Samuel Butler

Priests are not men of the world; it is not intended that they should be; and a University training is the one best adapted to prevent their becoming so.

He has spent his life best who has enjoyed it most. God will take care that we do not enjoy it any more than is good for us.

It is a wise tune that knows its own father, and I like my music to be the legitimate offspring of respectable parents.

Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.

Logic is like the sword

If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do.

Principles have no real force except when one is well-fed.

It’s your life-but only if you make it so.

Events tend to recur in cycles.

Our minds want clothes as much as our bodies.

It is not where you start but how high you aim that matters for success.

A man cannot be said to succeed in this life who does not satisfy one friend.

Wine gives a man nothing. It neither gives him knowledge nor wit; it only animates a man, and enables him to bring out what a dread of the company has repressed. It only puts in motion what had been locked up in frost.

I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, and obsequious attendance, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board.

When you’re first figuring yourself out, you care so much about what people think of you.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

Whether he knew it or not, the life he lived was his penance. Punishing himself, for what he believes are his sins. Consciously or subconsciously, he creates the world he lives in. Never believing that he is deserving happiness, deserving joy. His self-destructive nature, in his eyes, and his eyes only, is justified. Everyone is deserving absolution, but he needs to understand, that he is the only one able to forgive himself.

I think a compliment ought to always precede a complaint, where one is possible, because it softens resentment and insures for the complaint a courteous and gentle reception.

As Love ought to bring them together, so it is the best Way to keep them well together.

Every man passes his life in the search after friendship.

The faults of the burglar are the qualities of the financier.