Chapter 7

Fortitude implies a firmness and strength of mind, that enables us to do and suffer as we ought. It rises upon an opposition, and, like a river, swells the higher for having its course stopped.--JEREMY COLLIER.

True fortitude I take to be the quiet possession of a man's self, and an undisturbed doing his duty, whatever evil besets or danger lies in his way.--LOCKE.

FORTUNE.--It is a madness to make fortune the mistress of events, because in herself she is nothing, but is ruled by prudence.--DRYDEN.

The prudent man really frames his own fortunes for himself.--PLAUTUS.

Let fortune do her worst, whatever she makes us lose, so long as she never makes us lose our honesty and our independence.--POPE.

Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.--SHAKESPEARE.

Every man is the architect of his own fortune.--SALLUST.

The bad fortune of the good turns their faces up to heaven; and the good fortune of the bad bows their heads down to the earth.--SAADI.

Fortune favors the bold.--CICERO.

The less we deserve good fortune, the more we hope for it.--MOLIÈRE.

FREEDOM.--I would rather be a freeman among slaves than a slave among freemen.--SWIFT.

There are two freedoms,--the false, where a man is free to do what he likes; the true, where a man is free to do what he ought.--CHARLES KINGSLEY.

The cause of freedom is the cause of God.--BOWLES.

Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage; Minds innocent and quiet take That for an hermitage; If I have freedom in my love, And in my soul am free, Angels alone that soar above, Enjoy such liberty. --RICHARD LOVELACE.

And ne'er shall the sons of Columbia be slaves, While the earth bears a plant, or the sea rolls its waves. --ROBERT TREAT PAINE.

Many politicians are in the habit of laying it down as a self-evident proposition, that no people ought to be free till they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story, who resolved not to go into the water till he had learned to swim.--MACAULAY.

To have freedom is only to have that which is absolutely necessary to enable us to be what we ought to be, and to possess what we ought to possess.--RAHEL.

When Freedom from her mountain height Unfurled her standard to the air, She tore the azure robe of night, And set the stars of glory there. She mingled with its gorgeous dyes The milky baldric of the skies, And striped its pure, celestial white With streakings of the morning light. --JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE.

Freedom is not caprice but room to enlarge.--C.A. BARTOL.

Blandishments will not fascinate us, nor will threats of a "halter" intimidate. For, under God, we are determined that, wheresoever, whensoever, or howsoever we shall be called to make our exit, we will die freemen.--JOSIAH QUINCY.

Who then is free?--the wise, who well maintains An empire o'er himself; whom neither chains, Nor want, nor death, with slavish fear inspire; Who boldly answers to his warm desire; Who can ambition's vainest gifts despise; Firm in himself, who on himself relies; Polish'd and round, who runs his proper course, And breaks misfortune with superior force. --HORACE.

The only freedom worth possessing is that which gives enlargement to a people's energy, intellect, and virtues.--CHANNING.

He was the freeman whom the truth made free; Who first of all, the bands of Satan broke; Who broke the bands of sin, and for his soul, In spite of fools consulted seriously. --POLLOCK.

FRIENDSHIP.--Friendship is the only thing in the world concerning the usefulness of which all mankind are agreed.--CICERO.

The man that hails you Tom or Jack, And proves by thumping on your back His sense of your great merit, Is such a friend, that one had need Be very much his friend indeed To pardon or to bear it. --COWPER.

He is a friend indeed who proves himself a friend in need.--PLAUTUS.

Thine own friend, and thy father's friend, forsake not.--PROVERBS 27:10.

To God, thy country, and thy friend be true.--VAUGHAN.

There is no man so friendless but that he can find a friend sincere enough to tell him disagreeable truths.--LYTTON.

A friendship that makes the least noise is very often the most useful; for which reason I should prefer a prudent friend to a zealous one. --ADDISON.

A slender acquaintance with the world must convince every man that actions, not words, are the true criterion of the attachment of friends; and that the most liberal professions of good-will are very far from being the surest marks of it.--GEORGE WASHINGTON.

