Part 47

There is no slight danger from general ignorance; and the only choice which Providence has graciously left to a vicious government is either to fall by the people, if they are suffered to become enlightened, or with them, if they are kept enslaved and ignorant.--Coleridge.

To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of ignorance.--Alcott.

The true instrument of man's degradation is his ignorance.--Lady Morgan.

Ignorance is not so damnable as humbug, but when it prescribes pills it may happen to do more harm.--George Eliot.

The ignorant hath an eagle's wings and an owl's eyes.--George Herbert.

Ignorance is mere privation, by which nothing can be produced; it is a vacuity in which the soul sits motionless and torpid for want of attraction.--Johnson.

~Illusion.~--In youth we feel richer for every new illusion; in maturer years, for every one we lose.--Madame Swetchine.

Illusion is the first of all pleasures.--Voltaire.

~Imagination.~--We are all of us imaginative in some form or other, for images are the brood of desire.--George Eliot.

A vile imagination, once indulged, gets the key of our minds, and can get in again very easily, whether we will or no, and can so return as to bring seven other spirits with it more wicked than itself; and what may follow no one knows.--Spurgeon.

He who has imagination without learning has wings and no feet.--Joubert.

No man will be found in whose mind airy notions do not sometimes tyrannize, and force him to hope or fear beyond the limits of sober probability.--Johnson.

~Imitation.~--Imitators are a servile race.--Fontaine.

Imitation causes us to leave natural ways to enter into artificial ones; it therefore makes slaves.--Dr. Vinet.

"Name to me an animal, though never so skillful, that I cannot imitate!" So bragged the ape to the fox. But the fox replied, "And do thou name to me an animal so humble as to think of imitating thee."--Lessing.

~Immortality.~--When I consider the wonderful activity of the mind, so great a memory of what is past, and such a capacity of penetrating into the future; when I behold such a number of arts and sciences, and such a multitude of discoveries thence arising; I believe and am firmly persuaded that a nature which contains so many things within itself cannot be mortal.--Cicero.

Whatsoever that be within us that feels, thinks, desires, and animates, is something celestial, divine, and consequently imperishable.--Aristotle.

The spirit of man, which God inspired, cannot together perish with this corporeal clod.--Milton.

All men's souls are immortal, but the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.--Socrates.

What springs from earth dissolves to earth again, and heaven-born things fly to their native seat.--Marcus Antoninus.

The seed dies into a new life, and so does man.--George MacDonald.

~Impatience.~--Impatience turns an ague into a fever, a fever to the plague, fear into despair, anger into rage, loss into madness, and sorrow to amazement.--Jeremy Taylor.

~Impossibility.~--One great difference between a wise man and a fool is, the former only wishes for what he may possibly obtain; the latter desires impossibilities.--Democritus.

~Improvement.~--Slumber not in the tents of your fathers. The world is advancing. Advance with it.--Mazzini.

People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy after.--Goldsmith.

~Improvidence.~--How full or how empty our lives, depends, we say, on Providence. Suppose we say, more or less on improvidence.--Bovée.

~Income.~--Our incomes are like our shoes; if too small, they gall and pinch us; but if too large, they cause us to stumble and to trip.--Colton.

~Inconsistency.~--Men talk as if they believed in God, but they live as if they thought there was none: their vows and promises are no more than words of course.--L'Estrange.