Samuel Butler

The three most important things a man has are, briefly, his private parts, his money, and his religious opinions.

Parents are the last people on earth who ought to have children.

Logic is like the sword – those who appeal to it, shall perish by it.

When a man is in doubt about this or that in his writing, it will often guide him if he asks himself how it will tell a hundred years hence.

Silence is not always tact, but it is tact that is golden, not silence.

There is no such source of error as the pursuit of truth.

Your path will unfold as you walk it, step by step, each one a choice. Be mindful of where you put your feet; sometimes you will step on something sharp. This is a lesson; pay attention. Sometimes you will walk on soft green grass and you will stop and stay awhile. Enjoy those moments. Keep your eyes and heart on your destination and discover your way, one step at a time.

Natural abilities are like natural plants; they need pruning by study.

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.

A man cannot speak but he judges himself. With his will or against his will he draws his portrait to the eye of his companions by every word. Every opinion reacts on him who utters it. It is a threadball thrown at a mark, but the other end remains on the thrower.

One thing you learn: if you want to reveal yourself, you also have to know where to stop.

Let us treat the men and women well: treat them as if they were real: perhaps they are.

Do not tell me of my obligation to put all poor men in good situations. Are they my poor? I tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent, I give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong.

What you do makes a difference. And you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.

Language is a city to the building of which every human being brought a stone.

A graceful and pleasing figure is a perpetual letter of recommendation.

Sad people dislike the happy, and the happy the sad; the quick thinking the sedate, and the careless the busy and industrious.

Just praise is only a debt, but flattery is a present.

The first condition of progress is the removal of censorship.

When the eyes say one thing, and the tongue another, a practiced man relies on the language of the first.