No friend's a friend till he shall prove a friend.--BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

The qualities of your friends will be those of your enemies,--cold friends, cold enemies; half friends, half enemies; fervid enemies, warm friends.--LAVATER.

Purchase no friends by gifts; when thou ceasest to give such will cease to love.--FULLER.

The difficulty is not so great to die for a friend as to find a friend worth dying for.--HENRY HOME.

Real friendship is a slow grower, and never thrives unless engrafted upon a stock of known and reciprocal merit.--CHESTERFIELD.

There is nothing more becoming any wise man, than to make choice of friends, for by them thou shalt be judged what thou art: let them therefore be wise and virtuous, and none of those that follow thee for gain; but make election rather of thy betters, than thy inferiors.--SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

'Tis thus that on the choice of friends Our good or evil name depends. --GAY.

We may have many acquaintances, but we can have but few friends; this made Aristotle say that he that hath many friends hath none. --DR. JOHNSON.

An act, by which we make one friend and one enemy, is a losing game; because revenge is a much stronger principle than gratitude.--COLTON.

That friendship will not continue to the end that is begun for an end. --QUARLES.

Be slow to fall into friendship; but when thou art in continue firm and constant.--SOCRATES.

We cannot expect the deepest friendship unless we are willing to pay the price, a self-sacrificing love.--PELOUBET.

False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade. --BOVEE.

Be slow in choosing a friend, slower in changing.--FRANKLIN.

The greatest medicine is a true friend.--SIR W. TEMPLE.

True friends visit us in prosperity only when invited, but in adversity they come without invitation.--THEOPHRASTUS.

Sudden friendships rarely live to ripeness.--MLLE. DE SCUDÉRI.

Who friendship with a knave hath made, Is judg'd a partner in the trade. --GAY.

Thou mayest be sure that he who will in private tell thee of thy faults is thy friend, for he adventures thy dislike and doth hazard thy hatred.--SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

He is happy that hath a true friend at his need; but he is more truly happy that hath no need of his friend.--WARWICK.

I would not enter on my list of friends (Though graced with polish'd manners and fine sense, Yet wanting sensibility) the man Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm. --COWPER.

True happiness consists not in the multitude of friends, but in the worth and choice.--DR. JOHNSON.

FRUGALITY.--Frugality is founded on the principle that all riches have limits.--BURKE.

Frugality may be termed the daughter of prudence, the sister of temperance, and the parent of liberty.--DR. JOHNSON.

The world has not yet learned the riches of frugality.--CICERO.

FUTURITY.--It is vain to be always looking toward the future and never acting toward it.--J.F. BOYES.

The best preparation for the future is the present well seen to, the last duty done.--GEORGE MACDONALD.

Trust no future howe'er pleasant; Let the dead past bury its dead; Act,--act in the living present, Heart within and God o'erhead! --LONGFELLOW.

The state of that man's mind who feels too intense an interest as to future events, must be most deplorable.--SENECA.

God will not suffer man to have the knowledge of things to come; for if he had prescience of his prosperity, he would be careless; and, understanding of his adversity, he would be senseless.--ST. AUGUSTINE.

Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.--PROVERBS 27:1.

The golden age is not in the past, but in the future; not in the origin of human experience, but in its consummate flower; not opening in Eden, but out from Gethsemane.--CHAPIN.

Why will any man be so impertinently officious as to tell me all prospect of a future state is only fancy and delusion? Is there any merit in being the messenger of ill news. If it is a dream, let me enjoy it, since it makes me both the happier and better man.--ADDISON.

How narrow our souls become when absorbed in any present good or ill! it is only the thought of the future that makes them great.--RICHTER.

If there was no future life, our souls would not thirst for it.--RICHTER.

GAMBLING.--There is nothing that wears out a fine face like the vigils of the card-table, and those cutting passions which naturally attend them. Hollow eyes, haggard looks and pale complexions are the natural indications.--STEELE.

Games of chance are traps to catch school boy novices and gaping country squires, who begin with a guinea and end with a mortgage. --CUMBERLAND.

