Book of Wise Sayings, W. A. Clouston [best book clubs TXT] 📗
- Author: W. A. Clouston
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Sa’dī.
The potter forms what he pleases with soft clay, so a man accomplishes his works by his own act.
Hitopadesa.
No man of high and generous spirit is ever willing to indulge in flattery; the good may feel affection for others, but will not flatter them.
Aristotle.
An ass will with his long ears fray
The flies that tickle him away;
But man delights to have his ears
Blown maggots in by flatterers.
Butler.
Books are pleasant, but if by being over-studious we impair our health and spoil our good humour, two of the best things we have, let us give it over. I, for my part, am one of those who think no fruit derived from them can recompense so great a loss.
Montaigne.
He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace in his home.
Goethe.
If with a stranger thou discourse, first learn,
By strictest observation, to discern
If he be wiser than thyself, if so,
Be dumb, and rather choose by him to know;
But if thyself perchance the wiser be,
Then do thou speak, that he may learn by thee.
Randolph.
Being continually in people’s sight, by the satiety which it creates, diminishes the reverence felt for great characters.
Livy.
There is a great difference between one who can feel ashamed before his own soul and one who is only ashamed before his fellow men.
Talmud.
By rousing himself, by earnestness, by restraint and control the wise man may make for himself an island which no flood can overwhelm.
Dhammapada.
The best way to make ourselves agreeable to others is by seeming to think them so. If we appear fully sensible of their good qualities they will not complain of the want of them in us.
Hazlitt.
To form a judgment intuitively is the privilege of few; authority and example lead the rest of the world. They see with the eyes of others, they hear with the ears of others. Therefore it is very easy to think as all the world now think; but to think as all the world will think thirty years hence is not in the power of every one.
Schopenhauer.
Poesy is a beauteous damsel, chaste, honourable, discreet, witty, retired, and who keeps herself within the limits of propriety. She is a friend of solitude; fountains entertain her, meadows console her, woods free her from ennui, flowers delight her; in short, she gives pleasure and instruction to all with whom she communicates.
Cervantes.
How can we learn to know ourselves? By reflection, never, but by our actions. Attempt to do your duty, and you will immediately find what is in you.
Goethe.
Man is supreme lord and master
Of his own ruin and disaster,
Controls his fate, but nothing less
In ordering his own happiness:
For all his care and providence
Is too feeble a defence
To render it secure and certain
Against the injuries of Fortune;
And oft, in spite of all his wit,
Is lost by one unlucky hit,
And ruined with a circumstance,
And mere punctilio of a chance.
Butler.
There is nothing in this world which a resolute man, who exerts himself, cannot attain.
Somadeva.
Ere need be shown, some men will act,
As trees may fruit without a flower;
To some you speak with no result,
As seeds may die, and yield no grain.
Hindu Poetess.
Seven things characterise the wise man, and seven the blockhead. The wise man speaks not before those who are his superiors, either in age or wisdom. He interrupts not others in the midst of their discourse. He replies not hastily. His questions are relevant to the subject, his answers, to the purpose. In delivering his sentiments he taketh the first in order first, the last, last. What he understands not he says, “I understand not.” He acknowledges his error, and is open to conviction. The reverse of all this characterises the blockhead.
Talmud.
How absolute and omnipotent is the silence of the night! And yet the stillness seems almost audible. From all the measureless depths of air around us comes a half sound, a half whisper, as if we could hear the crumbling and falling away of the earth and all created things in the great miracle of nature—decay and reproduction—ever beginning, never ending—the gradual lapse and running of the sand in the great hour-glass of Time.
Longfellow.
What avails your wealth, if it makes you arrogant to the poor?
Arabic.
All confidence is dangerous unless it is complete; there are few circumstances in which it is not better either to hide all or to tell all.
La Bruyère.
It is well that there is no one without a fault, for he would not have a friend in the world: he would seem to belong to a different species.
Hazlitt.
The mind alike,
Vigorous or weak, is capable of culture,
But still bears fruit according to its nature.
’Tis not the teacher’s skill that rears the scholar:
The sparkling gem gives back the glorious radiance
It drinks from other light, but the dull earth
Absorbs the blaze, and yields no gleam again.
Bhavabhūti.
One man envies the success in life of another, and hates him in secret; nor is he willing to give him good advice when he is consulted, except it be by some wonderful effort of good feeling, and there are, alas, few such men in the world. A real friend, on the other hand, exults in his friend’s happiness, rejoices in all his joys, and is ready to afford him the best advice.
