Samuel Butler Quotes

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No miracle was effected without means of some kind; the difference between the faithful and the unbeliever consisted in the very fact that the former could see a miracle where the latter could not. The
Samuel Butler Quotes: No miracle was effected without
Brigands demand your money or your life; women require both.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Brigands demand your money or
In the midst of vice we are in virtue, and vice versa.
Samuel Butler Quotes: In the midst of vice
The only absolute morality is absolute stagnation.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The only absolute morality is
Young people have a marvelous faculty of either dying or adapting themselves to circumstances. Even if they are unhappy - very unhappy - it is astonishing how easily they can be prevented from finding it out, or at any rate from attributing it to any other cause than their own sinfulness.

To parents who wish to lead a quiet life I would say: Tell your children that they are naughty - much naughtier than most children. Point to the young people of some acquaintances as models of perfection and impress your own children with a deep sense of their own inferiority. You carry so many more guns than they do that they cannot fight you. This is called moral influence, and it will enable you to bounce them as much as you please. They think you know and they will not have yet caught you lying often enough to suspect that you are not the unworldly and scrupulously truthful person which you represent yourself to be; nor yet will they know how great a coward you are, nor how soon you will run away if they fight you with persistency and judgment. You keep the dice and throw them both for your children and yourself. Load them then, for you can easily manage to stop your children from examining them. Tell them how singularly indulgent you are; insist on the incalculable benefit you conferred upon them, firstly in bringing them into the world at all, but more particularly in bringing them into it as your own children rather than anyone else's... You hold all the trump cards, or if
Samuel Butler Quotes: Young people have a marvelous
The major sin is the sin of being born.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The major sin is the
This world is like Noah's Ark.
In which few men but many beasts embark.
Samuel Butler Quotes: This world is like Noah's
His knowledge was not far behind
The knight's, but of another kind,
And he another way came by't ;
Some call it Gifts, and some New Light.
A lib'ral art, that costs no pains
Of study, industry, or brains.
Samuel Butler Quotes: His knowledge was not far
When you have told anyone you have left him a legacy, the only decent thing to do is die at once.
Samuel Butler Quotes: When you have told anyone
It has been said that although God cannot alter the past, historians can
it is perhaps because they can be useful to Him in this respect that He tolerates their existence.
Samuel Butler Quotes: It has been said that
To do great work one must be very idle as well as very industrious.
Samuel Butler Quotes: To do great work one
He is greatest who is most often in men's good thoughts.
Samuel Butler Quotes: He is greatest who is
As there can be no translation from one language into another which shall not scant the meaning somewhat, or enlarge upon it, so there is no language which can render thought without a jarring and a harshness somewhere.
Samuel Butler Quotes: As there can be no
Parents are the last people on earth who ought to have children.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Parents are the last people
It is not sufficiently considered in the hour of exultation, that all human excellence is comparative; that no man performs much but in proportion to what other accomplish, or to the time and opportunities which have been allowed him.
Samuel Butler Quotes: It is not sufficiently considered
The public buys its opinions as it buys its meat, or takes in its milk, on the principle that it is cheaper to do this than to keep a cow. So it is, but the milk is more likely to be watered.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The public buys its opinions
Silence is not always tact and it is tact that is golden, not silence.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Silence is not always tact
Property, marriage, the law; as the bed to the river, so rule and convention to the instinct; and woe to him who tampers with the banks while the flood is flowing.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Property, marriage, the law; as
Books are like imprisoned souls till someone takes them down from a shelf and frees them.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Books are like imprisoned souls
The best liar is he who makes the smallest amount of lying go the longest way.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The best liar is he
He was born stupid, and greatly increased his birthright.
Samuel Butler Quotes: He was born stupid, and
Words are like money; there is nothing so useless, unless when in actual use.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Words are like money; there
What can it matter to me,' he says, 'whether people read my books or not? It may matter to (the critics)
but I have too much money to want more, and if the books have any stuff in them it will work by and by. I do not know nor greatly care whether they are good or not. What opinion can any sane man form about his own work? Some people must write stupid books just as there must be junior ops and third-class poll men. Why should I complain of being among the mediocrities? If a man is not absolutely below mediocrity let him be thankful
besides, the books will have to stand by themselves some day, so the sooner they begin the better.
Samuel Butler Quotes: What can it matter to
If [science] tends to thicken the crust of ice on which, as it were, we are skating, it is all right. If it tries to find, or professes to have found, the solid ground at the bottom of the water it is all wrong. Our business is with the thickening of this crust by extending our knowledge downward from above, as ice gets thicker while the frost lasts; we should not try to freeze upwards from the bottom.
Samuel Butler Quotes: If [science] tends to thicken
For truth is precious and divine, too rich a pearl for carnal swine.
Samuel Butler Quotes: For truth is precious and
Prayers are to men as dolls are to children.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Prayers are to men as
An obstinate man does not hold opinions, but they hold him; for when he is once possessed with an error, it is, like a devil, only cast out with great difficulty.
