise man his wisdom departs from him. 23. Vain-glory blossoms, but never bears fruit. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 113 24. Other vices chose to be in the dark; only pride loves always to be seen in the light. 25. The best way to humble a proud man is to take no notice of him. 26. If a man has a right to be proud of anything it is of a good action done as it ought to be without any base interest lurking at the bottom of it. 2;. He who gives himself airs of im- portance, exhibits the credentials of im- potence. 28. Poor is the man who can boast of nothing more than gold; and equally so mu.vt the woman be who can boast of noth- ing more than her beauty. 29. He who seems not to himself more th: n he is, is more than he seems. 30. Usually the greatest boasters are the smallest workers. The deep rivers pay a larger tribute to the sea than shallow brooks, and yet empty themselves with less noise. 31. As in a pair of bellows there is a forced breath without life, so in those that 114 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. are puffed up with the wind of ostentation there may be charitable words without works. 32. When a proud man forbids you his presence, he awkwardly confers a favor upon you. 33. He that adores himself hath a poor subject for his idolatry. 34. Dignity and pride are of a too near relationship for intermarriage. 35. The infinitely little have a pride in- finitely great. 36. There are four kinds of pride of which we should beware: Race pride, pride in our ancestors; face pride, pride in our beauty; place pride, pride in our position; grace pride, pride in our religion. $j. He who hardens his heart with pride softens his brains with the same. 38. Pride that dines on vanity, sups on contempt. 39. The mind of a proud man is like a mushroom, which starts up in a night. His business is first to forget himself, and then his friends. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 115 40. Say nothing of yourself, either good, bad or indifferent; nothing good, for that is vanity; nothing bad, for that is affecta- tion; nothing indifferent, for that is silly. 41. A wise man has dignity without pride; a fool has pride without dignity. 42. He who knows himself best, ex- altcth himself least. CHAPTER XXIV. GRATITUDE. 1. Gratitude is a duty none can be ex- cused from, because it is always at our dis- posal. 2. Without good nature and gratitude man had as well live in the wilderness. 3. He that calls a man ungrateful sums up all the evil that a man can be guilty of. 4. Gratitude is the memory of the heart. 5. He that receives a benefit without be- ing thankful robs the giver of his just re- ward. 6. He that conceals a benefit is to be held but one degree from denying it. 7. To do good to the ungrateful is to throw rose-water into the sea. 8. Not to return one good office for an- other is inhuman; but to return evil for good is diabolical. There are too many even of this sort, who, the more they owe, PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 117 the more they hate. There is nothing more dangerous than to oblige these peo- ple; for when they are conscious of not paying the debt, they wish the creditor out of the way. 9. The earth produces nothing worse than an ungrateful man. 10. It is better to be called over-liberal than ungrateful; the first, good men will applaud; the latter, even bad men will con- demn. 11. Liberality and thankfulness are the bonds of concord. 12. Friendship is the medicine for all misfortunes, but ingratitude dries up the fountain of all goodness. 13. He who receives a good turn should never forget it; he who does one should never remember it. 14. It is the character of an unworthy man to write injuries on marble and bene- fits in dust. 15. Ingratitude makes the receiver worse, but the benefactor better. 118 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 16. One ungrateful man does an injury to all who stand in need of aid. 17. A grateful mind is not only the greatest of all virtues, but the parent of all other virtues. 18. An ungrateful man is like a hog under a tree eating acorns, but never look- ing up to see where they come from. 19. To repay by a return equivalent is not in every one's power; but thanks are a tribute payable by the poorest. CHAPTER XXV. LEARNING AND WISDOM. i. Learning is wealth to the poor, an honor to the rich, an aid to the young, and a support and comfort to the aged. 2. Learning is an ornament in pros- perity, a refuge in adversity, an entertain- ment at all times. It cheers in solitude, and gives moderation and wisdom in all circumstances. 3. If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest. 4. An industrious and virtuous education of children is a better inheritance for them than a great estate. 5. Wisdom is to the mind what health is to the body. 6. Our chief wisdom consists in knowing our follies and faults, that we may correct them. 120 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 7. A man's wisdom is his best friend; folly, his worst enemy. 