Quotes from Joseph Addison

The person who has a firm trust in the Supreme Being is powerful in his power, wise by his wisdom, happy by his happiness.

Loveliest of women! heaven is in thy soul, Beauty and virtue shine forever round thee, Bright'ning each other! thou art all divine!

Nothing that isn't a real crime makes a man appear so contemptible and little in the eyes of the world as inconsistency.

A wealthy doctor who can help a poor man, and will not without a fee, has less sense of humanity than a poor ruffian, who kills a rich man to supply his necessities.

It is odd to consider the connection between despotism and barbarity, and how the making one person more than man makes the rest less.

When a man becomes familiar with his goddess, she quickly sinks into a woman.

Men may change their climate, but they cannot change their nature. A man that goes out a fool cannot ride or sail himself into common sense.

There is not any present moment that is unconnected with some future one. The life of every man is a continued chain of incidents, each link of which hangs upon the former.

If men would consider not so much wherein they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling in the world.

There are many more shining qualities in the mind of man, but there is none so useful as discretion.

To be perfectly just is an attribute of the divine nature; to be so to the utmost of our abilities, is the glory of man.

Were not this desire of fame very strong, the difficulty of obtaining it, and the danger of losing it when obtained, would be sufficient to deter a man from so vain a pursuit.

Cunning is only the mimic of discretion, and may pass upon weak men in the same manner as vivacity is often mistaken for wit, and gravity for wisdom.

There is not a more unhappy being than a superannuated idol.

Men who cherish for women the highest respect are seldom popular with them.

There is nothing touches our imagination so much as a beautiful woman in a plain dress.

I have often wondered that learning is not thought a proper ingredient in the education of a woman of quality or fortune. Since they have the same improvable minds as the male part of their species.

The post of honour is a private station.

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.

Mirth is like a flash of lightning, that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity.

They were a people so primitive they did not know how to get money, except by working for it.

What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the soul.

A misery is not to be measure from the nature of the evil but from the temper of the sufferer.

The utmost extent of man's knowledge, is to know that he knows nothing.