William Shenstone Quotes

Avarice is the most oppose of all characters to that of God Almighty, whose alone it is to give and not receive.

Immoderate assurance is perfect licentiousness.

Amid the most mercenary ages it is but a secondary sort of admiration that is bestowed upon magnificence.

Critics must excuse me if I compare them to certain animals called asses, who, by gnawing vines, originally taught the great advantage of pruning them.

Virtues, like essences, lose their fragrance when exposed. They are sensitive plants, which will not bear too familiar approaches.

Taste and good-nature are universally connected.

Trifles discover a character, more than actions of importance.

I trimmed my lamp, consumed the midnight oil.

In a heavy oppressive atmosphere, when the spirits sink too low, the best cordial is to read over all the letters of one's friends.

Let us be careful to distinguish modesty, which is ever amiable, from reserve, which is only prudent.

Learning, like money, may be of so base a coin as to be utterly void of use.

Wit is the refractory pupil of judgment.

To thee, fair Freedom! I retire From flattery, cards, and dice, and din: Nor art thou found in mansions higher Than the low cot, or humble inn.

Nothing is sure in London, except expense.

Independence may be found in comparative as well as in absolute abundance; I mean where a person contracts his desires within the limits of his fortune.

Fools are very often united in the strictest intimacies, as the lighter kinds of woods are the most closely glued together.

The lines of poetry, the period of prose, and even the texts of Scripture most frequently recollected and quoted, are those which are felt to be preeminently musical.

Necessity may be the mother of lucrative invention, but it is the death of poetical invention.

Let the gulled fool the toil of war pursue, where bleed the many to enrich the few.

A large, branching, aged oak is perhaps the most venerable of all inanimate objects.

Offensive objects, at a proper distance, acquire even a degree of beauty.

Love is a pleasing but a various clime.

I hate a style, as I do a garden, that is wholly flat and regular; that slides along like an eel, and never rises to what one can call an inequality.

A plain narrative of any remarkable fact, emphatically related, has a more striking effect without the author's comment.

A man of remarkable genius may afford to pass by a piece of wit, if it happen to border on abuse. A little genius is obliged to catch at every witticism indiscriminately.

Oft has good nature been the fool's defence, And honest meaning gilded want of sense.

Persons who discover a flatterer, do not always disapprove him, because he imagines them considerable enough to deserve his applications.

Whoe'er excels in what we prize, appears a hero in our eyes.

The fund of sensible discourse is limited; that of jest and badinerie is infinite.

The making presents to a lady one addresses is like throwing armor into an enemy's camp, with a resolution to recover it.

Glory relaxes often and debilitates the mind; censure stimulates and contracts,--both to an extreme. Simple fame is, perhaps, the proper medium.

Some men use no other means to acquire respect than by insisting on it; and it sometimes answers their purpose, as it does a highwayman's in regard to money.

Every good poet includes a critic, but the reverse is not true.

My banks they are furnish'd with bees, Whose murmur invites one to sleep.

It happens a little unluckily that the persons who have the most infinite contempt of money are the same that have the strongest appetite for the pleasures it procures.

People can commend the weather without envy.

The most reserved of men, that will not exchange two syllables together in an English coffee-house, should they meet at Ispahan, would drink sherbet and eat a mess of rice together.

In every village marked with little spire, Embowered in trees, and hardly known to fame.

I know not whether increasing years do not cause us to esteem fewer people and to bear with more.

There is a certain flimsiness of poetry which seems expedient in a song.

I am thankful that my name in obnoxious to no pun.

Bashfulness is more frequently connected with good sense than we find assurance; and impudence, on the other hand, is often the mere effect of downright stupidity.

Reserve is no more essentially connected with understanding than a church organ with devotion, or wine with good-nature.

When self-interest inclines a man to print, he should consider that the purchaser expects a pennyworth for his penny, and has reason to asperse his honesty if he finds himself deceived.

May I always have a heart superior, with economy suitable, to my fortune.

A rich dress adds but little to the beauty of a person. It may possibly create a deference, but that is rather an enemy to love.

Those who are incapable of shining out by dress would do well to consider that the contrast between them and their clothes turns out much to their disadvantage.

Fashion is a great restraint upon your persons of taste and fancy; who would otherwise in the most trifling instances be able to distinguish themselves from the vulgar.

Independence may be found in comparative as well as in absolute abundance I mean where a person contracts his desires within the limits of his fortune.

For seldom shall she hear a tale So sad so tender yet so true.