Poun ah fret cyaan pay ounce ah det
What good a educayshun if him got noh sens.
All kine ah fish eat man, but only shark get de blame.
So be subject to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double minded.
The deepest principle of human nature is the craving to be appreciated
Nothing is so fatiguing as the hanging on of an uncompleted task.
Whenever two people meet there are really six people present. There is each man as he sees himself, each man as the other person sees him, and each man as he really is.
Everybody should do at least two things each day that he hates to do, just for practice.
We must make automatic and habitual, as early as possible, as many useful actions as we can
If you want a quality, act as if you already had it. Try the “as if” technique.
Any object not interesting in itself may become interesting through becoming associated with an object in which interest already exists.
The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.
Even monkeys fall from trees.
A frog in a well does not know the great sea.
Clear sky, cultivate; rainy, read.
A few kind words can warm three winter months.
Time spent laughing is time spent with the kami.
Character can be built on daily routine.
A single arrow is easily broken, but ten in a bundle aren’t.
It’s better to lie a little than to be unhappy.
A crying child thrives.
Flattery is the best persuader.
Without a smiling face do not become a merchant.
All pursuits are mean in comparison with learning.
Man cannot reach perfection in a hundred years; he can fall in a day with time to spare.
Books are preserved minds.
To a person that does not wander, there is not enlightenment.
You can’t see the whole sky through a bamboo tube.
The reputation of a thousand years may be determined by the conduct of one hour.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
So let your light so shine before people, that they may see your good works, and may glorify your Father who is in Heaven.
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’s seat. So obey whatever they tell you to do—but do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. They bind heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves will not move them even with a finger. Everything they do is for the sake of being seen by others: they make their phylacteries broad and the borders of their garments enlarged, they love the honorary room at feasts and the chief seats in the synagogues, and they love to be greeted respectfully in the markets and have men call them “Rabbi, Rabbi.”
…The Kingdom of God is within you.
Don’t be surprised that I said unto you all, “You must be ‘born again.’”
Be in peace with many: nevertheless have but one counsellor of a thousand.
If you would get a friend, try him before you take him, and do not credit him easily.
Envy not the glory of a sinner: for you know not what shall be his end.
In the midst of the unwise, keep in the word till its time: but be continually among men that think.
There is no riches above the riches of the health of the body: and there is no pleasure above the joy of the heart.
Many therefore have refused to lend for other men’s ill dealing, fearing to be defrauded.
Yet have thou patience with a man in poor estate, and delay not to shew him mercy.
Neither consult with a woman touching her of whom she is jealous; neither with a coward in matters of war; nor with a merchant concerning exchange; nor with a buyer of selling; nor with an envious man of thankfulness; nor with an unmerciful man touching kindness; nor with the slothful for any work; nor with an hireling for a year of finishing work; nor with an idle servant of much business: hearken not unto these in any matter of counsel.
A losing football team looks at excuses. A championship football team looks at solutions.
Labor, if it were not necessary for existence, would be indispensable for the happiness of man.
Much time is lost in regretting the time which had been lost before.
Men are seldom satisfied with praise introduced or followed by any mention of defect.
A man should be careful never to tell tales of himself to his own disadvantage. People may be amused and laugh at the time, but they will be remembered, and brought out against him upon some subsequent occasion.
A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little good.
Those who will not take the trouble to think for themselves, have always somebody that thinks for them…
If we will have the kindness of others, we must endure their follies. He who cannot persuade himself to withdraw from society, must be content to pay a tribute of his time to a multitude of tyrants; to the loiterer, who makes appointments which he never keeps; to the consulter, who asks advice which he never takes; to the boaster, who blusters only to be praised; to the complainer, who whines only to be pitied; to the projector, whose happiness is to entertain his friends with expectations which all but himself know to be vain; to the economist, who tells of bargains and settlements; to the politician, who predicts the fate of battles and breach of alliances; to the usurer, who compares the different funds; and to the talker, who talks only because he loves to be talking.
No sooner do we sit down to enjoy our acquisitions, than we find them insufficient to fill up the vacuities of life.
The desires of man increase with his acquisitions; every step which he advances brings something within his view, which he did not see before, and which, as soon as he sees it, he begins to want. Where necessity ends, curiosity begins; and no sooner are we supplied with every thing that nature can demand, than we sit down to contrive artificial appetites.
By this restlessness of mind, every populous and wealthy city is filled with innumerable employments, for which the greater part of mankind is without a name; with artificers, whose labour is exerted in producing such petty conveniencies, that many shops are furnished with instruments, of which the use can hardly be found without inquiry, but which he that once knows them quickly learns to number among necessary things.
What is read with delight is commonly retained, because pleasure always secures attention…
We are inclined to believe those whom we do not know because they have never deceived us.
Sir, there is nothing by which a man exasperates most people more, than by displaying a superiour ability or brilliancy in conversation. They seem pleased at the time; but their envy makes them curse him in their hearts.
It is common to overlook what is near, by keeping the eye fixed upon something remote. In the same manner, present opportunities are neglected, and attainable good is slighted, by minds busied in extensive ranges, and intent upon future advantages.
There would however be few enterprises of great labour or hazard undertaken, if we had not the power of magnifying the advantages which we persuade ourselves to expect of them. …
Every man, however hopeless his pretensions may appear to all but himself, has some project by which he hopes to rise to reputation; some art by which he imagines that the notice of the world will be attracted; some quality, good or bad, which discriminates him from the common herd of mortals, and by which others may be persuaded to love, or compelled to fear him.