Samuel Butler Quotes: An obstinate man does not
He has spent his life best who has enjoyed it most. God will take care that we do not enjoy it any more than is good for us.
Samuel Butler Quotes: He has spent his life
The Ancient Mariner would not have taken so well if it had been called The Old Sailor.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The Ancient Mariner would not
Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Neither irony or sarcasm is
Since God himself cannot change the past, He is obliged to tolerate the existence of historians.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Since God himself cannot change
If, again, the most superficial introspection teaches the physiologist that his conscious life is dependent upon the mechanical adjustments of his body, and that inversely his body is subjected with certain limitations to his will, then it only remains for him to make one assumption more, namely, that this mutual interdependence between the spiritual and the material is itself also dependent on law, and he has discovered the bond by which the science of the matter and the science of consciousness are united into a single whole.
Samuel Butler Quotes: If, again, the most superficial
What is faith but a kind of betting or speculation after all? It should be, I bet that my Redeemer liveth.
Samuel Butler Quotes: What is faith but a
The dons of Oxford and Cambridge are too busy educating the young men to be able to teach them anything.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The dons of Oxford and
To himself everyone is immortal; he may know that he is going to die, but he can never know he is dead.
Samuel Butler Quotes: To himself everyone is immortal;
Evil is like water, it abounds, is cheap, soon fouls, but runs itself clear of taint.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Evil is like water, it
Conscience is thoroughly well bred and soon leaves off talking to those who do not wish to hear it.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Conscience is thoroughly well bred
Life is one long process of getting tired.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Life is one long process
Be virtuous and you will be vicious.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Be virtuous and you will
A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg.
Samuel Butler Quotes: A hen is only an
They say the test of literary power is whether a man can write an inscription. I say, 'Can he name a kitten?
Samuel Butler Quotes: They say the test of
A man should have any number of little aims about which he should be conscious and for which he should have names, but he should have neither name for, nor consciousness concerning the main aim of his life.
Samuel Butler Quotes: A man should have any
It stands to reason that he who would cure a moral ailment must be practically acquainted with it in all its bearings.
Samuel Butler Quotes: It stands to reason that
The wish to spread those opinions that we hold conducive to our own welfare is so deeply rooted in the English character that few of us can escape its influence.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The wish to spread those
We pay a person the compliment of acknowledging his superiority whenever we lie to them.
Samuel Butler Quotes: We pay a person the
A blind man knows he cannot see, and is glad to be led, though it be by a dog; but he that is blind in his understanding, which is the worst blindness of all, believes he sees as the best, and scorns a guide.
Samuel Butler Quotes: A blind man knows he
All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income
Samuel Butler Quotes: All progress is based upon
I never knew a writer yet who took the smallest pains with his style and was at the same time readable.
Samuel Butler Quotes: I never knew a writer
We all love best not those who offend us least, nor those who have done most for us, but those who make it most easy for us to forgive them.
Samuel Butler Quotes: We all love best not
There is no true gracefulness which is not epitomized goodness.
Samuel Butler Quotes: There is no true gracefulness
Life is like playing the violin in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Life is like playing the
When you've told someone that you've left them a legacy the only decent thing to do is to die at once.
Samuel Butler Quotes: When you've told someone that
The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The man who lets himself
Christ was only crucified once and for a few hours. Think of the hundreds of thousands whom Christ has been crucifying in a quiet way ever since.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Christ was only crucified once
From a worldly point of view, there is no mistake so great as that of being always right.
Samuel Butler Quotes: From a worldly point of
He that complies against his will
Is of his own opinion still.
Samuel Butler Quotes: He that complies against his
I have never written on any subject unless I believed that the authorities on it were hopelessly wrong.
Samuel Butler Quotes: I have never written on
The history of the world is the record of the weakness, frailty and death of public opinion.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The history of the world
Whereas, to borrow an illustration from mathematics, life was formerly an equation of, say, 100 unknown quantities, it is now one of 99 only, inasmuch as memory and heredity have been shown to be one and the same thing.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Whereas, to borrow an illustration
Faith - you can do very little with it, but you can do nothing without it.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Faith - you can do
To live is like to love
all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct for it
Samuel Butler Quotes: To live is like to
The course of true anything never does run smooth.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The course of true anything
The extremes of vice and virtue are alike detestable, and absolute virtue is as sure to kill a man as absolute vice is.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The extremes of vice and
Money is the last enemy that shall never be subdued. While there is flesh there is money or the want of money, but money is always on the brain so long as there is a brain in reasonable order.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Money is the last enemy
You cannot have a thing "matter" by itself which shall have no motion in it, nor yet a thing "motion" by itself which shall exist apart from matter; you must have both or neither. You can have matter moving much, or little, and in all conceivable ways; but you cannot have matter without any motion more than you can have motion without any matter that is moving.
Samuel Butler Quotes: You cannot have a thing
It is far safer to know too little than too much. People will condemn the one, though they will resent being called upon to exert themselves to follow the other.
Samuel Butler Quotes: It is far safer to
To die completely, a person must not only forget but be forgotten, and he who is not forgotten is not dead.