All gaming, since it implies a desire to profit at the expense of another, involves a breach of the tenth commandment.--WHATELY.

There is but one good throw upon the dice, which is, to throw them away.--CHATFIELD.

I look upon every man as a suicide from the moment he takes the dice-box desperately in his hand; and all that follows in his fatal career from that time is only sharpening the dagger before he strikes it to his heart.--CUMBERLAND.

It is the child of avarice, the brother of iniquity and the father of mischief.--WASHINGTON.

GENEROSITY.--All my experience of the world teaches me that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the safe side and the just side of a question is the generous side and the merciful side.--MRS. JAMESON.

He who gives what he would as readily throw away gives without generosity; for the essence of generosity is in self-sacrifice.--HENRY TAYLOR.

Generosity is only benevolence in practice.--BISHOP KEN.

The secret pleasure of a generous act is the great mind's great bribe. --DRYDEN.

If there be any truer measure of a man than by what he does, it must be by what he gives.--SOUTH.

Some are unwisely liberal; and more delight to give presents than to pay debts.--SIR P. SIDNEY.

When you give, take to yourself no credit for generosity, unless you deny yourself something in order that you may give.--HENRY TAYLOR.

The generous who is always just, and the just who is always generous, may, unannounced, approach the throne of heaven.--LAVATER.

Men of the noblest dispositions think themselves happiest when others share their happiness with them.--DUNCAN.

In giving, a man receives more than he gives; and the more is in proportion to the worth of the thing given.--GEORGE MACDONALD.

Let us proportion our alms to our ability, lest we provoke God to proportion His blessings to our alms.--BEVERIDGE.

A friend to everybody is often a friend to nobody, or else in his simplicity he robs his family to help strangers, and becomes brother to a beggar. There is wisdom in generosity, as in everything else. --SPURGEON.

GENIUS.--Genius is an immense capacity for taking trouble.--CARLYLE.

Genius always gives its best at first, prudence at last.--LAVATER.

There is hardly a more common error than that of taking the man who has but one talent for a genius.--HELPS.

Talent wears well, genius wears itself out; talent drives a brougham in fact; genius, a sun-chariot in fancy.--OUIDA.

Genius unexerted is no more genius than a bushel of acorns is a forest of oaks.--BEECHER.

The first and last thing which is required of genius is the love of truth.--GOETHE.

Genius can never despise labor.--ABEL STEVENS.

And genius hath electric power, Which earth can never tame; Bright suns may scorch, and dark clouds lower-- Its flash is still the same. --LYDIA M. CHILD.

Genius must be born, and never can be taught.--DRYDEN.

Genius is the gold in the mine, talent is the miner who works and brings it out.--LADY BLESSINGTON.

One science only will one genius fit; So vast is art, so narrow human wit. --POPE.

I know no such thing as genius,--genius is nothing but labor and diligence.--HOGARTH.

Men of genius are often dull and inert in society; as the blazing meteor, when it descends to earth, is only a stone.--LONGFELLOW.

Genius, without religion, is only a lamp on the outer gate of a palace. It may serve to cast a gleam of light on those that are without while the inhabitant sits in darkness.--HANNAH MORE.

Genius is supposed to be a power of producing excellences which are out of the reach of the rules of art: a power which no precepts can teach, and which no industry can acquire.--SIR J. REYNOLDS.

GENTLEMAN.--Propriety of manners, and consideration for others, are the two main characteristics of a gentleman.--BEACONSFIELD.

To be a gentleman does not depend upon the tailor or the toilet. Good clothes are not good habits. A gentleman is just a gentle-man,--no more, no less; a diamond polished, that was first a diamond in the rough.--BISHOP DOANE.

What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to be honest, to be gentle, to be generous, to be brave, to be wise, and, possessing all these qualities, to exercise them in the most graceful outward manner? Ought a gentleman to be a loyal son, a true husband, an honest father? Ought his life to be decent, his bills to be paid, his taste to be high and elegant, his aims in life lofty and noble?--THACKERAY.

