Many Thoughts of Many Minds Part 3

Anger causes us often to condemn in one what we approve of in another.--PASQUIER QUESNEL.

ANXIETY.--Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions than ruined by too confident a security.--BURKE.

Can your solicitude alter the cause or unravel the intricacy of human events?--BLAIR.

Almost all men are over-anxious. No sooner do they enter the world than they lose that taste for natural and simple pleasures so remarkable in early life. Every hour do they ask themselves what progress they have made in the pursuit of wealth or honor; and on they go as their fathers went before them, till, weary and sick at heart, they look back with a sigh of regret to the golden time of their childhood.--ROGERS.

Nothing in life is more remarkable than the unnecessary anxiety which we endure and generally occasion ourselves.--BEACONSFIELD.

ART.--The perfection of art is to conceal art.--QUINTILIAN.

Art must anchor in nature, or it is the sport of every breath of folly.--HAZLITT.

Beauty is at once the ultimate principle and the highest aim of art.--GOETHE.

Art does not imitate, but interpret.--MAZZINI.

Art is the gift of G.o.d, and must be used unto his glory.--LONGFELLOW.

a.s.sOCIATES.--Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.--1 CORINTHIANS 15:20.

He who comes from the kitchen smells of its smoke; he who adheres to a sect has something of its cant; the college air pursues the student, and dry inhumanity him who herds with literary pedants.--LAVATER.

He that walketh with wise men shall be wise.--SOLOMON.

If you always live with those who are lame, you will yourself learn to limp.--FROM THE LATIN.

If men wish to be held in esteem, they must a.s.sociate with those only who are estimable.--LA BRUYeRE.

Be very circ.u.mspect in the choice of thy company. In the society of thine equals thou shalt enjoy more pleasure; in the society of thy superiors thou shalt find more profit. To be the best in the company is the way to grow worse; the best means to grow better is to be the worst there.--QUARLES.

A companion of fools shall be destroyed.--PROVERBS 13:20.

Choose the company of your superiors whenever you can have it.--LORD CHESTERFIELD.

I set it down as a maxim, that it is good for a man to live where he can meet his betters, intellectual and social.--THACKERAY.

Keep good company, and you shall be of the number.--GEORGE HERBERT.

It is best to be with those in time that we hope to be with in eternity.--FULLER.

ASTRONOMY.--The contemplation of celestial things will make a man both speak and think more sublimely and magnificently when he descends to human affairs.--CICERO.

The sun rejoicing round the earth, announced Daily the wisdom, power and love of G.o.d.

The moon awoke, and from her maiden face, Shedding her cloudy locks, looked meekly forth, And with her virgin stars walked in the heavens,-- Walked nightly there, conversing as she walked, Of purity, and holiness, and G.o.d.

--ROBERT POLLOK.

I love to rove amidst the starry height, To leave the little scenes of Earth behind, And let Imagination wing her flight On eagle pinions swifter than the wind.

I love the planets in their course to trace; To mark the comets speeding to the sun, Then launch into immeasurable s.p.a.ce, Where, lost to human sight, remote they run.

I love to view the moon, when high she rides Amidst the heav'ns, in borrowed l.u.s.tre bright; To fathom how she rules the subject tides, And how she borrows from the sun her light.

O! these are wonders of th' Almighty hand, Whose wisdom first the circling orbits planned.

--T. RODD.

ATHEISM.--I should like to see a man sober in his habits, moderate, chaste, just in his dealings, a.s.sert that there is no G.o.d; he would speak at least without interested motives; but such a man is not to be found.--LA BRUYeRE.

An Atheist-laugh's a poor exchange For Deity offended!

--BURNS.

The fool hath said in his heart, There is no G.o.d.--PSALM 14:1.

Kircher, the astronomer, having an acquaintance who denied the existence of a Supreme Being, took the following method to convince him of his error. Expecting him on a visit, he placed a handsome celestial globe in a part of the room where it could not escape the notice of his friend, who, on observing it, inquired whence it came, and who was the maker.

"It was not made by any person," said the astronomer.

"That is impossible," replied the sceptic; "you surely jest."

Kircher then took occasion to reason with his friend upon his own atheistical principles, explaining to him that he had adopted this plan with a design to show him the fallacy of his scepticism.

"You will not," said he, "admit that this small body originated in mere chance, and yet you contend that those heavenly bodies, to which it bears only a faint and diminutive resemblance, came into existence without author or design."

He pursued this chain of reasoning till his friend was totally confounded, and cordially acknowledged the absurdity of his notions.

By night an atheist half believes a G.o.d.--YOUNG.

No one is so much alone in the world as a denier of G.o.d.--RICHTER.

When men live as if there were no G.o.d, it becomes expedient for them that there should be none; and then they endeavor to persuade themselves so.--TILLOTSON.

Atheism is the result of ignorance and pride, of strong sense and feeble reasons, of good eating and ill living.--JEREMY COLLIER.

Atheism can benefit no cla.s.s of people,--neither the unfortunate, whom it bereaves of hope, nor the prosperous, whose joys it renders insipid.--CHATEAUBRIAND.

AUTHORITY.--Self-possession is the backbone of authority.--HALIBURTON.

Man, proud man!

Dressed in a little brief authority: Most ignorant of what he's most a.s.sur'd.

His gla.s.sy essence--like an angry ape Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven, As make the angels weep.

--SHAKESPEARE.

Though authority be a stubborn bear, yet he is oft led by the nose with gold.--SHAKESPEARE.