Constant success shows us but one side of the world. For as it surrounds us with friends who will tell us only our merits, so it silences those enemies from whom alone we can learn our defects.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONConstant success shows us but one side of the world. For as it surrounds us with friends who will tell us only our merits, so it silences those enemies from whom alone we can learn our defects.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONTotal freedom from error is what none of us will allow to our neighbors; however we may be inclined to flirt a little with such spotless perfection ourselves.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONPain may be said to follow pleasure as its shadow; but the misfortune is that in this particular case, the substance belongs to the shadow, the emptiness to its cause.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONCheerfulness ought to be the viaticum vitae of their life to the old; age without cheerfulness is a Lapland winter without a sun.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONA fool is often as dangerous to deal with as a knave, and always more incorrigible.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONHe that places himself neither higher nor lower than he ought to do exercises the truest humility.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONGreat men, like comets, are eccentric in their courses, and formed to do extensive good by modes unintelligible to vulgar minds.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONDeliberate with caution, but act with decision and yield with graciousness, or oppose with firmness.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONIt may be observed of good writing, as of good blood, that it is much easier to say what it is composed of than to compose it.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONWe ask advice but we mean approbation.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONThe French have a saying that whatever excellence a man may exhibit in a public station he is very apt to be ridiculous in a private one.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONBed is a bundle of paradoxes: we go to it with reluctance, yet we quit it with regret.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONLet those who would affect singularity with success first determine to be very virtuous, and they will be sure to be very singular.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONAs the gout seems privileged to attack the bodies of the wealthy, so ennui seems to exert a similar prerogative over their minds.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONTrue friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it is lost.
CHARLES CALEB COLTONIt is better to meet danger than to wait for it. He that is on a lee shore, and foresees a hurricane, stands out to sea and encounters a storm to avoid a shipwreck.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON