Part 25

Though a man has all other perfections and wants discretion, he will be of no great consequence in the world; but if he has this single talent in perfection, and but a common share of others, he may do what he pleases in his particular station of life.--Addison.

~Dishonesty.~--So grasping is dishonesty that it is no respecter of persons: it will cheat friends as well as foes; and, were it possible, even God himself!--Bancroft.

~Dispatch.~--Use dispatch. Remember that the world only took six days to create. Ask me for whatever you please except time: that is the only thing which is beyond my power.--Napoleon.

True dispatch is a rich thing; for time is the measure of business, as money is of wares, and business is bought at a dear hand where there is small dispatch.--Bacon.

~Disposition.~--A tender-hearted and compassionate disposition, which inclines men to pity and feel the misfortunes of others, and which is even for its own sake incapable of involving any man in ruin and misery, is of all tempers of mind the most amiable; and, though it seldom receives much honor, is worthy of the highest.--Fielding.

A good disposition is more valuable than gold; for the latter is the gift of fortune, but the former is the dower of nature.--Addison.

~Distrust.~--As health lies in labor, and there is no royal road to it but through toil, so there is no republican road to safety but in constant distrust.--Wendell Phillips.

What loneliness is more lonely than distrust?--George Eliot.

When desperate ills demand a speedy cure, distrust is cowardice, and prudence folly.--Johnson.

~Doubt.~--Remember Talleyrand's advice, "If you are in doubt whether to write a letter or not--don't!" The advice applies to many doubts in life besides that of letter writing.--Bulwer-Lytton.

Doubt is hell in the human soul.--Gasparin.

Doubt springs from the mind; faith is the daughter of the soul.--J. Petit Senn.

Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise.--Shakespeare.

The doubts of an honest man contain more moral truth than the profession of faith of people under a worldly yoke.--X. Doudan.

There lives more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds.--Tennyson.

Every body drags its shadow, and every mind its doubt.--Victor Hugo.

~Dreams.~--Children of night, of indigestion bred.--Churchill.

A world of the dead in the hues of life.--Mrs. Hemans.

The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train.--Milton.

Dreams always go by contraries, my dear.--Samuel Lover.

We are somewhat more than ourselves in our sleeps, and the slumber of the body seems to be but the waking of the soul. It is the litigation of sense, but the liberty of reason; and our waking conceptions do not match the fancies of our sleeps.--Sir T. Browne.

The mockery of unquiet slumbers.--Shakespeare.

Like a dog, he hunts in dreams.--Tennyson.

~Dress.~--It is well known that a loose and easy dress contributes much to give to both sexes those fine proportions of body that are observable in the Grecian statues, and which serve as models to our present artists.--Rousseau.

~Duty.~--Stern daughter of the voice of God.--Wordsworth.

Duty is a power which rises with us in the morning and goes to rest with us at night. It is coextensive with the action of our intelligence. It is the shadow which cleaves to us, go where we will, and which only leaves us when we leave the light of life.--Gladstone.

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep his commandments; for this is the whole duty of man.--Bible.

The idea of duty, that recognition of something to be lived for beyond the mere satisfaction of self, is to the moral life what the addition of a great central ganglion is to animal life.--George Eliot.