Samuel Butler

The want of money is the root of all evil.

I believe that he was really sorry that people would not believe he was sorry that he was not more sorry.

Neither have they hearts to stay, nor wit enough to run away.

The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore.

Letters are like wine; if they are sound they ripen with keeping. A man should lay down letters as he does a cellar of wine.

Union may be strength, but it is mere blind brute strength unless wisely directed.

Humility and knowledge in poor clothes excel pride and ignorance in costly attire.

The nose of the bulldog has been slanted backwards so that he can breathe without letting go.

The squirrel that you kill in jest, dies in earnest.

One may make their house a palace of sham, or they can make it a home, a refuge.

Merry Christmas! the man threatened.

That strong mother doesn’t tell her cub ‘Son, stay weak so the wolves can get you’. She says, ‘Toughen up, this is reality we are living in’.

Every reform was once a private opinion, and when it shall be a private opinion again, it will solve the problem of the age.

Youth enters the world with very happy prejudices in her own favor. She imagines herself not only certain of accomplishing every adventure, but of obtaining those rewards which the accomplishment may deserve. She is not easily persuaded to believe that the force of merit can be resisted by obstinacy and avarice, or its luster darkened by envy and malignity.

We are chameleons, and our partialities and prejudices change place with an easy and blessed facility, and we are soon wonted to the change and happy in it.

I’m not denyin’ the women are foolish. God Almighty made ’em to match the men.

The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.

A word once uttered can never be recalled.

How some of the writers I come across get through their books without dying of boredom is beyond me.

If you strike a child, take care that you strike it in anger, even at the risk of maiming it for life. A blow in cold blood neither can nor should be forgiven.

A prudent question is one-half of wisdom.