8. Man without wisdom is like a house without a foundation. 9. Wisdom is the delight of the wise; folly, of the fool. 10. The fool has his understanding in his mouth; but the wise man has his mouth filled with understanding. 11. A man is wise as long as he seeks wisdom; but when he imagines that he has perfectly attained it, he is a fool. 12. We read of a philosopher who de- clared of himself that the first year he en- tered upon the study of philosophy he knew everything; the second year he knew some- thing; but the third, nothing. The more he studied, the more he declined in the opinion of his own knowledge, and saw more of the shortness of his understanding. 13. All countries are the wise man's home. 14. Wisdom is a tree that grows in the heart, and its fruit is in the tongue. 15. Think only according to the strength PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 121 of thy understanding, and investigate ac- cording to thy penetration; more is not re- quired of thee. 1 6. Honors, monuments, and all the works of vanity and ambition are demol- ished and destroyed by time; but the repu- tation of wisdom is venerable to posterity. 17. Wisdom is better without inheritance than an inheritance without wisdom. 18. Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army. If we re- trench the wages of the schoolmaster, we must raise those of the recruiting sergeant. 19. One part of knowledge consists in being ignorant of such things as are not worthy to be known. 20. Knowledge is a treasure, but prac- tice is the key to it. 21. Learning is like mercury, one of the most powerful and excellent things in the world in skilful hands ; in unskilful, the most mischievous. 22. The true order of learning should be, first, what is necessary; second, what is useful; and third, what is ornamental. To 122 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. reverse this arrangement is like beginning to build at the top of the edifice. 23. It is better to be unborn than un- taught, for ignorance is the root of mis- fortune. 24. Wisdom sought after in old age fades like characters traced in sand, whilst that acquired in youth may endure like char- acters engraved in stone. 25. He never dies whom wisdom keeps alive. 26. It happens to men truly learned, as to ears of corn; they shoot up and raise their heads high while they are empty; when full and swelled with grain, they be- gin to flag and droop. 2J. He who acquires knowledge without imparting it to others is like a myrtle in the desert, where there is no one to enjoy it. 28. Learn a little here and a little there, and you will increase knowledge. 29. A mind full of piety and knowledge is always rich, it is a bank that never fails; it yields a perpetual dividend of happiness. 30. The wise man has his foibles as well PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 123 as the fool. But the difference between them is that the foibles of the one are known to himself and concealed from the world ,and the foibles of the other are known to the world and concealed from himself. 31. Very few men are wise by their own counsel, or learned by their own teaching; for he that was only taught by himself had a fool for his master. 32. A college education shows a man how little other people know. 33. All wisdom consists in this, not to think that we know what we do not know. 34. It is the highest advantage for one that is wise not to seem to be wise. 35. A man of learning who makes no use of what he knows is like a cloud which gives no rain. 36. There are three classes of people in the world. The first learn from their own experience — these are wise; the second learn from the experience of others — these are the happy; the third neither learn from 124 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. their own experience nor the experience of others — these are fools. 37. We should not ask who is the most learned, but who is the best learned. 38. It is easy to learn something about everything, but difficult to learn everything about anything. 39. Some will never learn anything, be- cause they understand everything too soon. 40. A man cannot leave a better legacy to the world than a well-educated family. 41. Beauty is the wisdom of women, and wisdom is the beauty of men. 42. The more you practice what you know, the more shall you know what to practice. 43. There is nothing more imprudent than excessive prudence. CHAPTER XXVI. AVARICE AND COVETOUSNESS. 1. Poverty wants some, luxury many, avarice all things. 2. It is a much easier task to dig metal out of its native mine than to get it out of the covetous man's coffer. Death only has the key of the miser's chest. 3. The avaricious man is like barren, sandy ground, which sucks in the rain and dew with greediness and thirst; but yields no fruitful herbs or plants to the inhabit- ants. 4. He hath most that coveteth least. A wise man wants but little, because he de- sires not much. 5. A wise man will desire no more than what he can get justly, use soberly, dis- tribute cheerfully, and leave contentedly. 