Joseph Addison Quotes

If we hope for what we are not likely to possess, we act and think in vain, and make life a greater dream and shadow than it really is.

A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world.

What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the soul.

Their is no defense against criticism except obscurity.

A man's first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart.

True happiness arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's self, and in the next, from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions.

Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind, which are delivered down from generation to generation as presents to the posterity of those who are yet unborn.

Beauty soon grows familiar to the lover, Fades in his eye, and palls upon the sense.

Should the whole frame of nature round him break, In ruin and confusion hurled, He, unconcerned, would hear the mighty crack, And stand secure amidst a falling world.

It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are the more gentle and quiet we become towards the defects of others.

When men are easy in their circumstances, they are naturally enemies to innovations.

Music, the greatest good that mortals know and all of heaven we have hear below.

Of all the diversions of life, there is none so proper to fill up its empty spaces as the reading of useful and entertaining authors.

A man must be both stupid and uncharitable who believes there is no virtue or truth but on his own side.

Mutability of temper and inconsistency with ourselves is the greatest weakness of human nature.

Admiration is a very short-lived passion, that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object.

I value my garden more for being full of blackbirds than of cherries, and very frankly give them fruit for their songs.

The chief ingredients in the composition of those qualities that gain esteem and praise, are good nature, truth, good sense, and good breeding.

Cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, filling it with a steady and perpetual serenity

A misery is not to be measure from the nature of the evil but from the temper of the sufferer.

Mysterious love, uncertain treasure, hast thou more of pain or pleasure! Endless torments dwell about thee: Yet who would live, and live without thee!

A cloudy day or a little sunshine have as great an influence on many constitutions as the most recent blessings or misfortunes.

True happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noise it arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's self, and in the next from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions.

Suspicion is not less an enemy to virtue than to happiness; he that is already corrupt is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes suspicious will quickly be corrupt.

There is not any present moment that is unconnected with some future one. The life of every man is a continued chain of incidents, each link of which hangs upon the former. The transition from cause to effect, from event to event, is often carried on by secret steps, which our foresight cannot divine, and our sagacity is unable to trace. Evil may at some future period bring forth good; and good may bring forth evil, both equally unexpected.

In doing what we ought we deserve no praise, because it is our duty.

The sense of honour is of so fine and delicate a nature, that it is only to be met with in minds which are naturally noble, or in such as have been cultivated by good examples, or a refined education.

Sunday clears away the rust of the whole week.

Animals, in their generation, are wiser than the sons of men; but their wisdom is confined to a few particulars, and lies in a very narrow compass.

Reading is a basic tool in the living of a good life.

I will indulge my sorrows, and give way to all the pangs and fury of despair.

A true critic ought to dwell upon excellencies rather than imperfections, to discover the concealed beauties of a writer, and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observation.

The fear of death often proves mortal, and sets people on methods to save their Lives, which infallibly destroy them.

Soon as the evening shades prevail, The moon takes up the wondrous tale, And nightly to the listening earth Repeats the story of her birth.

Charity is a virtue of the heart, and not of the hands.

Blesses his stars and thinks it luxury.

Young men soon give, and soon forget, affronts; old age is slow in both.

Ridicule is generally made use of to laugh men out of virtue and good sense, by attacking everything praiseworthy in human life.

When a man becomes familiar with his goddess, she quickly sinks into a woman.

Better to die ten thousand deaths than wound my honor.

Is there not some chosen curse, some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven, red with uncommon wrath, to blast the man who owes his greatness to his country's ruin!

Men may change their climate, but they cannot change their nature. A man that goes out a fool cannot ride or sail himself into common sense.

Everything that is new or uncommon raises a pleasure in the imagination, because it fills the soul with an agreeable surprise, gratifies its curiosity, and gives it an idea of which it was not before possessed.

And pleas'd th' Almighty's orders to perform, Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm.

True benevolence or compassion, extends itself through the whole of existence and sympathizes with the distress of every creature capable of sensation.

No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority.

We are always doing something for posterity, but I would fain see posterity do something for us.

Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm.

To be exempt from the passions with which others are tormented, is the only pleasing solitude.

Knowledge is, indeed, that which, next to virtue, truly and essentially raises one man above another.

The utmost extent of man's knowledge, is to know that he knows nothing.

Friendship improves happiness, and abates misery, by doubling our joys, and dividing our grief.

Tradition is an important help to history, but its statements should be carefully scrutinized before we rely on them.

The friendships of the world are oft confederacies in vice, or leagues of pleasures.

Marriage enlarges the scene of our happiness and of our miseries. A marriage of love is pleasant, of interest, easy, and where both meet, happy. A happy marriage has in it all the pleasures of friendship, all the enjoyments of sense and reason, and,

Man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter.

From hence, let fierce contending nations know, what dire effects from civil discord flow.

There is nothing which we receive with so much reluctance as advice.

Nothing that isn't a real crime makes a man appear so contemptible and little in the eyes of the world as inconsistency.

Great souls by instinct to each other turn, demand alliance, and in friendship burn.

A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty Is worth a whole eternity in bondage.

Modesty is not only an ornament, but also a guard to virtue.

One should take good care not to grow too wise for so great a pleasure of life as laughter.

Exercise ferments the humors, casts them into their proper channels, throws off redundancies, and helps nature in those secret distributions, without which the body cannot subsist in its vigor, nor the soul act with cheerfulness.

It is the privilege of posterity to set matters right between those antagonists who, by their rivalry for greatness, divided a whole age.

A good conscience is to the soul what health is to the body it preserves constant ease and serenity within us and more than countervails all the calamities and afflictions which can befall us from without

We are growing serious, and, let me tell you, that's the very next step to being dull.

Sweet are the slumbers of the virtuous man.

There is no greater sign of a general decay of virtue in a nation, than a want of zeal in its inhabitants for the good of their country.

Talking with a friend is nothing else but thinking aloud.

An ostentatious man will rather relate a blunder or an absurdity he has committed, than be debarred from talking of his own dear person.

Nothing is capable of being well set to music that is not nonsense.

If men would consider not so much wherein they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling in the world.

There is no virtue so truly great and godlike as justice.

It is ridiculous for any man to criticize on the works of another, who has not distinguished himself by his own performances.

Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable.

This not in mortals to command success, but we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll deserve it.

Education is a companion which no misfortune can depress, no crime can destroy, no enemy can alienate, no despotism can enslave. At home, a friend, abroad, an introduction, in solitude a solace and in society an ornament. It chastens vice, it guides virtue, it gives at once grace and government to genius. Without it, what is man? A splendid slave, a reasoning savage.