The taste of beauty, and the relish of what is decent, just and amiable, perfects the character of the gentleman and the philosopher. And the study of such a taste or relish will, as we suppose, be ever the great employment and concern of him who covets as well to be wise and good, as agreeable and polite.--SHAFTESBURY.

Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company, and reflection must finish him.--LOCKE.

You may depend upon it, religion is, in its essence, the most gentlemanly thing in the world. It will alone gentilize, if unmixed with cant; and I know nothing else that will, alone. Certainly not the army, which is thought to be the grand embellisher of manners. --COLERIDGE.

He is the best gentleman that is the son of his own deserts, and not the degenerated heir of another's virtue.--VICTOR HUGO.

Perhaps propriety is as near a word as any to denote the manners of the gentleman; elegance is necessary to the fine gentleman; dignity is proper to noblemen; and majesty to kings.--HAZLITT.

He is gentle that doth gentle deeds.

Gentleman is a term which does not apply to any station, but to the mind and the feelings in every station.--TALFOURD.

Of the offspring of the gentilman Jafeth, came Habraham, Moyses, Aron and the profettys; and also the kyng of the right line of Mary, of whom that gentilman Jhesus was borne.--JULIANA BERNERS.

GENTLENESS.--True gentleness is founded on a sense of what we owe to Him who made us, and to the common nature which we all share. It arises from reflection on our own failings and wants, and from just views of the condition and the duty of man. It is native feeling heightened and improved by principle.--BLAIR.

We do not believe, or we forget, that "the Holy Ghost came down, not in shape of a vulture, but in the form of a dove."--EMERSON.

Gentleness in the gait is what simplicity is in the dress. Violent gestures or quick movements inspire involuntary disrespect.--BALZAC.

The best and simplest cosmetic for women is constant gentleness and sympathy for the noblest interests of her fellow-creatures. This preserves and gives to her features an indelibly gay, fresh, and agreeable expression. If women would but realize that harshness makes them ugly, it would prove the best means of conversion.--AUERBACH.

Gentleness, which belongs to virtue, is to be carefully distinguished from the mean spirit of cowards and the fawning assent of sycophants. --BLAIR.

GIFTS.--Posthumous charities are the very essence of selfishness, when bequeathed by those who, when alive, would part with nothing.--COLTON.

Give freely to him that deserveth well, and asketh nothing: and that is a way of giving to thyself.--FULLER.

The gift, to be true, must be the flowing of the giver unto me, correspondent to my flowing unto him.--EMERSON.

The only gift is a portion of thyself. * * * Therefore the poet brings his poem; the shepherd, his lamb; the farmer, corn; the miner, a gem; the sailor, coral and shells; the painter, his picture; the girl, a handkerchief of her own sewing.--EMERSON.

A gift--its kind, its value and appearance; the silence or the pomp that attends it; the style in which it reaches you--may decide the dignity or vulgarity of the giver.--LAVATER.

God's love gives in such a way that it flows from a Father's heart, the well-spring of all good. The heart of the giver makes the gift dear and precious; as among ourselves we say of even a trifling gift, "It comes from a hand we love," and look not so much at the gift as at the heart.--LUTHER.

There is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers.--SENECA.

GLORY.--Real glory springs from the quiet conquest of ourselves; and without that the conqueror is nought but the first slave.--THOMSON.

Wood burns because it has the proper stuff for that purpose in it; and a man becomes renowned because he has the necessary stuff in him. Renown is not to be sought, and all pursuit of it is vain. A person may, indeed, by skillful conduct and various artificial means, make a sort of name for himself; but if the inner jewel is wanting, all is vanity, and will not last a day.--GOETHE.

The road to glory would cease to be arduous if it were trite and trodden; and great minds must be ready not only to take opportunities but to make them.--COLTON.

True glory consists in doing what deserves to be written, in writing what deserves to be read, and in so living as to make the world happier and better for our living in it.--PLINY.

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

GLUTTONY.--Gluttony is the source of all our infirmities, and the fountain of all our diseases. As a lamp is choked by a superabundance of oil, a fire extinguished by excess of fuel, so is the natural health of the body destroyed by intemperate diet.--BURTON.

