decisive hour. Write it on your heart that every day is the best day
in the year. No man has learned anything rightly, until he knows that
every day is Doomsday.--EMERSON.
What is really momentous and all-important with us is the present, by
which the future is shaped and colored.--WHITTIER.
PRESS.--In the long, fierce struggle for freedom of opinion, the press,
like the Church, counted its martyrs by thousands.--JAMES A. GARFIELD.
The productions of the press, fast as steam can make and carry them,
go abroad through all the land, silent as snowflakes, but potent as
thunder. It is an additional tongue of steam and lightning, by which a
man speaks his first thought, his instant argument or grievance, to
millions in a day.--CHAPIN.
Let it be impressed upon your minds, let it be instilled into your
children, that the liberty of the press is the palladium of all the
civil, political, and religious rights.--JUNIUS.
The liberty of the press is the true measure of all other liberty; for
all freedom without this must be merely nominal.--CHATFIELD.
The invention of printing added a new element of power to the race.
From that hour, in a most especial sense, the brain and not the arm,
the thinker and not the soldier, books and not kings, were to rule the
world; and weapons, forged in the mind, keen-edged and brighter than
the sunbeam, were to supplant the sword and the battle-axe.--WHIPPLE.
PRETENSION.--It is worth noticing that those who assume an imposing
demeanor and seek to pass themselves off for something beyond what
they are, are not unfrequently as much underrated by some as overrated
by others.--WHATELY.
Where there is much pretension, much has been borrowed: nature never
pretends.--LAVATER.
When you see a man with a great deal of religion displayed in his shop
window, you may depend upon it he keeps a very small stock of it
within.--SPURGEON.
True glory strikes root, and even extends itself; all false pretensions
fall as do flowers, nor can anything feigned be lasting.--CICERO.
It is no disgrace not to be able to do everything; but to undertake,
or pretend to do, what you are not made for, is not only shameful, but
extremely troublesome and vexatious.--PLUTARCH.
He who gives himself airs of importance, exhibits the credentials of
impotence.--LAVATER.
The desire of appearing clever often prevents our becoming so.
--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.
The more honesty a man has, the less he affects the air of a saint.
--LAVATER.
PRIDE.--Without the sovereign influence of God's extraordinary and
immediate grace, men do very rarely put off all the trappings of their
pride, till they who are about them put on their winding-sheet.
--CLARENDON.
Pride and weakness are Siamese twins.--LOWELL.
Of all the causes that conspire to blind
Man's erring judgment, and misguide the mind,
What the weak head with strongest bias rules,
Is pride, the never-failing vice of fools.
--POPE.
It is hardly possible to overvalue ourselves but by undervaluing our
neighbors.--CLARENDON.
The sin of pride is the sin of sins; in which all subsequent sins are
included, as in their germ; they are but the unfolding of this one.
--ARCHBISHOP TRENCH.
Some people are proud of their humility.--BEECHER.
Pride requires very costly food--its keeper's happiness.--COLTON.
Pride, of all others the most dangerous fault,
Proceeds from want of sense, or want of thought.
--ROSCOMMON.
If a man has a right to be proud of anything, it is of a good action
done as it ought to be, without any base interest lurking at the
bottom of it.--STERNE.
There is this paradox in pride,--it makes some men ridiculous, but
prevents others from becoming so.--COLTON.
In reality, there is perhaps no one of our natural passions so hard to
subdue as pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, stifle it, mortify it
as much as you please, it is still alive, and will every now and then
peep out and show itself.--FRANKLIN.
Men say, "By pride the angels fell from heaven." By pride they reached
a place from which they fell!--JOAQUIN MILLER.
Pride breakfasted with plenty, dined with poverty, and supped with
infamy.--FRANKLIN.
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
--PROVERBS 16:18.
If he could only see how small a vacancy his death would leave, the
proud man would think less of the place he occupies in his lifetime.
--LEGOUVÉ.
I think half the troubles for which men go slouching in prayer to God
are caused by their intolerable pride. Many of our cares are but a
morbid way of looking at our privileges. We let our blessings get
mouldy, and then call them curses.--BEECHER.
When pride and presumption walk before, shame and loss follow very
closely.--LOUIS XI.
How can there be pride in a contrite heart? Humility is the earliest
fruit of religion.--HOSEA BALLOU.
In beginning the world, if you don't wish to get chafed at every turn,
fold up your pride carefully, put it under lock and key, and only let
it out to air upon grand occasions. Pride is a garment all stiff
brocade outside, all grating sackcloth on the side next to the skin.
--LYTTON.
Pride is a vice, which pride itself inclines every man to find in
others, and to overlook in himself.--DR. JOHNSON.
An avenging God closely follows the haughty.--SENECA.
Charity feeds the poor, so does pride; charity builds an hospital, so
does pride. In this they differ: charity gives her glory to God; pride
takes her glory from man.--QUARLES.
The proud man is forsaken of God.--PLATO.
PROCRASTINATION.--Faith in to-morrow, instead of Christ, is Satan's
nurse for man's perdition.--REV. DR. CHEEVER.
To be always intending to live a new life, but never to find time to
set about it; this is as if a man should put off eating and drinking
and sleeping from one day and night to another, till he is starved and
destroyed.--TILLOTSON.
By the streets of "By and By" one arrives at the house of "Never."
--CERVANTES.
By one delay after another they spin out their whole lives, till
there's no more future left for them.--L'ESTRANGE.
Procrastination is the thief of time.--YOUNG.
For Yesterday was once To-morrow.--PERSIUS.
Never leave that till to-morrow which you can do to-day.--FRANKLIN.
Indulge in procrastination, and in time you will come to this, that
because a thing ought to be done, therefore you can't do it.--CHARLES
BUXTON.
PROGRESS.--He only is advancing in life whose heart is getting softer,
whose blood warmer, whose brain quicker, whose spirit is entering into
living peace.--RUSKIN.
"Can any good come out of Nazareth?" This is always the question of
the wiseacres and the knowing ones. But the good, the new, comes from
exactly that quarter whence it is not looked for, and is always
something different from what is expected. Everything new is received
with contempt, for it begins in obscurity. It becomes a power
unobserved.--FEUERBACH.
Look up and not down; look forward and not back; look out and not in;
and lend a hand.--E.E. HALE.
I must do something to keep my thoughts fresh and growing. I dread
nothing so much as falling into a rut and feeling myself becoming a
fossil.--JAMES A. GARFIELD.
Humanity, in the aggregate, is progressing, and philanthropy looks
forward hopefully.--HOSEA BALLOU.
Human improvement is from within outwards.--FROUDE.
An original sentence, a step forward, is worth more than all the
centuries.--EMERSON.
Let us labor for that larger and larger comprehension of truth, that
more and more thorough repudiation of error, which shall make the
history of mankind a series of ascending developments.--HORACE MANN.
We can trace back our existence almost to a point. Former time
presents us with trains of thoughts gradually diminishing to nothing.
But our ideas of futurity are perpetually expanding. Our desires and
our hopes, even when modified by our fears, seem to grasp at
immensity. This alone would be sufficient to prove the progressiveness
of our nature, and that this little earth is but a point from which we
start toward a perfection of being.--SIR HUMPHRY DAVY.
By the disposition of a stupendous wisdom, moulding together the great
mysterious incorporation of the human race, the whole, at one time, is
never old, or middle-aged, or young; but, in a condition of
unchangeable constancy, moves on through the varied tenor of perpetual
decay, fall, renovation, and progression.--BURKE.
We are either progressing or retrograding all the while; there is no
such thing as remaining stationary in this life.--JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE.
It is wonderful how soon a piano gets into a log-hut on the frontier.
You would think they found it under a pine-stump. With it comes a
Latin grammar, and one of those tow-head boys has written a hymn on
Sunday. Now let colleges, now let senates take heed! for here is one
who, opening these fine tastes on the basis of the pioneer's iron
constitution, will gather all their laurels in his strong hands.
--EMERSON.
A fresh mind keeps the body fresh. Take in the ideas of the day, drain
off those of yesterday.--LYTTON.
The wisest man may be wiser to-day than he was yesterday, and
to-morrow than he is to-day. Total freedom from change would imply
total freedom from error; but this is the prerogative of Omniscience
alone.--COLTON.
PROSPERITY.--Watch lest prosperity destroy generosity.--BEECHER.
Prosperity seems to be scarcely safe, unless it be mixed with a little
adversity.--HOSEA BALLOU.
The increase of a great number of citizens in prosperity is a
necessary element to the security, and even to the existence, of a
civilized people.--BURET.
Prosperity is the touchstone of virtue; for it is less difficult to
bear misfortunes than to remain uncorrupted by pleasure.--TACITUS.
Prosperity demands of us more prudence and moderation than adversity.
--CICERO.
We must distinguish between felicity and prosperity; for prosperity
leads often to ambition, and ambition to disappointment.--LANDOR.
He that swells in prosperity will be sure to shrink in adversity.
--COLTON.
Prosperity is very liable to bring pride among the other goods with
which it endows an individual; it is then that prosperity costs too
dear.--HOSEA BALLOU.
Prosperity, in regard of our corrupt inclination to abuse the
blessings of Almighty God, doth prove a thing dangerous to the soul of
man.--HOOKER.
It is one of the worst effects of prosperity to make a man a vortex,
instead of a fountain; so that, instead of throwing out, he learns
only to draw in.--BEECHER.
Prosperity makes some friends and many enemies.--VAUVENARGUES.
They who lie soft and warm in a rich estate seldom come to heat
themselves at the altar.--SOUTH.
Take care to be an economist in prosperity: there is no fear of your
being one in adversity.--ZIMMERMAN.
PROVIDENCE.--The Providence of God is the great protector of our life
and usefulness, and under the divine care we are perfectly safe from
danger.--SPURGEON.
I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care.
--WHITTIER.
The decrees of Providence are inscrutable. In spite of man's
short-sighted endeavors to dispose of events according to his own
wishes and his own purposes, there is an Intelligence beyond his
reason, which holds the scales of justice, and promotes his
well-being, in spite of his puny efforts.--MORIER.
Divine Providence tempers his blessings to secure their better effect.
He keeps our joys and our fears on an even balance, that we may
neither presume nor despair. By such compositions God is pleased to
make both our crosses more tolerable and our enjoyments more wholesome
and safe.--W. WOGAN.
He who ruleth the raging of the sea, knows also how to check the
designs of the ungodly. I submit myself with reverence to His Holy
Will. O Abner, I fear my God, and I fear none but Him.--RACINE.
Duties are ours; events are God's. This removes an infinite burden
from the shoulders of a miserable, tempted, dying creature. On this
consideration only can he securely lay down his head and close his
eyes.--CECIL.
Yes, thou art ever present, power supreme!
Not circumscribed by time, nor fixt to space,
Confined to altars, nor to temples bound.
In wealth, in want, in freedom or in chains,
In dungeons or on thrones, the faithful find thee!
--HANNAH MORE.
We must follow, not force Providence.--SHAKESPEARE.
Go, mark the matchless working of the power
That shuts within the seed the future flower;
Bids these in elegance of form excel.
In color these, and those delight the smell;
Sends nature forth, the daughter of the skies,
To dance on earth, and charm all human eyes.
--COWPER.
A man's heart deviseth his way: but the Lord directeth his steps.
--PROVERBS 16:9.
PRUDENCE.--Men are born with two eyes, but with one tongue, in order
that they should see twice as much as they say.--COLTON.
Prudence is that virtue by which we discern what is proper to be done
under the various circumstances of time and place.--MILTON.
When any great design thou dost intend,
Think on the means, the manner, and the end.
--SIR J. DENHAM.
The prudence of the best heads is often defeated by the tenderness of
the best of hearts.--FIELDING.
Prudence is a necessary ingredient in all the virtues, without which
they degenerate into folly and excess.--JEREMY COLLIER.
No other protection is wanting, provided you are under the guidance of
prudence.--JUVENAL.
Prudence is not only the first in rank of the virtues political and
moral, but she is the director and regulator, the standard of them
all.--BURKE.
The rules of prudence, like the laws of the stone tables, are for the
most part prohibitive. "Thou shalt not" is their characteristic
formula.--COLERIDGE.
PUNCTUALITY.--I give it as my deliberate and solemn conviction that
the individual who is habitually tardy in meeting an appointment, will
never be respected or successful in life.--REV. W. FISK.
I have always been a quarter of an hour before my time, and it has
made a man of me.--LORD NELSON.
Unfaithfulness in the keeping of an appointment is an act of clear
dishonesty. You may as well borrow a person's money as his time.
--HORACE MANN.
It is no use running; to set out betimes is the main point.--LA FONTAINE.
I could never think well of a man's intellectual or moral character if
he was habitually unfaithful to his appointments.--EMMONS.
PURITY.--Purity in person and in morals is true godliness.--HOSEA BALLOU.
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.--MATTHEW 5:8.
God be thanked that there are some in the world to whose hearts the
barnacles will not cling.--J.G. HOLLAND.
While our hearts are pure,
Our lives are happy and our peace is sure.
--WILLIAM WINTER.
Purity lives and derives its life solely from the Spirit of God.--COLTON.
I pray thee, O God, that I may be beautiful within.--SOCRATES.
QUARRELS.--Quarrels would never last long if the fault was only on one
side.--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.
The quarrels of lovers are like summer storms; everything is more
beautiful when they have passed.--MADAME NECKER.
I will rather suffer a thousand wrongs than offer one. I have always
found that to strive with a superior is injurious; with an equal,
doubtful; with an inferior, sordid and base; with any, full of
unquietness.--BISHOP HALL.
He that blows the coals in quarrels he has nothing to do with has no
right to complain if the sparks fly in his face.--FRANKLIN.
Those who in quarrel interpose,
Must often wipe a bloody nose.
--GAY.
Thrice is he arm'd that hath his quarrel just;
And he but naked, though lock'd up in steel,
Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.
--SHAKESPEARE.
READING.--Resolve to edge in a little reading every day, if it is but
a single sentence. If you gain fifteen minutes a day, it will make
itself felt at the end of the year.--HORACE MANN.
We never read without profit if with the pen or pencil in our hand we
mark such ideas as strike us by their novelty, or correct those we
already possess.--ZIMMERMANN.
When what you read elevates your mind and fills you with noble
aspirations, look for no other rule by which to judge a book; it is
good, and is the work of a master-hand.--LA BRUYÈRE.
When in reading we meet with any maxim that may be of use, we should
take it for our own, and make an immediate application of it, as we
would of the advice of a friend whom we have purposely consulted.
--COLTON.
We should accustom the mind to keep the best company by introducing it
only to the best books.--SYDNEY SMITH.
If I were to pray for a taste which should stand me in stead under
every variety of circumstances, and be a source of happiness and
cheerfulness to me through life, and a shield against its ills,
however things might go amiss, and the world frown upon me, it would
be a taste for reading.--SIR JOHN HERSCHEL.
Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an
exact man.... Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics,
subtile; natural philosophy, deep; moral, grave; logic and rhetoric,
able to contend.--BACON.
Nothing, in truth, has such a tendency to weaken not only the powers
of invention, but the intellectual powers in general, as a habit of
extensive and various reading without reflection.--DUGALD STEWART.
Mr. Johnson had never, by his own account, been a close student, and
used to advise young people never to be without a book in their
pocket, to be read at bye-times, when they had nothing else to do. "It
has been by that means," said he to a boy at our house one day, "that
all my knowledge has been gained, except what I have picked up by
running about the world with my wits ready to observe, and my tongue
ready to talk."--MRS. PIOZZI.
Reading without purpose is sauntering, not exercise. More is got from
one book on which the thought settles for a definite end in knowledge,
than from libraries skimmed over by a wandering eye. A cottage flower
gives honey to the bee, a king's garden none to the butterfly.--LYTTON.
Read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest.--COLLECT.
Much reading is like much eating,--wholly useless without digestion.
--SOUTH.
REASON.--Reason is the glory of human nature, and one of the chief
eminences whereby we are raised above the beasts, in this lower
world.--DR. WATTS.
Let our reason, and not our senses, be the rule of our conduct; for
reason will teach us to think wisely, to speak prudently, and to
behave worthily.--CONFUCIUS.
Though reason is not to be relied upon as universally sufficient to
direct us what to do, yet it is generally to be relied upon and obeyed
where it tells us what we are not to do.--SOUTH.
He that will not reason is a bigot, he that cannot reason is a fool,
and he that dares not reason is a slave.--SIR W. DRUMMOND.
Wise men are instructed by reason; men of less understanding, by
experience; the most ignorant, by necessity; and beasts, by
nature.--CICERO.
When a man has not a good reason for doing a thing, he has one good
reason for letting it alone.--WALTER SCOTT.
One can never repeat too often, that reason, as it exists in man, is
only our intellectual eye, and that, like the eye, to see, it needs
light,--to see clearly and far, it needs the light of Heaven.
The language of reason, unaccompanied by kindness, will often fail of
making an impression; it has no effect on the understanding, because
it touches not the heart. The language of kindness, unassociated with
reason, will frequently be unable to persuade; because, though it may
gain upon the affections, it wants that which is necessary to convince
the judgment. But let reason and kindness be united in a discourse,
and seldom will even pride or prejudice find it easy to resist.
--GISBORNE.
Good reasons must, of force, give place to better.--SHAKESPEARE.
There is a just Latin axiom, that he who seeks a reason for everything
subverts reason.--EPES SARGENT.
REBUKE.--In all reprehensions, observe to express rather thy love than
thy anger; and strive rather to convince than exasperate: but if the
matter do require any special indignation, let it appear to be the
zeal of a displeased friend, rather than the passion of a provoked
enemy.--FULLER.
RECONCILIATION.--Wherein is it possible for us, wicked and impious
creatures, to be justified, except in the only Son of God? O sweet
reconciliation! O untraceable ministry! O unlooked-for blessing! that
the wickedness of many should be hidden in one godly and righteous
man, and the righteousness of one justify a host of sinners!--JUSTIN
MARTYR.
God pardons like a mother who kisses the offence into everlasting
forgetfulness.--BEECHER.
As thro' the land at eve we went,
And pluck'd the ripen'd ears,
We fell out, my wife and I,
We fell out I know not why,
And kiss'd again with tears.
And blessings on the falling out
That all the more endears,
When we fall out with those we love
And kiss again with tears!
For when we came where lies the child
We lost in other years,
There above the little grave,
Oh, there above the little grave,
We kiss'd again with tears.
--TENNYSON.
Oh, my dear friends,--you who are letting miserable misunderstandings
run on from year to year, meaning to clear them up some day,--if you
only could know and see and feel that the time is short, how it would
break the spell! How you would go instantly and do the thing which you
might never have another chance to do!--PHILLIPS BROOKS.
REFINEMENT.--Refinement is the delicate aroma of Christianity.
--CHARLOTTE M. YONGE.
That alone can be called true refinement which elevates the soul of
man, purifying the manners by improving the intellect.--HOSEA BALLOU.
Refinement that carries us away from our fellow-men is not God's
refinement.--BEECHER.
If refined sense, and exalted sense, be not so useful as common sense,
their rarity, their novelty, and the nobleness of their objects, make
some compensation, and render them the admiration of mankind.--HUME.
Far better, and more cheerfully, I could dispense with some part of
the downright necessaries of life, than with certain circumstances of
elegance and propriety in the daily habits of using them.--DE QUINCEY.
REFORM.--He who reforms himself, has done more toward reforming the
public, than a crowd of noisy, impotent patriots.--LAVATER.
He that has energy enough in his constitution to root out a vice
should go a little further, and try to plant a virtue in its place;
otherwise he will have his labor to renew. A strong soil that has
produced weeds may be made to produce wheat with far less difficulty
than it would cost to make it produce nothing.--COLTON.
Time yet serves, wherein you may redeem your tarnished honors, and
restore yourselves into the good thoughts of the world again.
--SHAKESPEARE.
Each year one vicious habit rooted out, in time might make the worst
man good.--FRANKLIN.
Reform, like charity, must begin at home.--CARLYLE.
Whatever you dislike in another person take care to correct in
yourself.--SPRAT.
He who reforms, God assists.--CERVANTES.
REGENERATION.--Content not thyself with a bare forbearance of sin, so
long as thy heart is not changed, nor thy will changed, nor thy
affections changed; but strive to become a new man, to be transformed
by the renewing of thy mind, to hate sin, to love God, to wrestle
against thy secret corruptions, to take delight in holy duties, to
subdue thine understanding, and will, and affections, to the obedience
of faith and godliness.--BP. SANDERSON.
He that is once "born of God shall overcome the world," and the prince
of this world too, by the power of God in him. Holiness is no
solitary, neglected thing; it hath stronger confederacies, greater
alliances, than sin and wickedness. It is in league with God and the
universe; the whole creation smiles upon it; there is something of God
in it, and therefore it must needs be a victorious and triumphant
thing.--CUDWORTH.