Many Thoughts of Many Minds Part 57

--DRYDEN.

SELF-CONTROL.--He that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city.--PROVERBS 16:32.

What is the best government? That which teaches us to govern ourselves.--GOETHE.

He who reigns within himself, and rules pa.s.sions, desires, and fears, is more than a king.--MILTON.

Real glory springs from the silent conquest of ourselves.--THOMSON.

He is a fool who cannot be angry: but he is a wise man who will not.--ENGLISH PROVERB.

SELF-DENIAL.--Self-denial is the quality of which Jesus Christ set us the example.--ARY SCHEFFER.

Only the soul that with an overwhelming impulse and a perfect trust gives itself up forever to the life of other men, finds the delight and peace which such complete self-surrender has to give.--PHILLIPS BROOKS.

Self-denial is a virtue of the highest quality, and he who has it not, and does not strive to acquire it, will never excel in anything.

--CONYBEARE.

The more a man denies himself the more he shall obtain from G.o.d.

--HORACE.

The worst education which teaches self-denial is better than the best which teaches everything else, and not that.--JOHN STERLING.

SELFISHNESS.--Selfishness is that detestable vice which no one will forgive in others, and no one is without in himself.--BEECHER.

It is to be doubted whether he will ever find the way to heaven who desires to go thither alone.--FELTHAM.

Take the selfishness out of this world and there would be more happiness than we should know what to do with.--H.W. SHAW.

We erect the idol self, and not only wish others to wors.h.i.+p, but wors.h.i.+p ourselves.--CECIL.

SILENCE.--Be silent, or say something better than silence.--PYTHAGORAS.

G.o.d's poet is silence! His song is unspoken, And yet so profound, so loud, and so far, It fills you, it thrills you with measures unbroken, And as soft, and as fair, and as far as a star.

--JOAQUIN MILLER.

Silence is the safest course for any man to adopt who distrusts himself.--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

If thou desire to be held wise, be so wise as to hold thy tongue.

--QUARLES.

As we must account for every idle word, so we must for every idle silence.--FRANKLIN.

Learn to hold thy tongue. Five words cost Zacharias forty weeks'

silence.--FULLER.

Silence is a virtue in those who are deficient in understanding.

--BOUHOURS.

Silence, when nothing need be said, is the eloquence of discretion.

--BOVEE.

Silence does not always mark wisdom.--S.T. COLERIDGE.

Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise.--PROVERBS 17:28.

SIN.--Suffer anything from man, rather than sin against G.o.d.--SIR HENRY VANE.

Let him that sows the serpent's teeth not hope to reap a joyous harvest. Every crime has, in the moment of its perpetration, its own avenging angel,--dark misgivings at the inmost heart.--SCHILLER.

I could not live in peace if I put the shadow of a willful sin between myself and G.o.d.--GEORGE ELIOT.

Never let any man imagine that he can pursue a good end by evil means, without sinning against his own soul! Any other issue is doubtful; the evil effect on himself is certain.--SOUTHEY.

Many afflictions will not cloud and obstruct peace of mind so much as one sin: therefore, if you would walk cheerfully, be most careful to walk holily. All the winds about the earth make not an earthquake, but only that within.--ARCHBISHOP LEIGHTON.

Think not for wrongs like these unscourged to live; Long may ye sin, and long may Heaven forgive; But when ye least expect, in sorrow's day, Vengeance shall fall more heavy for delay.

--CHURCHILL.

Sin is never at a stay; if we do not retreat from it, we shall advance in it; and the farther on we go, the more we have to come back.--BARROW.

Other men's sins are before our eyes, our own are behind our back.

--SENECA.

Take steadily some one sin, which seems to stand out before thee, to root it out, by G.o.d's grace, and every fibre of it. Purpose strongly, by the grace and strength of G.o.d, wholly to sacrifice this sin or sinful inclination to the love of G.o.d, to spare it not, until thou leave of it none remaining, neither root nor branch.--E.B. PUSEY.

Cast out thy Jonah--every sleeping and secure sin that brings a tempest upon thy s.h.i.+p, vexation to thy spirit.--REYNOLDS.

Use sin as it will use you; spare it not, for it will not spare you; it is your murderer, and the murderer of the whole world. Use it, therefore, as a murderer should be used; kill it before it kills you; and though it brings you to the grave, as it did your head, it shall not be able to keep you there. You love not death; love not the cause of death.--BAXTER.

SINCERITY.--I think you will find that people who honestly mean to be true really contradict themselves much more rarely than those who try to be "consistent."--HOLMES.

If the show of any thing be good for any thing, I am sure sincerity is better; for why does any man dissemble, or seem to be that which he is not, but because he thinks it good to have such a quality as he pretends to?--TILLOTSON.

The only conclusive evidence of a man's sincerity is that he gives himself for a principle. Words, money, all things else, are comparatively easy to give away; but when a man makes a gift of his daily life and practice, it is plain that the truth, whatever it may be, has taken possession of him.--LOWELL.

Private sincerity is a public welfare.--BARTOL.

I hope I shall always possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain, what I consider the most enviable of all t.i.tles, the character of an "honest man."--WAs.h.i.+NGTON.

Sincerity is to speak as we think, to do as we pretend and profess, to perform and make good what we promise, and really to be what we would seem and appear to be.--TILLOTSON.

Let us then be what we are, and speak what we think, and in all things keep ourselves loyal to truth, and the sacred professions of friends.h.i.+p.--LONGFELLOW.