Physical ills are the taxes laid upon this wretched life; some are taxed higher, and some lower, but all pay something.
Know the true value of time; snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it.
It is always right to detect a fraud, and to perceive a folly; but it is very often wrong to expose either. A man of business should always have his eyes open, but must often seem to have them shut.
Custom has made dancing sometimes necessary for a young man; therefore mind it while you learn it, that you may learn to do it well, and not be ridiculous, though in a ridiculous act.
Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable. However, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable.
Young men are apt to think themselves wise enough, as drunken men are apt to think themselves sober enough.
Sex: the pleasure is momentary, the position ridiculous, and the expense damnable.
Patience is the most necessary quality for business, many a man would rather you heard his story than grant his request.
I sometimes give myself admirable advice, but I am incapable of taking it.
Take care in your minutes, and the hours will take care of themselves.
Dispatch is the soul of business, and nothing contributes more to Dispatch than Method.
Wear your learning like your watch, in a private pocket; and do not pull it out, and strike it, merely to show that you have one.
Common sense is the best sense I know of.
Character must be kept bright as well as clean.
He makes people pleased with him by making them first pleased with themselves.
Inferiority is what you enjoy in your best friends.
A novel must be exceptionally good to live as long as the average cat.
Hear one side and you will be in the dark. Hear both and all will be clear.
Whoever incites anger has a strong insurance against indifference.
In my mind, there is nothing so illiberal, and so ill-bred, as audible laughter.
Gratitude is a burden upon our imperfect nature, and we are but too willing to ease ourselves of it, or at least to lighten it as much as we can.
Our prejudices are our mistresses; reason is at best our wife, very often heard indeed, but seldom minded.
Swift speedy time, feathered with flying hours, Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow.
You must look into people as well as at them.
Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds.
Knowledge of the world in only to be acquired in the world, and not in a closet.
To govern mankind, one must not overrate them.
Politicians neither love nor hate. Interest, not sentiment, directs them.
Any affectation whatsoever in dress implies, in my mind, a flaw in the understanding.
The rich are always advising the poor, but the poor seldom return the compliment.
Remember, as long as you live, that nothing but strict truth can carry you through the world, with either your conscience or your honor unwounded.
Good humor is the health of the soul, sadness is its poison.
Choose your pleasures for yourself and do not let them be imposed upon you.
You foolish man, you don't even know your own foolish business.
I recommend you to take care of the minutes, for the hours will take care of themselves.
A man of sense only trifles with them, plays with them, humors and flatters them, as he does with a sprightly and forward child; but he neither consults them about, nor trusts them with, serious matters.
Pleasure is a necessary reciprocal. No one feels, who does not at the same time give it. To be pleased, one must please. What pleases you in others, will in general please them in you.
Business by no means forbids pleasures; on the contrary, they reciprocally season each other; and I will venture to affirm that no man enjoys either in perfection that does not join both.
Men, as well as women, are much oftener led by their hearts than by their understandings.
Be your character what it will, it will be known; and nobody will take it upon your word.
In the mass of mankind, I fear, there is too great a majority of fools and knaves; who, singly from their number, must to a certain degree be respected, though they are by no means respectable.
Being pretty on the inside means you don't hit your brother and you eat all your peas - that's what my grandma taught me.
It is an undoubted truth, that the less one has to do, the less time one finds to do it in.
To have frequent recourse to narrative betrays great want of imagination.
The mere brute pleasure of reading - the sort of pleasure a cow must have in grazing.
As fathers commonly go, it is seldom a misfortune to be fatherless; and considering the general run of sons, as seldom a misfortune to be childless.
Know the true value of time snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it. No idleness, no laziness, no procrastination: never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.
I look upon indolence as a sort of suicide; for the man is effectually destroyed, though the appetites of the brute may survive.
A weak mind is like a microscope, which magnifies trifling things, but cannot receive great ones.