6. He is a slave to the greatest slave who serveth none but himself. 126 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 7. If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him. 8. He who requests a favor of the ava- ricious is like him who attempts to catch fish in the desert. 9. Some men are called sagacious merely on account of their avarice ; whereas a child can clench its fist the moment it is born. 10. The covetous person lives as if the world were made altogether for him, and not he for the world; to take everything and part with nothing. 11. The birds of the air despise a miser. 12. Some men are as covetous as if they were to live forever, and others as profuse as if they were to die the next morning. 13. A miser grows rich by seeming poor; an extravagant man grows poor by seem- ing rich. 14. The prodigal robs his heir, the miser robs himself. The middle way is justice to ourselves and others. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 127 15. Dignity and riches consist in the abandonment of covetousness. 16. He who makes an idol of his interest makes a martyr of his integrity. 17. "It is a great blessing to possess what one wishes," said some one to an an- cient philosopher, who replied: "It is a greater blessing still not to desire what one does not possess." 18. A man's desires always disappoint him; for though he meets with something that gives him satisfaction, yet it never thoroughly answers his expectations. 19. From our eagerness to grasp, we strangle and destroy pleasures. 20. The people will worship a calf if it be a golden one. 21. The only gratification a covetous man gives his neighbors is to let them see that he himself is as little better for what he has as they are. 22. Four great enemies to peace inhabit with us, viz., avarice, ambition, envy, and pride. If those enemies were to be ban- 128 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. ished, we should infallibly enjoy perpetual peace. 23. A man that keeps riches and enjoys them not is like an ass that carries gold and eats thistles. 24. An envious man waxes lean with the fatness of his neighbor. 25. No estate can make him rich that has a poor heart. 26. If we did but know how little some enjoy of the great things that they possess there would not be such envy in the world. 27. The difference between the philan- thropist and the miser is this: the former lives to give, but the latter dies to give. 28. The heart is a small thing, but de- sireth great matters. It is not sufficient for a kite's dinner, yet the whole world is not sufficient for it. 29. Avarice is always poor, but poor by her own fault. 30. The wealth of covetous persons is like the sun after he is set — delights none. 31. He who lives only to benefit himself confers on the world a favor when he dies. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 129 32. Avarice is like a graveyard; it takes all that it can get, and gives nothing back. 33. An avaricious man is a great lover of generosity — in everybody except him- self. 34. Covetous persons are like the sponges, which greedily drink in water, but return very little until they are squeezed. 35. What madness it is for a man to starve himself to enrich his heir, and to turn a friend into an enemy! For his joy at your death will be proportioned to what you leave him. 36. He who gives a trifle meanly is meaner than the trifle. 37. He who is not liberal with what he has does but deceive himself when he thinks he. would be liberal if he had more. 38. It matters not how wrinkled the face may be, so long it is not wrinkled by selfishness. CHAPTER XXVII. VANITY AND PLEASURE. i. Young men when they are once dyed in pleasure and vanity will scarcely take any other color. 2. The vanity of human life is like a river, constantly passing away and yet con- stantly coming on. 3. Pleasures unduly taken enervate the soul, make fools of the wise, and cowards of the brave. A libertine life is not a life of liberty. 4. Excessive pleasures, while they flatter a man, sting him to death. 5. As dreams are the fancies of those that sleep, so fancies are but the dreams of men awake. 6. Nothing is more ridiculous than to be serious about trifles, and to be trifling about serious matters. 7. Do not hurt yourselves or others by the pursuit of pleasure. Consult your whole PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 131 nature. Consider yourselves not only as sensitive, but as rational beings; not only as rational, but social; not only as social, but immortal. 8. Of all our infirmities, vanity is the dearest to us. A man will starve his other vices to keep that alive. 9. The roses of pleasure seldom last long enough to adorn the brow of him who plucks them; and they are the only roses which do not retain their sweetness after they have lost their beauty. 10. He that feasts his body with ban- quets and delicate fare, and starves his soul for want of spiritual food, is like him that feasts his slave and starves his wife. 11. The epicure puts his purse in his belly; the miser his belly into his purse. 12. The temperate man's pleasures are durable, because they are regular; and all his life is calm and serene, because it is in- nocent. 13. To expose one's self to great dan- gers for trivial advantages is to fish with 132 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. a golden hook, where more may be lost than gained. 14. When necessity ends, desire and cur- iosity begin; and no sooner are we sup- plied with everything nature can demand than we sit down to contrive artificial ap- petites. 15. The seeds of repentance are sown in youth by pleasure; but the harvest is reaped in age by pain. 16. The best throw with the dice is to throw them away. 17. When the idea of undue pleasure strikes your imagination, make a just com- putation between the duration of the pleas- ure and that of the repentance that is likely to follow it. 18. Every man has just as much vanity as he wants understanding. 19. To make pleasures pleasant shorten them. 20. He who can, at all times, sacrifice pleasure to duty approaches sublimity. 21. Pleasure is to women what the sun is to the flower; if moderately enjoyed, it PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 133 beautifies; if immoderately, deteriorates and destroys. 22. Pleasure's coach is virtue's grave. 23. Pleasures become bitter as soon as they become abused. 24. Vanity is a confounded donkey, ever apt to put his head between his legs and chuck us over. 25. If most married women possessed as much prudence as they do vanity, we would find many husbands far happier. 26. To be a man's own fool is bad enough; but the vain man is everybody's. 27. It is well to possess pleasure, but not to be possessed by it. 28. Pleasure is like a cordial; a little of it is not injurious, but too much destroys. 29. Indulging in dangerous pleasure is licking honey from a knife and cutting the tongue with the edge. 30. Whenever we drink too deeply of pleasure we find a sediment at the bottom which pollutes and embitters that we rel- ished at first. 31. Dwell not too long upon sports; for 134 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. as they refresh a man that is weary, so they weary a man that is refreshed. 32. Vanity is the quicksand of reason. 33. She neglects her heart who studies the glass. 34. He repents on thorns that sleeps on roses. 35. We first make our habits, and then our habits make us. 36. The body of a sensualist is the coffin of a dead soul. MISCELLANIES. " Proverbs are the literature of reason, or the statement of absolute truth without qualifica- tion. — R. W. Emerson. MISCELLANIES. i. Four things are grievously empty: a head without brains, a wit without judg- ment, a heart without honesty, and a purse without money. 2. There are three persons you should never deceive: your physician, your con- fessor, and your lawyer. 3. Censure is the tax a man pays to the public for being eminent. 4. Never live in hope or expectation while your arms are folded. 5. All is but lip-wisdom which wants ex- perience. 6. Fashion is, for the most part, nothing but the ostentation of riches. 7. Fools with bookish knowledge are children with edged weapons; they hurt themselves, and put others in pain. The half-learned is more dangerous than the simpleton. 8. He that thinks of many things thinks 138 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. of nothing, and he that would go several ways stands still. 9. In prosperity prepare for a change; in adversity hope for one. 10. He that blows the coals in quarrels he has nothing to do with has no right to complain if the sparks fly in his face. 11. Reason cannot show itself more rea- sonable than to cease reasoning on things above reason. 12. A good fame is better than a good face. 13. If marriages are made in heaven, many have but a few friends there. 14. He who trusts all things to chance makes a lottery of his life. 15. If the best man's faults were written on his forehead it would only make him pull his hat over his eyes. 16. Lawmakers should not be law- breakers. 17. Men may blush to hear what they were not ashamed to act. 18. Never sound the trumpet of your own praise. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 139 19. A good jest in time of misfortune is food and drink. It is strength to the arm, digestion to the stomach, and courage to the heart. A prosperous man can afford to be melancholy; but if the miserable are so, they are worse than dead — it is sure to kill them. 20. The stone that lieth not in thy way need not offend thee. 21. There are no gains without pains; then plow deep while sluggards sleep. 22. Have pity upon the honorable man that is despised, upon the rich that is im- poverished, and upon the wise man who hath fallen among fools. 