Joseph Addison Quotes

Those Marriages generally abound most with Love and Constancy, that are preceded by a long Courtship.

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

Nothing is more amiable than true modesty, and nothing more contemptible than the false. The one guards virtue, the other betrays it.

They were a people so primitive they did not know how to get money, except by working for it.

It is odd to consider the connection between despotism and barbarity, and how the making one person more than man makes the rest less.

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.

A wealthy doctor who can help a poor man, and will not without a fee, has less sense of humanity than a poor ruffian, who kills a rich man to supply his necessities.

Talking with a friend is nothing else but thinking aloud.

A person may be qualified to do greater good to mankind and become more beneficial to the world, by morality without faith than by faith without morality.

Music, when thus applied, raises noble hints in the mind of the hearer, and fills it with great conceptions. It strengthens devotion, and advances praise into rapture.

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!

Let freedom never perish in your hands.

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.

True modesty avoids everything that is criminal; false modesty everything that is unfashionable.

Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable.

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

My voice is still for war.

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.

Friendships, in general, are suddenly contracted; and therefore it is no wonder they are easily dissolved.

Music is the only sensual gratification which mankind may indulge in to excess without injury to their moral or religious feelings.

Who rant by note, and through the gamut rage; in songs and airs express their martial fire; combat in trills, and in a fugue expire.

Plenty of people wish to become devout, but no one wishes to be humble.

It is impossible for authors to discover beauties in one another's works; they have eyes only for spots and blemishes.

Artificial intelligence will never be a match for natural stupidity.

Without constancy there is neither love, friendship, nor virtue in the world.

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

With regard to donations always expect the most from prudent people, who keep their own accounts.

Music can noble hints impart, Engender fury, kindle love, With unsuspected eloquence can move, And manage all the man with secret art.

The Fear of Death often proves Mortal.

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.

Jealousy is that pain which a man feels from the apprehension that he is not equally beloved by the person whom he entirely loves.

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

Charity is the perfection and ornament of religion.

Waning moons their settled periods keep, to swell the billows and ferment the deep.

The peacock in all his pride does not display half the colors that appear in the garments of a British lady when she is dressed.

Antidotes are what you take to prevent dotes.

To a man of pleasure every moment appears to be lost, which partakes not of the vivacity of amusement.

Oh, Liberty! thou goddess heavenly bright! Profuse of bliss, and pregnant with delight! Eternal pleasures in thy presence reign, And smiling plenty leads thy wanton train.

To be perfectly just is an attribute of the divine nature; to be so to the utmost of our abilities, is the glory of man.

The unjustifiable severity of a parent is loaded with this aggravation, that those whom he injures are always in his sight.

There is nothing which strengthens faith more than the observance of morality.

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.

The Mind that lies fallow but a single Day, sprouts up in Follies that are only to be killed by a constant and assiduous Culture.

If we may believe our logicians, man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter. He has a heart capable of mirth, and naturally disposed to it.

Mere bashfulness without merit is awkwardness.

There are many more shining qualities in the mind of man, but there is none so useful as discretion.

True religion and virtue give a cheerful and happy turn to the mind, admit of all true pleasures, and even procure for us the highest.

There is not a more unhappy being than a superannuated idol.

Religion contracts the circle of our pleasures, but leaves it wide enough for her votaries to expatiate in.

Cunning is only the mimic of discretion, and may pass upon weak men in the same manner as vivacity is often mistaken for wit, and gravity for wisdom.