Let thy words between two foes be such that if they were to become friends thou shouldst not be ashamed.
An indiscreet man is more hurtful than an ill-natured one; for as the latter will only attack his enemies, and those he wishes ill to, the other injures indifferently both his friends and foes.
A man of quick and active wit For drudgery is more unfit, Compared to those of duller parts, Than running nags are to draw carts.
All affectation is the vain and ridiculous attempt of poverty to appear rich.
There never was, there never will be, a man who is always praised, or a man who is always blamed.
A good man's intellect is piercing, yet inflicts no wound; his actions are deliberate, yet bold; his heart is warm, but never burns; his speech is eloquent, yet ever true.
He who can feel ashamed will not readily do wrong.
A stranger who is kind is a kinsman; an unkind kinsman is a stranger.
The good to others kindness show, And from them no return exact; The best and greatest men, they know, Thus ever nobly love to act.[7]
Trees loaded with fruit are bent down; the clouds when charged with fresh rain hang down near the earth: even so good men are not uplifted through prosperity. Such is the natural character of the liberal.
The man who neither gives in charity nor enjoys his wealth, which every day increases, breathes, indeed, like the bellows of a smith, but cannot be said to live.
That energy which veils itself in mildness is most effective of its object.
Our writings are like so many dishes, our readers, our guests, our books, like beauty--that which one admires another rejects; so we are approved as men's fancies are inclined.... As apothecaries, we make new mixtures every day, pour out of one vessel into another; and as those old Romans robbed all cities of the world to set out their bad-cited Rome, we skim off the cream of other men's wits, pick the choice flowers of their tilled gardens, to set out our own sterile plots. We weave the same web still, twist the same rope again and again; or, if it be a new invention, 'tis but some bauble or toy, which idle fellows write, for as idle fellows to read.[8]
[8] Ferriar has pointed out, in his _Illustrations of Sterne_, how these passages from Burton's _Anatomy of Melancholy_ have been boldly plagiarised in the introduction to the fragment on Whiskers in _Tristram Shandy_: "Shall we for ever make new books as apothecaries make new mixtures, by only pouring out of one vessel into another? Are we for ever to be twisting and untwisting the same rope?" And Dr. Johnson, who was a great admirer of Burton, adopts the illustration of the plundering Romans in his _Rambler_, No. 143.