The pride of ancestry is a superstructure of the most imposing height, but resting on the most flimsy foundation. It is ridiculous… — 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
If we look backwards to antiquity it should be as those that are winning a race. — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
If our eloquence be directed above the heads of our hearers, we shall do no execution. By pointing our arguments low, we… — 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
Criticism is like champagne, nothing more execrable if bad, nothing more excellent if good; if meagre, muddy, vapid and sour, both are… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Most importantly: Don't adjust your results to build up the ego of the chief strategist. Especially if the strategist is you. — 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 rich, it is easy enough to conceal our wealth; but, if poor, it is not quite so easy to conceal our… — 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
To be a mere verbal critic is what no man of genius would be if he could; but to be a critic… — 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
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
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
If martyrdom is now on the decline, it is not because martyrs are less zealous, but because martyr-mongers are more wise. The… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Envy, if surrounded on all sides by the brightness of another's prosperity, like the scorpion confined within a circle of fire, will… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
All the poets are indebted more or less to those who have gone before them; even Homer's originality has been questioned, and… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
We are ruined, not by what we really want, but by what we think we do; therefore never go abroad in search… — 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
If you cannot avoid a quarrel with a blackguard, let your lawyer manage it, rather than yourself. No man sweeps his own… — 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
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
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
There are many that despise half the world; but if there be any that despise the whole of it, it is because… — Charles Caleb Colton Copy Share Image
Some well-meaning Christians tremble for their salvation, because they have never gone through that valley of tears and of sorrow, which they… — 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