23. The more women look in their glasses, the less they look at their houses. 24. He that scoffs at the crooked had need to go very upright himself. 25. It is as natural for women to pride themselves in fine clothes as it is for a pea- cock to spread his tail. 26. To make an empire durable the mag- istrates must obey the laws, and the people the magistrates. 140 PROVERBIAL, WISDOM. 27. It is not your posterity, but your ac- tions, that will perpetuate your memory. 28. Creditors have better memories than debtors; and creditors are a superstitious sect, great observers of set days and times. 29. Do not all you can; spend not all you have; believe not all you hear, and tell not all you know. 30. Though you are commanded to love your enemy, you are not bound to put a sword in his hand. 31. Keep out of a hasty man's way for a while; out of the sullen man's, all the days of your life. 32. You will never be thought to talk too much when you talk well; and always too much when you speak ill. 33. Too much asseveration is a good ground for suspicion. 34. You will never have a friend if you must have one without fault. 35. The intention ought to obey the laws, not the laws the intention. 36. Of all the pests the greatest pest is superstition. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 141 37. Deliberate long of what thou canst do but once. 38. The hypocrite has honey in his mouth, words of milk, gall in his heart, and fraud in his deeds. 39. He that is not handsome at twenty, strong at thirty, wise at forty, and rich at fifty will never be handsome, strong, wise or rich. 40. The gambler, the more skilful he is in his art, the more wicked he is. 41. If you would be known and not know, vegetate in a village; if you would know and not be known, live in a city. 42. The traveler with empty pockets will sing in the presence of the robber. 43. Those who cross the sea change their clime, but not their nature. 44. Men generally are willing to believe what they wish to be true. 45. The magistrates are the ministers of the law, the judges are the interpreters of the law; we all, in fine, are the servants of the law that we may be free. 142 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 46. You will never repent of being pa- tient and sober. 47. Wilful faults have no excuse, and de- serve no pardon. 48. Nothing is more easy than to deceive one's self, as our affections are subtle per- suaders. 49. Many come to bring their clothes to church rather than themselves. 50. No cord or cable can draw so forci- bly or bind so fast as love can do with only a single thread. 51. He that wants hope is the poorest man living. 52. Some are unwisely liberal, and more delight to give presents than to pay debts. 53. Many get into a dispute well that cannot get out well. 54. He that makes a question where there is no doubt must make an answer where there is no reason. 55. He is doubly' sinful who congratu- lates a successful knave. 56. There are four good mothers, of whom are often born four unhappy daugh- PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 143 ters : Truth begets hatred, prosperity pride, security danger, and familiarity contempt. 57. He that will sell his fame will also sell the public interest. 58. What maintains one vice would bring up two children. 59. A fool may ask more questions in an hour than a wise man can answer in seven years. 60. The future destiny of the child is al- ways the work of the mother. 61. A good presence is a letter of recom- mendation. 62. The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear. 63. Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall. 64. Fame is the perfume of heroic deeds. 65. Have not to do with any man in his passion; for men are not, like iron, to be wrought upon when they are hot. 66. All fools are not knaves; but all knaves are fools. 144 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 6y. One month in the school of affliction will teach us more wisdom than the grave precepts of Aristotle in seven years. 68. According to your purse govern your mouth. 69. Fame, like a river, is narrowest at its source and broadest afar off. 70. Whether young or old, think it not too soon or too late to turn over the leaves of your past life; and consider what you would do if what you have done were to do again. 71. It is a miserable thing to live in sus- pense; it is the life of a spider. 72. The gifts of the mind are able to cover the defects of the body; but the per- fections of the body cannot hide the im- perfections of the mind. 73. A man that doth the best he can doth all that he should do. 74. Mercy to the evil proves cruelty to the innocent. 75. Many old camels carry the skins of the young ones to the market. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 145 j6. Youth is the opportunity to do some- thing and to become somebody. yy. To mourn without measure is folly; not to mourn at all, insensibility. 