Part 91

Solitude has but one disadvantage; it is apt to give one too high an opinion of one's self. In the world we are sure to be often reminded of every known or supposed defect we may have.--Byron.

Through the wide world he only is alone who lives not for another.--Rogers.

Solitude is the worst of all companions when we seek comfort and oblivion.--Méry.

~Sophistry.~--The juggle of sophistry consists, for the most part, in using a word in one sense in all the premises, and in another sense in the conclusion.--Coleridge.

There is no error which hath not some appearance of probability resembling truth, which, when men who study to be singular find out, straining reason, they then publish to the world matter of contention and jangling.--Sir W. Raleigh.

~Sorrow.~--Our sweetest songs are those which tell of saddest thought.--Shelley.

If hearty sorrow be a sufficient ransom for offence, I tender it here; I do as truly suffer as e'er I did commit.--Shakespeare.

And weep the more, because I weep in vain.--Gray.

The man who has learned to triumph over sorrow wears his miseries as though they were sacred fillets upon his brow, and nothing is so entirely admirable as a man bravely wretched.--Seneca.

Sorrow more beautiful than beauty's self.--Keats.

The violence of sorrow is not at the first to be striven withal; being, like a mighty beast, sooner tamed with following than overthrown by withstanding.--Sir P. Sidney.

Never morning wore to evening, but some heart did break.--Tennyson.

Sorrow being the natural and direct offspring of sin, that which first brought sin into the world must, by necessary consequence, bring in sorrow too.--South.

In extent sorrow is boundless. It pours from ten million sources, and floods the world. But its depth is small. It drowns few.--Charles Buxton.

It is the veiled angel of sorrow who plucks away one thing and another that bound us here in ease and security, and, in the vanishing of these dear objects, indicates the true home of our affections and our peace.--Chapin.

The mind profits by the wreck of every passion, and we may measure our road to wisdom by the sorrows we have undergone.--Bulwer-Lytton.

Earth hath no sorrow that heaven cannot heal.--Moore.

Sorrow breaks seasons, and reposing hours; makes the night morning, and the noontide night.--Shakespeare.

Sorrow is not evil, since it stimulates and purifies.--Mazzini.

Sorrows must die with the joys they outnumber.--Schiller.

He that hath so many causes of joy, and so great, is very much in love with sorrow and peevishness, who loses all these pleasures, and chooses to sit down on his little handful of thorns. Such a person is fit to bear Nero company in his funeral sorrow for the loss of one of Poppea's hairs, or help to mourn for Lesbia's sparrow; and because he loves it, he deserves to starve in the midst of plenty, and to want comfort while he is encircled with blessings.--Jeremy Taylor.

~Soul.~--Had I no other proof of the immortality of the soul than the oppression of the just and the triumph of the wicked in this world, this alone would prevent my having the least doubt of it. So shocking a discord amidst a general harmony of things would make me naturally look for a cause; I should say to myself we do not cease to exist with this life; everything reassumes its order after death.--Rousseau.

What is mind? No matter. What is matter? Never mind. What is the soul? It is immaterial.--Hood.

The human soul is hospitable, and will entertain conflicting sentiments and contradictory opinions with much impartiality.--George Eliot.

Our immortal souls, while righteous, are by God himself beautified with the title of his own image and similitude.--Sir W. Raleigh.

~Specialty.~--No one can exist in society without some specialty. Eighty years ago it was only necessary to be well dressed and amiable; to-day a man of this kind would be too much like the garçons at the cafés.--Taine.

~Speech.~--Sheridan once said of some speech, in his acute, sarcastic way, that "it contained a great deal both of what was new and what was true: but that unfortunately what was new was not true, and what was true was not new."--Hazlitt.

God has given us speech in order that we may say pleasant things to our friends, and tell bitter truths to our enemies.--Heinrich Heine.