Our real blessings often appear to us in the shape of pains, losses and disappointments; but let us have patience and we soon shall see them in their proper figures.
Among all kinds of Writing, there is none in which Authors are more apt to miscarry than in Works of Humour, as there is none in which they are more ambitious to excel.
The only way therefore to try a Piece of Wit, is to translate it into a different Language: If it bears the Test you may pronounceit true; but if it vanishes in the Experiment you may conclude it to have been a Punn.
it would generally be found that he had suffered more from the apprehension of such evils as never happened to him than from those evils which had really befallen him.
To this end, nothing is to be more carefully consulted than plainness. In a lady’s attire this is the single excellence; for to be what some people call fine, is the same vice, in that case, as to be florid is in writing or speaking.
I consider the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow: when I see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world with their contests and disputes.
A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world; and if in the present life his happiness arises from the subduing of his desires, it will arise in the next from the gratification of them.
What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but scattered along life’s pathway, the good they do is inconceivable.
