Maturin Ballou - Pearls of Thought

Caution.– Whenever our neighbor's house is on fire, it cannot be amiss for the engines to play a little on our own. Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. — Burke.

Censure.– Censure pardons the ravens, but rebukes the doves. — Juvenal.

We do not like our friends the worse because they sometimes give us an opportunity to rail at them heartily. Their faults reconcile us to their virtues. — Hazlitt.

Censure is like the lightning which strikes the highest mountains. — Balthasar Gracian.

Chance.– There must be chance in the midst of design; by which we mean that events which are not designed necessarily arise from the pursuit of events which are designed. — Paley.

Chance generally favors the prudent. — Joubert.

It is strictly and philosophically true in nature and reason that there is no such thing as chance or accident; it being evident that these words do not signify anything really existing, anything that is truly an agent or the cause of any event; but they signify merely men's ignorance of the real and immediate cause. — Adam Clarke.

What can be more foolish than to think that all this rare fabric of heaven and earth could come by chance, when all the skill of art is not able to make an oyster! — Jeremy Taylor.

He who distrusts the security of chance takes more pains to effect the safety which results from labor. To find what you seek in the road of life, the best proverb of all is that which says: "Leave no stone unturned." — Bulwer-Lytton.

Change.– The great world spins forever down the ringing grooves of change. — Tennyson.

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. — Byron.

In this world of change, naught which comes stays, and naught which goes is lost. — Madame Swetchine.

Character.– As there is much beast and some devil in man, so is there some angel and some God in him. The beast and the devil may be conquered, but in this life never destroyed. — Coleridge.

Character is not cut in marble – it is not something solid and unalterable. It is something living and changing, and may become diseased as our bodies do. — George Eliot.

Grit is the grain of character. It may generally be described as heroism materialized, – spirit and will thrust into heart, brain, and backbone, so as to form part of the physical substance of the man. — Whipple.

Depend upon it, you would gain unspeakably if you would learn with me to see some of the poetry and the pathos, the tragedy and the comedy, lying in the experience of a human soul that looks out through dull gray eyes, and that speaks in a voice of quite ordinary tones. — George Eliot.

Character is the diamond that scratches every other stone — Bartol.

Character is human nature in its best form. It is moral order embodied in the individual. Men of character are not only the conscience of society, but in every well-governed state they are its best motive power; for it is moral qualities in the main which rule the world. — Samuel Smiles.

He whose life seems fair, if all his errors and follies were articled against him would seem vicious and miserable. — Jeremy Taylor.

In common discourse we denominate persons and things according to the major part of their character: he is to be called a wise man who has but few follies. — Watts.

Never does a man portray his own character more vividly than in his manner of portraying another. — Richter.

We are not that we are, nor do we treat or esteem each other for such, but for that we are capable of being. — Thoreau.

Charity.– Charity is a principle of prevailing love to God and good-will to men, which effectually inclines one endued with it to glorify God, and to do good to others. — Cruden.

The highest exercise of charity is charity towards the uncharitable. — Buckminster.

The charities that soothe, and heat, and bless, lie scattered at the feet of men like flowers. — Wordsworth.

Prayer carries us half way to God, fasting brings us to the door of his palace, and alms-giving procures us admission. — Koran.

Shall we repine at a little misplaced charity, we who could no way foresee the effect, – when an all-knowing, all-wise Being showers down every day his benefits on the unthankful and undeserving? — Atterbury.

As the purse is emptied the heart is filled. — Victor Hugo.

What we employ in charitable uses during our lives is given away from ourselves: what we bequeath at our death is given from others only, as our nearest relations. — Atterbury.

Goodness answers to the theological virtue of charity, and admits no excess but error; the desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall; but in charity there is no excess: neither can angel or man come into danger by it. — Bacon.

Poplicola's doors were opened on the outside, to save the people even the common civility of asking entrance; where misfortune was a powerful recommendation, and where want itself was a powerful mediator. — Dryden.

When thy brother has lost all that he ever had, and lies languishing, and even gasping under the utmost extremities of poverty and distress, dost thou think to lick him whole again only with thy tongue? — South.

What we frankly give, forever is our own. — Granville.

Faith and hope themselves shall die, while deathless charity remains. — Prior.

The place of charity, like that of God, is everywhere. — Professor Vinet.

People do not care to give alms without some security for their money; and a wooden leg or a withered arm is a sort of draftment upon heaven for those who choose to have their money placed to account there. — Mackenzie.

Chastity.– Chastity enables the soul to breathe a pure air in the foulest places; continence makes her strong, no matter in what condition the body may be; her sway over the senses makes her queenly; her light and peace render her beautiful. — Joubert.

Cheerfulness.– Cheerfulness is also an excellent wearing quality. It has been called the bright weather of the heart. — Samuel Smiles.

There is no Christian duty that is not to be seasoned and set off with cheerishness, – which in a thousand outward and intermitting crosses may yet be done well, as in this vale of tears. — Milton.

Such a man, truly wise, creams of nature, leaving the sour and the dregs for philosophy and reason to lap up. — Swift.

Be thou like the bird perched upon some frail thing, although he feels the branch bending beneath him, yet loudly sings, knowing full well that he has wings. — Mme. de Gasparin.

Children.– With children we must mix gentleness with firmness; they must not always have their own way, but they must not always be thwarted. If we never have headaches through rebuking them, we shall have plenty of heartaches when they grow up. Be obeyed at all costs. If you yield up your authority once, you will hardly ever get it again. — Spurgeon.

The smallest children are nearest to God, as the smallest planets are nearest the sun. — Richter.

The death of a child occasions a passion of grief and frantic tears, such as your end, brother reader, will never inspire. — Thackeray.

Childhood has no forebodings; but then, it is soothed by no memories of outlived sorrow. — George Eliot.