Grief is the agony of an instant; the indulgence of grief the blunder of a life |
Had it not been for you, I should have remained what I was when we first met, a prejudiced, narrow-minded being, with contracted sympathies and false knowledge, wasting my life on obsolete trifles, and utterly insensible to the privilege of living in this wondrous age of change and progress. |
He has not one single redeeming defect |
He has to learn that petulance is no sarcasm, and that insolence is not invective |
He is a great master of gibes and flouts and jeers |
He is a self-made man, very much in love with his creator. |
He made his conscience not his guide but his accomplice |
He traces the steam engine all the way back to the tea kettle. |
He traces the steam train always back to the kettle |
He was distinguished for ignorance; for he had only one idea, and that was wrong. |
He who anticipates his century is generally persecuted when living, and always pilfered when dead. |
His Christianity was muscular |
His shortcoming is his long staying. |
Honest people are easily deceived |
How very seldom do you encounter in the world a man of great abilities, acquirements, experience, who will unmask his mind, unbutton his brains, and pour forth in careless and picturesque phrase all the results of his studies and observation; his knowledge of men, books, and nature. On the contrary, if a man has by any chance an original idea, he hoards it as if it were old gold; and rather avoids the subject with which he is most conversant, from fear that you may appropriate his best thoughts. |