Samuel Butler

The voice of the Lord is the voice of common sense, which is shared by all that is.

Let us be grateful to the mirror for revealing to us our appearance only.

The Ancient Mariner would not have taken so well if it had been called The Old Sailor.

To himself everyone is an immortal. He may know that he is going to die, but he can never know that he is dead.

In matrimony, to hesitate is sometimes to be saved.

The function of vice is to keep virtue within reasonable bounds.

We perceive and are affected by changes too subtle to be described.

Perhaps his might be one of the natures where a wise estimate of consequences is fused in the fires of that passionate belief which determines the consequences it believes in.

In conversation the game is, to say something new with old words. And you shall observe a man of the people picking his way along, step by step, using every time an old boulder, yet never setting his foot on an old place.

Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider.

He who praises everybody, praises nobody.

He is the best sailor who can steer within the fewest points of the wind, and exact a motive power out of the greatest obstacles.

Human life is as evanescent as the morning dew or a flash of lightning.

From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.

The world is its own magic.

Certainly virtue is like precious odors, most fragrant when they are incensed, or crushed: for prosperity does best discover vice, but adversity does best discover virtue.

You are a product of your environment. So choose the environment that will best develop you toward your objective. Analyze your life in terms of its environment. Are the things around you helping you toward success – or are they holding you back?

Slanderers do not hurt me because they do not hit me.

The moment we want to believe something, we suddenly see all the arguments for it, and become blind to the arguments against it.

Upon retiring, sleep as if you had entered your last sleep. Upon awakening, leave your bed behind you instantly as if you had cast away a pair of old shoes.

There are some cases in which the sense of injury breeds – not the will to inflict injuries and climb over them as a ladder, but – a hatred of all injury.