No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library; for who can see the wall crowded on every side by mighty volumes, the works of laborious meditations and accurate inquiry, now scarcely known but by the catalogue...
It is not often that any man can have so much knowledge of another as is necessary to make instruction useful. We are sometimes not ourselves conscious of the original motives of our actions; and when we know them, our first care is to hide them from the sight of others... It is, therefore, very probable, that he who endeavours to cure our intellectual maladies, mistakes their cause; and that his prescriptions avail nothing, because he knows not which of the passions or desires is vitiated.
Every thing future is to be estimated, by a wise man, in proportion to the probability of attaining it and its value, when attained…
The most authentick witnesses of any man’s character are those who know him in his own family, and see him without any restraint, or rule of conduct, but such as he voluntarily prescribes to himself.
No cause more frequently produces bashfulness than too high an opinion of our own importance.
…The truth is, that no man is much regarded by the rest of the world. He that considers how little he dwells upon the condition of others, will learn how little the attention of others is attracted by himself.
A request made with diffidence and timidity is easily denied, because the petitioner himself seems to doubt its fitness…
We have less reason to be surprised or offended when we find others differ from us in opinion, because we very often differ from ourselves.
To strive with difficulties, and to conquer them, is the highest human felicity; the next is, to strive, and deserve to conquer: but he whose life has passed without a contest, and who can boast neither success nor merit, can survey himself only as a useless filler of existence; and if he is content with his own character, must owe his satisfaction to insensibility.
….He who expects from mankind, that they should give up established customs in compliance with his single will, and exacts that deference which he does not pay, may be endured, but can never be approved. …
Whoever commits a fraud is guilty not only of the particular injury to him who he deceives, but of the diminution of that confidence which constitutes not only the ease but the existence of society.
It is true, that no diligence can ascertain success; death may intercept the swiftest career; but he who is cut off in the execution of an honest undertaking has at least the honour of falling in his rank, and has fought the battle, though he missed the victory.
Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble.
Praise, like gold and diamonds, owes its value only to its scarcity.
No estimate is more in danger of erroneous calculations than those by which a man computes the force of his own genius.
Leisure and curiosity might soon make great advances in useful knowledge, were they not diverted by minute emulation and laborious trifles.
Scarce any man becomes eminently disagreeable but by a departure from his real character, and an attempt at something for which nature or education has left him unqualified.
That kind of life is most happy which affords us most opportunities of gaining our own esteem.
...As a man advances in life, he gets what is better than admiration,—judgement, to estimate things at their true value.
My poor friend Smart showed the disturbance of his mind, by falling upon his knees, and saying his prayers in the street, or in any other unusual place. Now although, rationally speaking, it is greater madness not to pray at all, than to pray as Smart did, I am afraid there are so many who do not pray that their understanding is not called in question.
Those who have attempted much, have seldom failed to perform more than those who never deviate from the common roads of action: many valuable preparations of chymistry are supposed to have risen from unsuccessful enquiries after the grand elixir: it is, therefore, just to encourage those who endeavour to enlarge the power of art, since they often succeed beyond expectation; and when they fail, may sometimes benefit the world even by their miscarriages.
Every man has something to do which he neglects; every man has faults to conquer which he delays to combat.
I have now spent fifty-five years in resolving: having, from the earliest time almost that I can remember, been forming plans of a better life. I have done nothing. The need of doing, therefore, is pressing, since the time of doing is short.
He that in the latter part of his life too strictly inquires what he has done, can very seldom receive from his own heart such an account as will give him satisfaction.
The best teachers of humanity are the lives of great men.
Nothing makes you more tolerant of a neighbor’s noisy party than being there.
I never looked at the consequences of missing a big shot… When you think about the consequences you always think of a negative result.
We never see the target a man aims at in life. We see only the target he hits. We judge from results, and we imagine an infinity of motives that must have been in the man’s mind. No human being since creation has been able to live a life so pure and noble as to exempt him from the misjudgement of those around him. It is impossible to get anything but a distorted image from a convex or a concave mirror.
Man’s conscious influence, when he is on dress-parade, when he is posing to impress those around him,--is woefully small. But his unconscious influence, the silent, subtle radiation of his personality, the effect of his words and acts, the trifles he never considers,--is tremendous.
The earth and myself are of one mind.
I believe much trouble and blood would be saved if we opened our hearts more.
A thought is often original, though you have uttered it a hundred times. It has come to you over a new route, by a new and express train of associations. (Pensees)
The aim of an argument or of a discussion should not be victory, but progress.
We may convince others by our arguments; but we can only persuade them by their own.
Children need models more than they need critics.
In order to be happy, think of the ills you have been spared.
We begin life with the world presenting itself to us as it is. Someone—our parents, teachers, analysts—hypnotizes us to “see” the world and construe it in the “right” way. These others label the world, attach names and give voices to the beings and events in it, so that thereafter, we cannot read the world in any other language or hear it saying other things to us. The task is to break the hypnotic spell, so that we become undeaf, unblind and multilingual, thereby letting the world speak to us in new voices and write all its possible meanings in the new book of our existence. Be careful in your choice of hypnotists.
The greatest and most important problems of life are all in a certain sense insoluble. … They can never be solved but only outgrown.
Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.
Men who are unequal to the labor of discussing an argument or wish to avoid it, are willing enough to suppose that much has been proved because much has been said.