LITMIR.BIZ

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take rank by descent. Such of us as have the longest pedigree, and are therefore the furthest removed from the first who made the fortune and founded the family, we are the noblest. The nearer to the fountain the fouler the stream: and that first ancestor who has soiled his fingers by labor is no better than a parvenu.—Froude.

      Breed is stronger than pasture.—George Eliot.

      The glory of ancestors sheds a light around posterity; it allows neither their good nor bad qualities to remain in obscurity.—Sallust.

      Nobility of birth does not always insure a corresponding nobility of mind; if it did, it would always act as a stimulus to noble actions; but it sometimes acts as a clog rather than a spur.—Colton.

      Honorable descent is in all nations greatly esteemed; besides, it is to be expected that the children of men of worth will be like their fathers, for nobility is the virtue of a family.—Aristotle.

      A long series of ancestors shows the native lustre with advantage; but if he any way degenerate from his line, the least spot is visible on ermine.—Dryden.

      The happiest lot for a man, as far as birth is concerned, is that it should be such as to give him but little occasion to think much about it.—Whately.

      Ancients.—In tragedy and satire I maintain, against some critics, that this age and the last have excelled the ancients; and I would instance in Shakespeare of the former, in Dorset of the latter.—Dryden.

      Though the knowledge they have left us be worth our study, yet they exhausted not all its treasures; they left a great deal for the industry and sagacity of after-ages.—Locke.

      Angels.—In old days there were angels who came and took men by the hand and led them away from the city of destruction. We see no white-winged angels now. But yet men are led away from threatening destruction: a hand is put in theirs, which leads them forth gently towards a calm and bright land, so that they look no more backward; and the hand may be a little child's.—George Eliot.

      Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep.—Milton.

      Anger.—If a man meets with injustice, it is not required that he shall not be roused to meet it; but if he is angry after he has had time to think upon it, that is sinful. The flame is not wrong, but the coals are.—Beecher.

      Temperate anger well becomes the wise.—Philemon.

      When anger rushes, unrestrained, to action, like a hot steed, it stumbles in its way.—Savage.

      Bad temper is its own scourge. Few things are bitterer than to feel bitter. A man's venom poisons himself more than his victim.—Charles Buxton.

      Above all, gentlemen, no heat.—Talleyrand.

      Anger ventilated often hurries towards forgiveness; anger concealed often hardens into revenge.—Bulwer-Lytton.

      Keep cool and you command everybody.—St. Just.

      I never work better than when I am inspired by anger; when I am angry I can write, pray, and preach well; for then my whole temperament is quickened, my understanding sharpened, and all mundane vexations and temptations depart.—Luther.

      When one is in a good sound rage, it is astonishing how calm one can be.—Bulwer-Lytton.

      Angling.—I give up fly-fishing; it is a light, volatile, dissipated pursuit. But ground-bait with a good steady float that never bobs without a bite is an occupation for a bishop, and in no way interferes with sermon-making.—Sydney Smith.

      He that reads Plutarch shall find that angling was not contemptible in the days of Mark Antony and Cleopatra.—Izaak Walton.

      Idle time not idly spent.—Sir Henry Wotton.

      To see the fish cut with her golden oars the silver stream and greedily devour the treacherous bait.—Shakespeare.

      Anticipation.—It has been well said that no man ever sank under the burden of the day. It is when to-morrow's burden is added to the burden of to-day that the weight is more than a man can bear.—George MacDonald.

      The craving for a delicate fruit is pleasanter than the fruit itself.—Herder.

      The hours we pass with happy prospects in view are more pleasing than those crowned with fruition. In the first instance, we cook the dish to our own appetite; in the latter, nature cooks it for us.—Goldsmith.

      We are apt to rely upon future prospects, and become really expensive while we are only rich in possibility. We live up to our expectations, not to our possessions, and make a figure proportionable to what we may be, not what we are. We outrun our present income, as not doubting to disburse ourselves out of the profits of some future place, project, or reversion that we have in view.—Addison.

      Nothing is so good as it seems beforehand.—George Eliot.

      Antiquarian.—A thorough-paced antiquarian not only remembers what all other people have thought proper to forget, but he also forgets what all other people think it proper to remember.—Colton.

      The earliest and the longest has still the mastery over us.—George Eliot.

      Antithesis.—Young people are dazzled by the brilliancy of antithesis, and employ it.—Bruyère.

      Antithesis may be the blossom of wit, but it will never arrive at maturity unless sound sense be the trunk, and truth the root.—Colton.

      Apology.—An apology in the original sense was a pleading off from some charge or imputation, by explaining or defending principles or conduct. It therefore amounted to a vindication.—Crabbe.

      Brother, brother, we are both in the wrong.—Gay.

      Apothegms.—Nor do apothegms only serve for ornament and delight, but also for action and civil use, as being the edge tools of speech, which cut and penetrate the knots of business and affairs.—Bacon.

      Exclusively of the abstract sciences, the largest and worthiest portion of our knowledge consists of aphorisms, and the greatest and best of men is but an aphorism.—Coleridge.

      Proverbs are potted wisdom.—Charles Buxton.

      Appeal.—Seeing all men are not Œdipuses to read the riddle of another man's inside, and most men judge by appearances, it behooves a man to barter for a good esteem, even from his clothes and outside. We guess the goodness of the pasture by the mantle we see it wears.—Feltham.

      Appearances.—It is the appearances that fill the scene; and we pause not to ask of what realities they are the proxies. When the actor of Athens moved all hearts as he clasped the burial urn, and burst into broken sobs, how few then knew that it held the ashes of his son!—Bulwer-Lytton.

      What waste, what misery, what bankruptcy, come from all this ambition to dazzle others with the glare of apparent worldly success, we need not describe. The mischievous results show themselves in a thousand ways—in the rank frauds committed by men who dare to be dishonest, but do not dare to seem poor; and in the desperate dashes at fortune, in which the pity is not so much for those who fail, as for the hundreds of innocent families who are so often involved in their ruin.—Samuel Smiles.

      Foolish men mistake transitory semblances for eternal fact, and go astray more and more.—Carlyle.

      What is a good appearance? It is not being pompous and starchy; for proud looks lose hearts, and gentle words win them. It is not wearing fine clothes; for such dressing tells the world that the outside is the better part of the man. You cannot judge a horse by his harness;

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