78. Love thy neighbor, but pull not down thy hedge. 79. He that can read and meditate will not find his evenings long or his life tedi- ous. 80. He that is not sensible of his loss has lost nothing. 81. Keep aloof from quarrels; be neither a witness nor a party. 82. Honor thy physician before thou hast need of him. 83. As worms are generated in a stag- nant pool, so are evil thoughts in the mind of him who is unemployed. 84. Beware of him who regards not his reputation. 85. Do not the lion in thy house; be not tyrannical and cruel toward thy inferiors. 86. It is better that a man's own works than that another man's words should praise him. 146 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 87. It is with narrow-souled people as with narrow-necked bottles: the less they have in them the more noise they make in pouring it out. 88. Men possessing small souls are gen- erally the authors of great evil. 89. Would you have others to befriend you, be friendly; would you have them to respect you, respect yourself. 90. One doth the blame, another bears the shame. 91. It is vain to use words when deeds are expected. 92. Kindle not a fire that you cannot ex- tinguish. 93. He that spends without regard shall want without pity. 94. A person with a bad name is already half hanged. 95. Experience without learning is better than learning without experience. 96. Consideration is the parent of wis- dom. 97. Reprove thy friend privately; com- mend him publicly. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 147 98. A man without reason is a beast in season. 99. When you go to dance take heed whom you take by the hand. 100. The life of life is society; of society, freedom; of freedom, the direct and mod- erate use of it. 101. A man gets no thanks for what he loseth at play. 102. Vice is most dangerous when it puts on the garb of virtue. 103. He who has no mind to trade with the devil should be so wise as to keep away from his shop. 104. Light cares speak; great ones are dumb. 105. People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy after. 106. Never reason from what you do not know. If you do, you will soon believe what is utterly against reason. 107. To endeavor to work upon the vul- gar with fine sense is like attempting to hew blocks with a razor. 148 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 1 08. Of all the dark catalogues of sins there is not one more vile and execrable than profaneness. 109. Less of your courtesy and more of your purse. no. He that buys what he does not want will soon want what he cannot buy. in. The overcurious are not overwise. 112. There are two things in which men, in other things wise enough, do usually miscarry — in putting off the making of their wills, and their repentance. 113. Try to be something in the world, and you will be something. 114. We promise according to our hopes, but perform according to our fears. 115. One good head is better than a great many hands. 116. Trust him little who praises all, him less who censures all, and him least who is indifferent about all. 117. He that maketh others fear him hath reason to fear them. 118. It is as great a point of wisdom to hide ignorance as to discover knowledge. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 149 119. Live in peace with all men; never- theless have but one counsellor. 120. He who shuts his eyes to some things saves his sight; but he who winks at all things is a fool. 121. He that builds his house with the wealth of others is collecting stones for his own grave. 122. Young men's construction is de- struction, and old men's destruction is con- struction. 123. He who injured thee was stronger or weaker; if weaker, spare him; if strong- er, spare yourself. 124. Beauty is the first present nature gives to women, and the first it takes away. 125. There is no place where weeds do not grow, and there is no heart where errors are not to be found. 126. A learned fool is more foolish than an ignorant fool. 127. Of all thieves fools are the worst; they rob you of time and temper. 128. It would be easier to endow a fool 150 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. with intellect than to persuade him that he had none. 129. Fear is the tax that conscience pays to guilt. 130. A fool may have his cap embroid- ered with gold, but it is a fool's cap still. 131. The dew of compassion is a tear. 132. Quick believers need broad shoul- ders. 133. Love is like the measles; all the worse when it comes late in life. 134. To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of ignorance. 134. Hypocrisy has become a fashion- able vice, and all fashionable vices pass for virtue. 135. Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds and the holiday of fools. 136. Home is the seminary of all other institutions. 137. Jealousy is the sister of love, as the devil is the brother of angels. 138. The ignorant hath an eagle's wings and an owl's eyes. 139. Love reasons without reason. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 151 140. Many are destined to reason wrong- ly; others not to reason at all, and others to persecute those who do reason. 141. No man can be wise on an empty stomach. 142. He that thinks he can afford to be negligent is not far from being poor. 143. Trifles make perfection, but perfec- tion is no trifle. 144. The religion of humanity is love. 145. Some men, like pictures, are fitter for a corner than a full light. 146. The childhood shows the man as morning shows the day. 147. Beauty is worse than wine; it in- toxicates both the holder and the beiiolder. 148. Affectation is a greater enemy to the face than the smallpox. 149. An excuse is worse and more terri- ble than a lie; for an excuse is a lie guarded. 150. The difference between a rich man and a poor man is this: the former eats when he pleases, and the latter when he can get it. 152 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 151. "Impossible" is a word to be found in the dictionary of fools. 152. It is better to have nothing to do than to be doing nothing. 153. A jealous man sleeps dog-sleep. 1 54. Letters which are warmly sealed are often but coldly opened. 155. Never risk a joke, even the least of- fensive in its nature and the most common, with a person who is not well bred and possessed of sense to comprehend it. 156. The most difficult thing in life is to know yourself. 157. Impatience dries the blood sooner than age and sorrow. 158. The first and worst of all frauds is to cheat oneself. All sin is easy after that. 159. Pity those whom nature abuses, but never those who abuse nature. 160. The patient can oftener do without the doctor than the doctor without the pa- tient. 161. To him nothing is possible who is always dreaming of his past impossibilities. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 153 162. It is a great happiness to be praised by them that are most praiseworthy. 163. The more you speak of yourself, the more you are likely to lie. 164. Every man is a volume if you know how to read him. 165. The worst thing an old man can be is a lover. 166. If thou art a master, be sometimes blind; if a servant, sometimes deaf. 167. Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust. 168. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. 169. He who will not reason is a bigot; he who cannot is a fool, and he who dares not is a slave. 170. How many people live on the repu- tation of the reputation they might have made! 171. A broad hat does not always cover a wise head. 172. A nobody is just the person to find fault with everybody. 154 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 173. A fool never adores himself so much as when he has committed some great folly. 174. Those who have done nothing in the world are the very ones who imagine they can do everything. 175. A woman's heart, like the moon, is always changing; but there is always a man in it. 176. Self-preservation is the first law of nature, but too many in the world act as though it were the only one. 177. It is far better to have a red face than a black heart. 178. Fall not a victim to the face before you know what the body is. i7g. A cheerful face is nearly as good for an invalid as healthy weather. 180. He that lives upon hopes will die fasting. 181. Luck is ever waiting for something to turn up. Labor, with keen eyes and strong will, will turn up something. 182. Luck is the idol of the idle. 183. Beware, as long as you live, of judg- ing men by their outward appearance. PROVERBIAL WISDOM, 155 184. Every reply is an answer, but every answer is not a reply. 185. Deliberately consider whether a thing be practicable; if it be not practica- ble, do not attempt it. 186. They are never alone who are ac- companied by noble thoughts. 187. A hearty greeting does not always denote friendship. 188. Affront your friend in sport and you will lose him in earnest. 189. Middle age should protect young age and revere old age. 190. Every man, however wise, requires the advice of some sagacious friend in the affairs of life. 191. He alone is wise who can adapt himself to every condition of life. 192. This is now truly the golden age; highest honors are bought with gold; even love is purchased with gold. 193. Be wise worldly, but not worldly wise. 194. The way not to be disappointed in our expectations is not to expect too much. 156 PROVERBIAL, WISDOM. 195. Leisure for men of business, and business for men of leisure, would cure many complaints. 196. He that chooseth an apple by the skin and a man by the face may be de- ceived in the one and overshot by the other. 197. There is nothing more unbecoming than an old busybody. 198. It is hard for the face to conceal the thoughts of the heart, the true character of the soul. 199. Religious contention is the devil's harvest. 200. They that do nothing are in the readiest way to do that which is worse than nothing. 