I have come to the conclusion that mankind consume twice too much food.--SYDNEY SMITH.

Fat paunches have lean pates; and dainty bits Make rich the ribs, but bankrupt quite the wits. --SHAKESPEARE.

The pleasures of the palate deal with us like Egyptian thieves who strangle those whom they embrace.--SENECA.

When I behold a fashionable table set out in all its magnificence, I fancy that I see gouts and dropsies, fevers and lethargies, with other innumerable distempers lying in ambuscade among the dishes. Nature delights in the most plain and simple diet. Every animal but man keeps to one dish. Herbs are the food of this species, fish of that, and flesh of a third. Man falls upon everything that comes in his way; not the smallest fruit or excrescence of the earth, scarce a berry or a mushroom can escape him.--ADDISON.

GOD.--In all thy actions think God sees thee; and in all His actions labor to see Him; that will make thee fear Him; this will move thee to love Him; the fear of God is the beginning of knowledge, and the knowledge of God is the perfection of love.--QUARLES.

God should be the object of all our desires, the end of all our actions, the principle of all our affections, and the governing power of our whole souls.--MASSILLON.

God governs the world, and we have only to do our duty wisely, and leave the issue to Him.--JOHN JAY.

They that deny a God destroy man's nobility; for certainly man is like the beasts in his body; and if he is not like God in his spirit, he is an ignoble creature.--BACON.

God is all love; it is He who made everything, and He loves everything that He has made.--HENRY BROOKE.

How calmly may we commit ourselves to the hands of Him who bears up the world,--of Him who has created, and who provides for the joys even of insects, as carefully as if He were their father.--RICHTER.

I fear God, and next to God, I chiefly fear him who fears Him not. --SAADI.

A foe to God was never true friend to man.--YOUNG.

God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform; He plants His footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm. --COWPER.

There never was a man of solid understanding, whose apprehensions are sober, and by a pensive inspection advised, but that he hath found by an irresistible necessity one true God and everlasting being.--SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

Who guides below, and rules above, The great disposer, and the mighty king; Than He none greater, next Him none, That can be, is, or was. --HORACE.

Thou art, O God, the life and light Of all this wondrous world we see; Its glow by day, its smile by night, Are but reflections caught from Thee! Where'er we turn thy glories shine, And all things fair and bright are thine! --MOORE.

From God derived, to God by nature join'd. We act the dictates of His mighty mind: And though the priests are mute and temples still, God never wants a voice to speak His will. --ROWE.

The very impossibility in which I find myself to prove that God is not, discovers to me His existence.--BRUYÈRE.

We find in God all the excellences of light, truth, wisdom, greatness, goodness and life. Light gives joy and gladness; truth gives satisfaction; wisdom gives learning and instruction; greatness excites admiration; goodness produces love and gratitude; life gives immortality and insures enjoyment.--JONES OF NAYLAND.

We have a friend and protector, from whom, if we do not ourselves depart from Him, nor power nor spirit can separate us. In His strength let us proceed on our journey, through the storms, and troubles, and dangers of the world. However they may rage and swell, though the mountains shake at the tempests, our rock will not be moved: we have one friend who will never forsake us; one refuge, where we may rest in peace and stand in our lot at the end of the days. That same is He who liveth, and was dead; who is alive forevermore; and hath the keys of hell and of death.--BISHOP HEBER.

It is a most unhappy state to be at a distance with God: man needs no greater infelicity than to be left to himself.--FELTHAM.

The man who forgets the wonders and mercies of the Lord is without any excuse; for we are continually surrounded with objects which may serve to bring the power and goodness of God strikingly to mind.--SLADE.

God is the light which, never seen itself, makes all things visible, and clothes itself in colors. Thine eye feels not its ray, but thine heart feels its warmth.--RICHTER.

A secret sense of God's goodness is by no means enough. Men should make solemn and outward expressions of it, when they receive His creatures for their support; a service and homage not only due to Him, but profitable to themselves.--DEAN STANHOPE.