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None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them; such persons covet secrets as a spendthrift covets money, for the purpose of circulation.

Charles Caleb Colton

A fool is often as dangerous to deal with as a knave, and always more incorrigible.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Dangerous Deal Fools
Let those who would affect singularity with success first determine to be very virtuous, and they will be sure to be very singular.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Affect Determination Success Virtue
Unlike the sun, intellectual luminaries shine brightest after they set.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Bright Intellectual Shine Sun
The Grecian’s maxim would indeed be a sweeping clause in Literature; it would reduce many a giant to a pygmy; many a speech to a sentence; and many a folio to a primer.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Literature Sentence Speech Talk
The true measure of your character is what you do when nobody’s watching.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Character Measurement True Watch
As the gout seems privileged to attack the bodies of the wealthy, so ennui seems to exert a similar prerogative over their minds.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Attack Body Mindset Privilege Wealth
Pride is less ashamed of being ignorant, than of being instructed, and she looks too high to find that, which very often lies beneath her.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Beneath Herself Ignorance Lying Pride Shame
Body and mind, like man and wife, do not always agree to die together.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Agreement Body Death Man Mindset Togetherness Wife
Most plagiarists, like the drone, have neither taste to select, industry to acquire, nor skill to improve, but impudently pilfer the honey ready prepared, from the hive.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Improvement Plagiarism Preparation Selection Skills Taste
There are two way of establishing a reputation, one to be praised by honest people and the other to be accused by rogues. It is best, however, to secure the first one, because it will always be accompanied by the latter.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Accompany Establishment Oneself Reputation Secure Way
The victim to too severe a law is considered as a martyr rather than a criminal.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Crime Severe Victim
A society composed of none but the wicked could not exist; it contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction, and without a flood, would be swept away from the earth by the deluge of its own iniquity.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Destruction Earth Existence Seed Society
I have somewhere seen it observed that we should make the same use of a book that the bee does of a flower: she steals sweets from it, but does not injure it.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Books Flower Injury Observation Steal
He that can enjoy the intimacy of the great, and on no occasion disgust them by familiarity, or disgrace himself by servility, proves that he is as perfect a gentleman by nature as his companions are by rank.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Enjoyment Grace Greatness Himself Intimacy Rank
God will excuse our prayers for ourselves whenever we are prevented from them by being occupied in such good works as to entitle us to the prayers of others.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

God Goodness Prayer Prevent Work
There are both dull correctness and piquant carelessness; it is needless to say which will command the most readers and have the most influence.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Care Command Influence Reading
It is easier to pretend to be what you are not than to hide what you really are; but he that can accomplish both has little to learn in hypocrisy.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Accomplishment Easy Hide Hypocrisy Learning Pretend
A coxcomb begins by determining that his own profession is the first; and he finishes by deciding that he is the first of profession.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Beginning Decision Determination Himself Professional
Light, whether it be material or moral, is the best reformer.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Best Light Material Moral
Justice to my readers compels me to admit that I write because I have nothing to do; justice to myself induces me to add that I will cease to write the moment I have nothing to say.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Admit Justice Moments Myself Reading
That is fine benevolence, finely executed, which, like the Nile, comes from hidden sources.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Execution Fine Hide Source
Silence is less injurious than a weak reply.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Injurious Reply Silence Weakness
Man is an embodied paradox, a bundle of contradictions.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Bundle Contradiction Man Paradox
We ask advice but we mean approbation.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Anand Thakur
Much may be done in those little shreds and patches of time which every day produces, and which most men throw away.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Away Man Production Throw Time
There is this difference between happiness and wisdom; he that thinks himself the happiest man, really is so; but he that thinks himself the wisest, is generally the greatest fool.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Difference Fools Greatness Happiness Wisdom
If you are under obligations to many, it is prudent to postpone the recompensing of one, until it be in your power to remunerate all; otherwise you will make more enemies by what you give, than by what you withhold.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Enemy Hold Obligation Power

None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them; such persons covet secrets as a spendthrift covets money, for the purpose of circulation.

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None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them; such persons covet secrets as a spendthrift covets money, for the purpose of circulation.

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Popular Authors

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