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CLASSIC QUOTATIONS : 
 
 §. SMt-Suft 
 
 OF THE 
 
 WISE SPRITS OP al;. ages and all countries, 
 
 PIT POU ALL MEN AND ALL HOUES. 
 
 COLLECTED, ARRANGED, AND EDITED 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES ELMES, 
 
 H 
 
 Author of "Memoirs of Sir Christopher Wren ;" "Dictionary of the 
 Fine Arts; w "Lectures on Architecture," &a 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 PUBLISHED BY JAMES MILLER, 
 
 (BUCCESSOB TO 0. 8. FEANCI3 & CO.,) 
 
 522 BROADWAY. 
 
 1863. 
 
w 
 
 
 Entebhd according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S63, 
 
 By JAMES MILLER, 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for 
 the Southern District of New York. 
 
TO THE 
 
 RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 HENRY LORD BROUGHAM, 
 
 &c. &c. &c, 
 
 THE SCHOOLMASTER OF HIS AGE, 
 AND ONE OF THE MOST THOUGHTFUL MEN 
 OF HIS DAY, 
 THE FOLLOWING COLLECTION OF 
 
 THOUGHTS AND MAXIMS 
 ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. 
 
 In giving to this work an American form, it 
 is scarcely necessary to do more by way of 
 recommendation, than to invite attention to its 
 title, as verified by its Table of Contents. 
 
 These fruit-thoughts of a student's learned 
 leisure, may aptly become the seed-thoughts for 
 many vacant and desultory hours of other men. 
 Our American mind, although so often strained 
 to the top of its bent, refuses a total relaxation. 
 1 Studious of change, and pleased with novelty," 
 it carries somewhat of its spontaneous activity 
 even into its vacations, and finds, as Sir William 
 Jones said of himself, suflicient repose in a 
 change of occupation. 
 
IV PREFACE TO THE 
 
 For such periods of remitted toil our book 
 is designed, engaging the mind with suggestions 
 rather than taxing it with problems. 
 
 No matter what the natural complexion of 
 the reader's taste, so that it be not impure — or 
 his habit of mind, so that it be not morbid, — 
 he will find among these " gleaned thoughts of 
 wise spirits," enough that is racy, rare, and 
 wholesome, to refresh his fancy, gratify his 
 curiosity, or feed his faculties. It is in faQt 
 one of the charms of the book, that it has gath- 
 ered its contents from almost every latitude and 
 longitude, and sometimes from the opposite 
 poles of thought. 
 
 Jew, Pagan, and Christian — classic and pa- 
 tristic—primitive and recent authors — furnish 
 each his quota to the design. Men are here 
 found standing side by side who were wide 
 apart in time, space, and character — agreeing in 
 nothing, except that they thought on the same 
 subject, and thought well. 
 
AMERICAN EDITION. V 
 
 p 
 
 Aristotle and Bacon are joined together , but 
 joined, as ever, like wrestlers, the more closely 
 from the fierceness of opposition. 
 
 Justin Martyr, the earliest and most au- 
 thentic Father of Ecclesiastical History, har- 
 monizes with Jortin, the angry critic of the 
 Fathers. 
 
 St. Augustine moralizes with Dean Swift. 
 Plato and Coleridge breathe into the same page 
 the one spirit of the earliest and the latest phi- 
 losophy. King Arthur and the great Frederick 
 illustrate the kingly tact, the Son of Sirach and 
 D'Israeli the social. The Talmud furnishes a 
 sprinkling of wisdom out of its poverty, and the 
 Bible from its overflow. 
 
 Nor are the topics and authorship much 
 more various than the styles of this little book. 
 
 Hooker, in his voluminous majesty — Milton, 
 in learned pomp — South, tense and pregnant — 
 Jeremy Taylor, oozing forth sweetness like " the 
 
VI PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. 
 
 irrepressible drops of the honey-comb" — Jeremy 
 Collier, homely, dry, and true — Locke, manly 
 and sensible, if sometimes inelegant — and Addi- 
 son, always graceful, even though feeble ; — these 
 are some of the sponsors for the little emigrant 
 work, which we now introduce to the chance 
 readers of our community. 
 
 A. H. VINTON. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The following collection of " thoughts that 
 breathe and words that burn, 7 ' have been gath- 
 ered from the literary treasures of all ages and 
 all countries : they have been selected with a 
 certain regard to uniformity of sentiment on 
 moral, philosophical, and religious Truth ; and 
 particularly as tending to prove the conformity 
 of Reason with Revelation. 
 
 The Editor, having suffered from deprivation 
 of sight for more than four years, was compelled 
 to turn his thoughts inward, to regale himself 
 with the mental stores of his earlier years, to 
 hear, from beloved lips, those truths which he 
 had formerly read for himself; and like Milton, 
 (would that the comparison were more apt as to 
 himself,) to employ the pen of an affectionate 
 daughter to write his dictations. In this man- 
 
Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 ner, whilst totally blind, was his brief u History 
 of Architecture in Great Britain," which ap- 
 peared monthly in Laxton's Journal for 1847, - 
 dictated, written, revised, and transcribed for 
 the press. 
 
 Lately, a slight return of vision in one eye 
 enabled him, with the aid of magnifying glasses, 
 to read at short intervals the strongly marked 
 characters of the Hebrew and German languages, 
 which he had formerly slightly cultivated in 
 hours of leisure, and our beautiful English 
 black-letter, and, occasionally, the large, well- 
 defined Roman type of our early folios ; and by 
 habit, to make extracts that he sometimes could 
 not read. 
 