Samuel Butler Quotes: To die completely, a person
The sinews of art and literature, like those of war, are money.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The sinews of art and
The truest characters of ignorance are vanity and pride and arrogance.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The truest characters of ignorance
There are orphanages," he exclaimed to himself, "for children who have lost their parents--oh! why, why, why, are there no harbours of refuge for grown men who have not yet lost them?
Samuel Butler Quotes: There are orphanages,
In old times people used to try and square the circle; now they try and devise schemes for satisfying the Irish nation.
Samuel Butler Quotes: In old times people used
Science is being daily more and more personified and anthromorphized into a god. By and by they will say that science took our nature upon him, and sent down his only begotten son, Charles Darwin, or Huxley, into the world so that those who believe in him, &c.; and they will burn people for saying that science, after all, is only an expression for our ignorance of our own ignorance.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Science is being daily more
If people would dare to speak to one another unreservedly, there would be a good deal less sorrow in the world a hundred years hence.
Samuel Butler Quotes: If people would dare to
Don't learn to do, but learn in doing.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Don't learn to do, but
Though analogy is often misleading, it is the least misleading thing we have.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Though analogy is often misleading,
I said to him one day that the very slender reward which God had attached to the pursuit of serious inquiry was a sufficient proof that He disapproved of it, or at any rate that he did not set much store by it nor wish to encourage it.
Samuel Butler Quotes: I said to him one
[P]oetry resembles metaphysics: one does not mind one's own, but one does not like anyone else's.
Samuel Butler Quotes: [P]oetry resembles metaphysics: one does
People are lucky and unlucky not according to what they get absolutely, but according to the ratio between what they get and what they have been led to expect.
Samuel Butler Quotes: People are lucky and unlucky
There is nothing which at once affects a man so much and so little as his own death.
Samuel Butler Quotes: There is nothing which at
The want of money is the root of all evil.
Samuel Butler Quotes: The want of money is
We can never get rid of mouse-ideas completely, they keep turning up again and again, and nibble, nibble
no matter how often we drive them off. The best way to keep them down is to have a few good strong cat-ideas which will embrace them and ensure their not reappearing till they do so in another shape.
Samuel Butler Quotes: We can never get rid
Whatsoever we perpetrate, we do but row; we are steered by fate.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Whatsoever we perpetrate, we do
A man should be just cultured enough to be able to look with suspicion upon culture at first, not second hand.
Samuel Butler Quotes: A man should be just
A virtue to be serviceable must, like gold, be alloyed with some commoner, but more durable alloy.
Samuel Butler Quotes: A virtue to be serviceable
I fall asleep in the full and certain hope That my slumber shall not be broken; And that, though I be all-forgetting, Yet shall I not be all-forgotten, But continue that life in the thoughts and deeds of those I have loved.
Samuel Butler Quotes: I fall asleep in the
Silence and tact may or may not be the same thing.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Silence and tact may or
Belief like any other moving body follows the path of least resistance.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Belief like any other moving
Opinions have vested interests just as men have.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Opinions have vested interests just
To know God better is only to realize how impossible it is that we should ever know him at all. I know not which is more childish to deny him, or define him.
Samuel Butler Quotes: To know God better is
History is a bucket of ashes.
Samuel Butler Quotes: History is a bucket of
If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do.
Samuel Butler Quotes: If we attend continually and
Those who have never had a father can at any rate never know the sweets of losing one. To most men the death of his father is a new lease of life.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Those who have never had
A credulous mind ... finds most delight in believing
strange things, and the stranger they are the easier they pass
with him; but never regards those that are plain and
feasible, for every man can believe such.
Samuel Butler Quotes: A credulous mind ... finds
There was no doubt that Theobald passed peacefully away during his sleep. Can a man who died thus be said to have died at all? He has presented the phenomena of death to other people, but in respect of himself he has not only not died, but has not even thought that he was going to die. This is not more than half dying, but then neither was his life more than half living. He presented so many of the phenomena of living that I suppose on the whole it would be less trouble to think of him as having been alive than as never having been born at all, but
Samuel Butler Quotes: There was no doubt that
For as whipp'd tops and bandied balls,
The learned hold, are animals;
So horses they affirm to be
Mere engines made by geometry
Samuel Butler Quotes: For as whipp'd tops and
One of the first businesses of a sensible man is to know when he is beaten, and to leave off fighting at once.
Samuel Butler Quotes: One of the first businesses
When people talk of atoms obeying fixed laws, they are either ascribing some kind of intelligence and free will to atoms or they are talking nonsense. There is no obedience unless there is at any rate a potentiality of disobeying.
Samuel Butler Quotes: When people talk of atoms
If the headache would only precede the intoxication, alcoholism would be a virtue.
Samuel Butler Quotes: If the headache would only
Genius might be described as a supreme capacity for getting its possessors into trouble of all kinds
Samuel Butler Quotes: Genius might be described as
Neither have they hearts to stay, nor wit enough to run away.
Samuel Butler Quotes: Neither have they hearts to
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