There are times when it would seem as if God fished with a line, and the
devil with a net.--_Madame Swetchine._
~Tenderness.~--When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our
tenderness that we repent of, but our severity.--_George Eliot._
~Theatre.~--A man who enters the theatre is immediately struck with the
view of so great a multitude, participating of one common amusement; and
experiences, from their very aspect, a superior sensibility or
disposition of being affected with every sentiment which he shares with
his fellow-creatures.--_Hume._
The theatre has often been at variance with the pulpit; they ought not
to quarrel. How much it is to be wished that the celebration of nature
and of God were intrusted to none but men of noble minds!--_Goethe._
~Theories.~--Most men take least notice of what is plain, as if that were
of no use; but puzzle their thoughts, and lose themselves in those vast
depths and abysses which no human understanding can fathom.--_Sherlock._
Metaphysicians can unsettle things, but they can erect nothing. They can
pull down a church, but they cannot build a hovel.--_Cecil._
~Thought.~--I have asked several men what passes in their minds when they
are thinking, and I could never find any man who could think for two
minutes together. Everybody has seemed to admit that it was a perpetual
deviation from a particular path, and a perpetual return to it; which,
imperfect as the operation is, is the only method in which we can
operate with our minds to carry on any process of thought.--_Sydney
Smith._