Quotes About Restraint

Abstainer: a weak man who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.

Moderation is an ostentatious proof of our strength of character.

A bird can roost but on one branch. A mouse can drink no more than its fill from a river.

The real art of conversation is not only to say the right thing in the right place but to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.

For ye have need of patience....

Do not disturb the sleeping dog.

He who drinks a little too much drinks much too much.

Drink not the third glass - which thou can'st not tame when once it is within thee.

Eat bread at pleasure, drink wine by measure.

He is a drunkard who takes more than three glasses, though he be not drunk.

I would appeal to Philip, she said, but to Philip sober.

I exercise self-control and never touch any beverage stronger than gin before breakfast.

There is nothing wrong with sobriety in moderation.

I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time.

Whoever has his foe at his mercy, and does not kill him, is his own enemy.

Nothing is more like a wise man than a fool who holds his tongue.

Nothing in excess.

Friends are like a pleasant park where you wish to go; while you may enjoy the flowers, you may not eat them.

Keep flax from fire, youth from gaming.

It is in self-limitation that a master first shows himself.

Who will present pleasure refrain, shall in time to come the more pleasure obtain.

No revenge is more honorable than the one not taken.

Life is livable because we know that wherever we go most of the people we meet will be restrained in their actions toward us by an almost instinctive network of taboos.

Try to keep your mind open to possibilities and your mouth closed on matters that you don't know about. Limit your 'always' and your 'nevers.'