Quotes from Sydney Smith

The fact is that in order to do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand shivering on the bank thinking of the cold and the danger, but jump in and scramble through as well as we can.

we know nothing of tomorrow, our business is to be good and happy today

When you rise in the morning, form a resolution to make the day a happy one for a fellow creature.

People who love only once in their lives are shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I call either the lethargy of custom, or their lack of imagination

I always fear that creation will expire before teatime.

A man who wishes to make his way in life could do no better than go through the world with a boiling tea-kettle in his hand.

No furniture is so charming as books, even if you never open them or read a single word.

If I were to begin life again, I would devote it to music. It is the only cheap and unpunished rapture upon earth.

Life is to be fortified by many friendships. To love, and to be loved, is the greatest happiness of existence.

Have the courage to be ignorant of a great number of things, in order to avoid the calamity of being ignorant of everything.

Partial Quote; "A great deal of talent is lost to the world for want of a little courage". Full Quote; "A great deal of talent is lost to the world for want of a little courage. Every day sends to their graves obscure men whose timidity prevented them from making a first effort".

I never read a book before reviewing it; it prejudices a man so.

It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little; do something.

Mankind are always happy for having happiness. So if you make them happy now, you make them happy twenty years from now by the memory of it.

Take short views, Hope for the best, and Trust in God.

I am glad you like what I said of Mrs. Elizabeth Fry (prison and mental hospital reformer). She is very unpopular with the clergy; examples of living, active virtue disturb our repose and give one to distressing comparisons; we long to burn her alive.

Human beings cling to their delicious tyrannies and to their exquisite nonsense, till death stares them in the face.

Never give way to melancholy: nothing encroaches more; I fight against it vigorously. One great remedy is, to take short views of life. Are you happy now? Are you likely to remain so till this evening? or next week? or next year? Then why destroy present happiness by a distant misery, which may never come at all, or you may never live to see it? For every substantial grief has twenty shadows, and most of them shadows of your own making.

Live always in the best company when you read.

Manners are the shadows of virtues; the momentary display of those qualities which our fellow-creatures love and respect. If we strive to become, then, what we strive to appear, manners may often be rendered useful guides to the performance of our duties.

Jika anda membuat seseorang bahagia hari ini, Anda juga membuat dia berbahagia dua puluh tahun lagi, saat ia mengenang peristiwa itu.

What you don't know would make a great book.

A great deal of talent is lost to the world for want of a little courage

Many in this world run after felicity like an absent man hunting for his hat, while all the time it is on his head or in his hand.