201. A single conversation across the table with a wise man is worth a month's study of books. 202. Better a blush on the face than a blot on the heart. 203. Remember that what you believe will depend very much upon what you are. 204. There is one person that is wiser than anybody, and that is everybody. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 157. 205. Never say you know a man till you have divided an inheritance with him. 205. Action may not always bring hap- piness; but there is no happiness without action. 206. Take time for all things. Great haste makes great waste. 207. He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else. 208. A bitter and perplexed "What shall I do?" is worse to man than worse neces- sity. 209. The man who builds and lacks wherewith to pay provides a home from which to run away. 210. Eat to please thyself, but dress to please others. 211. If honor be your clothing, the suit will last a lifetime; but if clothing be your honor, it will soon be worn threadbare. 212. The best lightning rod for your protection is your own spine. 213. There is a foolish corner even in the brain of the sage. 158 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 214. Young men think old men fools, and old men know young men to be so. 215. A happy family is an earlier heaven. 216. It is a matter of indifference to a fool whether you laugh at him or with him. 217. To Adam, Paradise was home; and among his descendants home is a paradise. 218. Experience is the most eloquent of preachers, but she never has a large con- gregation. 219. For three things there is no rem- edy; poverty associated with laziness, sick- ness coupled with old age, and enmity mixed with envy. 220. He is the happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace in his home. 221. He who has not forgiven an enemy has never yet tasted one of the most sub- lime enjoyments of life. 222. Mankind consists of two men; one who takes heed, the other of whom heed is taken. 223. A fool may be known by six things : anger, without cause; speech, without PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 159 profit; change, without progress; inquiry, without object; putting trust in a stranger; and mistaking foes for friends. 224. Happy is he who is admonished through others; unhappy if others are ad- monished through him. 225. Slumber not in the tents of your fathers. The world is advancing. Advance with it. 226. Waste not, want not; willful waste makes woeful want. 227. Three things too much and three things too little are pernicious to man; to speak much and know little; to spend much and have little ; to presume much and be worth little. 228. If nobody loves you, be sure it is your own fault. 229. Take heed of an ox before, and an ass behind, and a knave on all sides. 230. "Luck" is a very good word if you put a "P" before it. 231. "Better late than never" is not so good a maxim as "Better never late." 160 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 232. When wealth is lost, nothing is lost; when health is lost, something is lost; when character is lost, all is lost. 233. Whoever makes a father's heart to bleed shall have a child that will revenge the deed. 234. There are three kinds of people in the world: the wills, the won'ts, and the can'ts. The first accomplish everything; the second oppose everything; the third fail in everything. 235. A man in his own opinion deserves more than he receives; in the opinion of others, he receives more than he deserves. 236. One great difference between a wise man and a fool is the former only wishes for what he may possibly obtain; the latter desires impossibilities. 237. He is but the counterfeit of a man who has not the life of a man. 238. Many men are angry with them that tell them of their faults, when they should be angry only with the faults that are told them. PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 161 239. A woman's head is always influ- enced by her heart; but a man's heart is always influenced by his head. 240. There are three classes into which all old women are divided: first, that dear old soul; second, that old woman; and third, that old witch. 241. Lawless are they who make their wills their law. 242. It is better to hope and be disap- pointed than to be entirely hopeless. 243. Those who change their religion through selfish motives are generally such as have no religion to change. 244. Let there be a place for everything and everything in its place; also a time for everything and everything at its proper time. 245. He is a fool who thinks that another does not think. 246. When vice is united to fortune she changes her name. 247. Short visits, like short accounts, make long friends. 162 PROVERBIAL WISDOM. 248. Get work ! Be sure it is better than what you work to get. 249. Upright and do right make all right. Lbllr ■ J iif ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ I. '! ■ ■ • ■ ' >•■ ■