Many Thoughts of Many Minds Part 12

COVETOUSNESS.--Covetousness, like a candle ill made, smothers the splendor of a happy fortune in its own grease.--F. OSBORN.

The only instance of a despairing sinner left upon record in the New Testament is that of a treacherous and greedy Judas.

He deservedly loses his own property who covets that of another.

--PHAEDRUS.

Covetousness, which is idolatry.--COLOSSIANS 3:5.

There is not a vice which more effectually contracts and deadens the feelings, which more completely makes a man's affections centre in himself, and excludes all others from partaking in them, than the desire of acc.u.mulating possessions. When the desire has once gotten hold on the heart, it shuts out all other considerations, but such as may promote its views. In its zeal for the attainment of its end, it is not delicate in the choice of means. As it closes the heart, so also it clouds the understanding. It cannot discern between right and wrong; it takes evil for good, and good for evil; it calls darkness light, and light darkness. Beware, then, of the beginning of covetousness, for you know not where it will end.--BISHOP MANT.

The covetous person lives as if the world were made altogether for him, and not he for the world; to take in everything, and part with nothing.--SOUTH.

Covetous men are fools, miserable wretches, buzzards, madmen, who live by themselves, in perpetual slavery, fear, suspicion, sorrow, discontent, with more of gall than honey in their enjoyments; who are rather possessed by their money than possessors of it.--BURTON.

Why are we so blind? That which we improve, we have, that which we h.o.a.rd is not for ourselves.--MADAME DELUZY.

If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that it may be said to possess him.--BACON.

Those who give not till they die show that they would not then if they could keep it any longer.--BISHOP HALL.

CRITICISM.--He whose first emotion, on the view of an excellent production, is to undervalue it, will never have one of his own to show.--AIKEN.

Neither praise nor blame is the object of true criticism. Justly to discriminate, firmly to establish, wisely to prescribe and honestly to award--these are the true aims and duties of criticism.--SIMMS.

Censure and criticism never hurt anybody. If false, they can't hurt you unless you are wanting in manly character; and if true, they show a man his weak points, and forewarn him against failure and trouble.--GLADSTONE.

It is easy to criticise an author, but it is difficult to appreciate him.--VAUVENARGUES.

It is much easier to be critical than to be correct.--BEACONSFIELD.

There is a certain meddlesome spirit, which, in the garb of learned research, goes prying about the traces of history, casting down its monuments, and marring and mutilating its fairest trophies. Care should be taken to vindicate great names from such pernicious erudition.--WAs.h.i.+NGTON IRVING.

He who would reproach an author for obscurity should look into his own mind to see whether it is quite clear there. In the dusk the plainest writing is illegible.--GOETHE.

A man must serve his time to ev'ry trade, Save censure; critics all are ready-made.

CUNNING.--In a great business there is nothing so fatal as cunning management.--JUNIUS.

Cunning leads to knavery; it is but a step from one to the other, and that very slippery; lying only makes the difference; add that to cunning, and it is knavery.--LA BRUYeRE.

Cunning is the art of concealing our own defects, and discovering other people's weaknesses.--HAZLITT.

A cunning man overreaches no one half as much as himself.--BEECHER.

The animals to whom nature has given the faculty we call cunning know always when to use it, and use it wisely; but when man descends to cunning, he blunders and betrays.--THOMAS PAINE.

The most sure method of subjecting yourself to be deceived, is to consider yourself more cunning than others.--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

DEATH.--G.o.d's finger touch'd him, and he slept.--TENNYSON.

But no! that look is not the last; We yet may meet where seraphs dwell, Where love no more deplores the past, Nor breathes that withering word--Farewell!

--PEABODY.

How beautiful it is for a man to die on the walls of Zion! to be called like a watch-worn and weary sentinel, to put his armor off, and rest in heaven.--N.P. WILLIS.

I looked, and behold a pale horse; and his name that sat on him was Death.--REVELATION 6:8.

When we see our enemies and friends gliding away before us, let us not forget that we are subject to the general law of mortality, and shall soon be where our doom will be fixed forever.--DR. JOHNSON.

I have seen those who have arrived at a fearless contemplation of the future, from faith in the doctrine which our religion teaches. Such men were not only calm and supported, but cheerful in the hour of death; and I never quitted such a sick chamber without a hope that my last end might be like theirs.--SIR HENRY HALFORD.

One may live as a conqueror, a king or a magistrate; but he must die as a man. The bed of death brings every human being to his pure individuality; to the intense contemplation of that deepest and most solemn of all relations, the relation between the creature and his Creator. Here it is that fame and renown cannot a.s.sist us; that all external things must fail to aid us; that even friends, affection and human love and devotedness cannot succor us.--WEBSTER.

There is no death. The thing that we call death Is but another, sadder name for life.

--STODDARD.

To die,--to sleep,-- No more;--and by a sleep to say we end The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to.

--SHAKESPEARE.

All that nature has prescribed must be good; and as death is natural to us, it is absurdity to fear it. Fear loses its purpose when we are sure it cannot preserve us, and we should draw resolution to meet it, from the impossibility to escape it.--STEELE.

There is nothing certain in man's life but this, that he must lose it.--OWEN MEREDITH.

Death robs the rich and relieves the poor.--J.L. BASFORD.

Death is the liberator of him whom freedom cannot release, the physician of him whom medicine cannot cure, and the comforter of him whom time cannot console.--COLTON.

Death, so called, is a thing that makes men weep, And yet a third of life is pa.s.s'd in sleep.

--BYRON.

The finest day of life is that on which one quits it.--FREDERICK THE GREAT.

Death is delightful. Death is dawn-- The waking from a weary night Of fevers unto truth and light.

--JOAQUIN MILLER.

The hour conceal'd and so remote the fear, Death still draws nearer, never seeming near.

--POPE.

All that lives must die, Pa.s.sing through nature to eternity.

--SHAKESPEARE.

Death gives us sleep, eternal youth, and immortality.--RICHTER.

You should not fear, nor yet should you wish for your last day.