Henry Taylor (1800 – 1886)
English author and dramatist.
For no syren did ever so charm the ear of the listener, as the listening ear has charmed the soul of the syren.
Climbing the bole of the tree, a man clings with all his arms and legs, and lays hold of every knob and sliver. When he mounts amongst the branches, it should be with a more easy alacrity. A man will often be apt at the one operation, yet awkward at the other. Nor is it, indeed, common to meet with a man of such a character as can be carried from a low condition of life through successive ascents, with an aptitude for every condition into which he passes; and thus it is that men who rise well will often stand infirmly. But for want of due consideration being given to the nature of men and circumstances, it is a usual thing to hear, not only regret but surprise expressed, when a man who has attained an elevated position in life exhibits in that position those very defects of character through which he is there.
Prodigality is indeed the vice of a weak nature, as avarice is of a strong one; it comes of a weak craving for those blandishments of the world which are easily to be had for money, and which, when obtained, are as much worse than worthless as a harlot's love is worse than none.
The hope, and not the fact, of advancement, is the spur to industry.
Good nature and kindness towards those with whom they come in personal contact, at the expense of public interests, that is of those whom they never see, is the besetting sin of public men.
We figure to ourselves
The thing we like; and then we build it up,
As chance will have it, on the rock or sand,—
For thought is tired of wandering o’er the world,
And homebound Fancy runs her bark ashore.
Such souls,
Whose sudden visitations daze the world,
Vanish like lightning, but they leave behind
A voice that in the distance far away
Wakens the slumbering ages.
I have not skill
From such a sharp and waspish word as "No"
To pluck the sting.
Conscience is, in most men, an anticipation of the opinions of others.
Shy and proud men ... are more liable than any others to fall into the hands of parasites and creatures of low character. For in the intimacies which are formed by shy men, they do not choose, but are chosen.
Such souls,
Whose sudden visitations daze the world,
Vanish like lighting, but they leave behind
A voice that in the distance far away
Wakens the slumbering ages.
Where there are large powers with little ambition (which will happen sometimes, though seldom) nature may be said to have fallen short of her purposes.
The philosophy which affects to teach us a contempt of money does not run very deep; for, indeed, it ought to be still more clear to the philosopher than it is to ordinary men, that there are few things in the world of greater importance.
His food
Was glory, which was poison to his mind
And peril to his body.
An unreflected light did never yet
Dazzle the vision feminine.
When you give, therefore, take to yourself no credit for generosity, unless you deny yourself something in order that you may give.
Wisdom is corrupted by ambition, even when the quality of the ambition is intellectual. For ambition, even of this quality, is but a form of self-love…
The art of living easily as to money, is to pitch your scale of living one degree below your means.
The world knows nothing of its greatest men.
Shy and unready men are great betrayers of secrets; for there are few wants more urgent for the moment than the want of something to say.