If a book really wants the patronage of a great name, it is a bad book; and if it be a good… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Sloth, if it has prevented many crimes, has also smothered many virtues. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If Satan ever laughs, it must be at hypocrites; they are the greatest dupes he has. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Villainy that is vigilant will be an overmatch for virtue, if she slumber at her post. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
The upright, if he suffer calumny to move him, fears the tongue of man more than the eye of God. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If we look backwards to antiquity it should be as those that are winning a race. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If you want enemies, excel others; if you want friends, let others excel you. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If all seconds were as averse to duels as their principals, very little blood would be shed in that way. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
That an author's work is the mirror of his mind is a position that has led to very false conclusions. If Satan… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Great minds had rather deserve contemporaneous applause without obtaining it, than obtain without deserving it. If it follow them it is well,… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Love, like the cold bath, is never negative, it seldom leaves us where it finds us; if once we plunge into it,… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
I question if Epicurus and Hume have done mankind a greater service by the looseness of their doctrines than by the purity… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
We should have a glorious conflagration, if all who cannot put fire into their works would only consent to put their works… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If a cause be good, the most violent attack of its enemies will not injure it so much as an injudicious defence… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
The gamester, if he die a martyr to his profession, is doubly ruined. He adds his soul to every other loss, and… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
A public debt is a kind of anchor in the storm; but if the anchor be too heavy for the vessel, she… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If it be true that men of strong imaginations are usually dogmatists--and I am inclined to think it is so--it ought to… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Emulation has been termed a spur to virtue, and assumes to be a spur of gold. But it is a spur composed… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
No man can promise himself even fifty years of life, but any man may, if he please, live in the proportion of… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If kings would only determine not to extend their dominions until they had filled them with happiness, they would find the smallest… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Living authors, therefore, are usually, bad companions. If they have not gained character, they seek to do so by methods often ridiculous,… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
To judge by the event is an error all commit: for in every instance courage, if crowned with success, is heroism; if… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If often happens too, both in courts and in cabinets, that there are two things going on together,--a main plot and an… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
We submit to the society of those that can inform us, but we seek the society of those whom we can inform.… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If merited, no courage can stand against its just indignation. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
A beautiful woman, if poor, should use double circumspection; for her beauty will tempt others, her poverty herself. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Criticism is like champagne, nothing more execrable if bad, nothing more excellent if good. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Much too oft we make life gloomy-- When happy we might be, If we gathered more of sunshine, And not dark shadows… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If the prodigal quits life in debt to others, the miser quits it still deeper in debt to himself. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
It is good to act as if. It is even better to grow to the point where it is no longer an… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
What would you do if you knew for sure that no one would ever find out? — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
It is best, if possible, to deceive no one; for he that ... begins by deceiving others, will end ... by deceiving himself. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Hope is a prodigal young heir, and Experience is his banker; but his drafts are seldom honoured, since there is often a… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
For all the practical purposes of life, truth might as well be in a prison as in the folio of a schoolman;… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If sensuality be our only happiness we ought to envy the brutes, for instinct is a surer, shorter, safer guide to such… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Wars are to the body politic, what drams are to the individual. There are times when they may prevent a sudden death,… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
The road to glory would cease to be arduous if it were trite and trodden; and great minds must be ready not… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Nobility of birth does not always insure a corresponding unity of mind; if it did, it would always act as a stimulus… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Man, if he compare himself with all that he can see, is at the zenith of power; but if he compare himself… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
A man's profundity may keep him from opening on a first interview, and his caution on a second; but I should suspect… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Villainy that is vigilant will be an overmatch for virtue, if she slumber at her post. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
A beautiful woman, if poor, should use double circumspection; for her beauty will tempt others, her poverty herself. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Were the life of man prolonged, he would become such a proficient in villainy, that it would become necessary again to drown or to… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
To dare to live alone is the rarest courage; since there are many who had rather meet their bitterest enemy in the field, than… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
It is doubtful whether mankind are most indebted to those who like Bacon and Butler dig the gold from the mine of literature, or… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Be very slow to believe that you are wiser than all others; it is a fatal but common error. Where one has been saved… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Mental pleasures never cloy; unlike those of the body, they are increased by reputation, approved by reflection, and strengthened by enjoyment. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Ignorance lies at the bottom of all human knowledge, and the deeper we penetrate, the nearer we arrive unto it. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Heroism, self-denial, and magnanimity, in all instances where they do not spring from a principle of religion, are but splendid altars on which we… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
We ought not to be over-anxious to encourage innovation in cases of doubtful improvement, for an old system must ever have two advantages over… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
We owe almost all our knowledge not to those who have agreed, but to those who have differed — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