Herodotus.
This body is a tent which for a space
Does the pure soul with kingly presence grace;
When he departs, comes the tent-pitcher, Death,
Strikes it, and moves to a new halting-place.
Omar Khayyām.
Speak but little, and that little only when thy own purposes require it. Heaven has given thee two ears but only one tongue, which means: listen to two things, but be not the first to propose one.
Hāfiz.
The natural hostility of beasts is laid aside when flying from pursuers; so also when danger is impending the enmity of rivals is ended.
Bhāravi.
He who toils with pain will eat with pleasure.
Chinese.
A day of fortune is like a harvest-day, we must be busy when the corn is ripe.
Goethe.
The fame of good men’s actions seldom goes beyond their own doors, but their evil deeds are carried a thousand miles’ distance.
Chinese.
A subtle-witted man is like an arrow, which, rending little surface, enters deeply, but they whose minds are dull resemble stones dashing with clumsy force, but never piercing.
Māgha.
It is good to tame the mind, which is difficult to hold in, and flighty, rushing wheresoever it listeth: a tamed mind brings blessings.
Dhammapada.
The man who every sacred science knows,
Yet has not strength to keep in check the foes
That rise within him, mars his Fortune’s fame,
And brings her by his feebleness to shame.
Bhāravi.
What a rich man gives and what he consumes, that is his real worth.
Hitopadesa.
He who does not think too much of himself is much more esteemed than he imagines.
Goethe.
It is a kind of policy in these days to prefix a fantastical title to a book which is to be sold; for as larks come down to a day-net, many vain readers will tarry and stand gazing, like silly passengers, at an antic picture in a painter’s shop that will not look at a judicious piece.
Burton.
With many readers brilliancy of style passes for affluence of thought: they mistake buttercups in the grass for immeasurable gold mines under the ground.
Longfellow.
The doctrine that enters only into the ear is like the repast one takes in a dream.
Chinese.
Adorn thy mind with knowledge, for knowledge maketh thy worth.
Firdausī.
Men hail the rising sun with glee,
They love his setting glow to see,
But fail to mark that every day
In fragments bears their life away.
All Nature’s face delight to view,
As changing seasons come anew;
None sees how each revolving year
Abridges swiftly man’s career.
Ramāyāna.
The good man shuns evil and follows good; he keeps secret that which ought to be hidden; he makes his virtues manifest to all; he does not forsake one in adversity; he gives in season: such are the marks of a worthy friend.
Bhartrihari.
No one hath come into the world for a continuance save him who leaveth behind him a good name.*
Sa’dī.
* Cf. 29.
Gross ignorance produces a dogmatic spirit. He who knows nothing thinks he can teach others what he has himself just been learning. He who knows much scarcely believes that what he is saying is unknown to others, and consequently speaks with more hesitation.
La Bruyère.
When you see a man elated with pride, glorying in his riches and high descent, rising even above fortune, look out for his speedy punishment; for he is only raised the higher that he may fall with a heavier crash.
Menander.
The ridiculous is produced by any defect that is unattended by pain, or fatal consequences; thus, an ugly and deformed countenance does not fail to cause laughter, if it is not occasioned by pain.
Aristotle.
Happy the man who early learns the difference between his wishes and his powers.
Goethe.
There is nothing more pitiable in the world than an irresolute man vacillating between two feelings, who would willingly unite the two, and who does not perceive that nothing can unite them.
Goethe.
Beauty in a modest woman is like fire at a distance, or like a sharp sword: neither doth the one burn nor the other wound him that comes not too near them.
Cervantes.
We are more sociable and get on better with people by the heart than the intellect.
La Bruyère.
A good man may fall, but he falls like a ball [and rebounds]; the ignoble man falls like a lump of clay.
Bhartrihari.
Do not anxiously expect what is not yet come; do not vainly regret what is already past.
Chinese.
The way to subject all things to thyself is to subject thyself to reason; thou shalt govern many if reason govern thee. Wouldst thou be a monarch of a little world, command thyself.
Quarles.
If our inward griefs were written on our brows, how many who are envied now would be pitied. It would seem that they had their deadliest foe in their own breast, and their whole happiness would be reduced to mere seeming.
Metastasio.
There are many who talk on from ignorance rather than from knowledge, and who find the former an inexhaustible fund of conversation.
Hazlitt.
Whoever brings cheerfulness to his work, and is ever active, dashes through the world’s labours.
Tieck.
Grossness is not difficult to
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