 These circumstances opened new sources of 
 occupation to him, and a release, in some degree, 
 of his able and amiable reader and amanuensis 
 from a portion of her daily task. The result 
 has been this tithe-barn of gleanings, this Spici- 
 legium of golden thoughts of wise spirits, who, 
 though dead, yet speak, and whose voices are 
 still heard among us. 
 
SCEIPTUEE QUOTATIONS. 
 
 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat 
 bread, till thou return unto the ground ; 
 for out of it wast thou taken : for dust 
 thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. 
 — Genesis iii. 19. 
 
 Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man 
 shall his blood be shed. — Genesis ix. 6. 
 
 He kept him as the apple of his eye. — 
 Judges xvi. 9. 
 
 For whither thou goest, I will go ; and 
 where thou lodgest, I will lodge : thy peo- 
 ple shall be my people, and thy God my 
 God.— Ruth i. 16, 
 
X SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS. 
 
 Very pleasant hast thou been unto me : 
 thy love to me was wonderful, passing the 
 love of women.— 2 Samuel i. 26. 
 
 Behold, there ariseth a little eloud out 
 of the sea, like a man's hand. — 1 Kings 
 xviii. 44. 
 
 The Lord gave, and the Lord hath 
 taken away ; blessed be the name of the 
 Lord. — Job i. 21. 
 
 There the wicked cease from troubling, 
 and there the weary be at rest. — JoBiii. 17. 
 
 Yet man is born unto trouble, as the 
 sparks fly upward. — Job v. 7. 
 
 I have been young, and now am old ; 
 yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, 
 nor his seed begging bread. — Psalm xxxvii. 
 
 25. ■ 
 
 Mercy and truth are met together : 
 righteousness and peace have kissed each 
 other. — Psalm lxxxv. 10. 
 
 Behold, how good and how pleasant it 
 is for brethren to dwell together in unity ! 
 — Psalm cxxxiil 1. 
 
SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS. XI 
 
 A soft answer turneth away wrath. — 
 Proverbs xv. 1. 
 
 Look not thou upon the wine, when it 
 is red ; when it giveth his color in the cup ; 
 
 at the last it biteth like a serpent 
 
 and stingeth like an adder. — Proverbs 
 xxiii. 31, 32. 
 
 Kemember now thy Creator in the days 
 of thy youth. — Ecclesiastes xii. 1. 
 
 Man goeth to his long home. — Eccle- 
 siastes xii. 5. 
 
 Or ever the silver cord be loosed^ or the 
 golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be 
 broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken 
 at the cistern.— Ecclesiastes xii. 6. 
 
 Then shall the dust return to the earth 
 as it was ; and the spirit shall return unto 
 God who gave it. — Ecclesiastes xii. 7. 
 
 Behold, the nations are as a drop of a 
 bucket, and are counted as the small dust 
 of the balance. — Isaiah xl. 15. 
 
 *Is there no balm in Grilead ? is there no 
 physician there ? — Jeremiah viii. 22. 
 
Xll SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS. 
 
 The fathers have eaten sour grapes, 
 and the children's teeth are set on edge. — 
 Ezekiel xviii. 2. 
 
 Thou art weighed in the balances, and 
 art found wanting. — Daniel v. 27. 
 
 For they have sown the wind, and they 
 shall reap the whirlwind. — Hosea viii. 7. 
 
 He that toucheth pitch shall be defiled 
 therewith. — Ecclesiasticus xiii. 1. 
 
 Great is truth and mighty above all 
 things. — Esdras iv. 51. 
 
 Ye are the salt of the earth : but if the 
 salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it 
 be salted ? — Matthew v. 13. 
 
 But when thou doest alms, let not thy 
 left hand know what thy right hand doeth. 
 —Matthew vi. 3. 
 
 Consider the lilies of the field, how they 
 grow ; they toil not, neither do they spin, 
 — Matthew vi. 28. 
 
 ^ Where their worm dieth not, and the 
 fire is not quenched. — Mark ix. 44. 
 
SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS. Xlll 
 
 And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou 
 hast much goods laid up for many years ; 
 take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. 
 — Luke xii. 19. 
 
 Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh 
 away the sin of the world ! — John i. 29. 
 
 Gather up the fragments that remain, 
 that nothing be lost — John vi. 12. 
 
 It is more blessed to give than to re- 
 ceive. — Acts xx. 35. 
 
 Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed 
 him ; if he thirst, give him drink : for in 
 so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his 
 head. — Komans xii. 20. 
 
 I have planted, Apollos watered ; but 
 God gave the increase. — 1 Corinthians 
 iii. 6. 
 
 Be not deceived : evil communications 
 corrupt good manners. — 1 Corinthians 
 xv. 33. 
 
 Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall 
 he also reap. — Galatians vi, 7, 
 
XIV SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS. 
 
 Be ye angry, and sin not : let not the 
 sun go down upon your wrath. — Ephesians 
 iv. 26. 
 
 Prove all things : hold fast that which 
 is good. — 1 Thessalonians v. 21. 
 
 Drink no longer water, but use a little 
 wine for thy stomach's sake. — 1 Timothy 
 v. 23. 
 
 I have fought a good fight, I have fin- 
 ished my course, I have kept the faith. — 
 2 Timothy iv. 7. 
 
 For whom the Lord loveth he ehasten- 
 eth. — HEbREWS xii. 6. 
 
 Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, 
 for thereby some have entertained angels 
 unawares.— -Hebrews xiii. 2. 
 
 Behold, how great a matter a little fire 
 kindleth ! — James iii. 5. 
 
 Charity shall cover the multitude of 
 sins. — 1 Peter iv. 8. 
 
 But the day of the Lord will come as a 
 thief in the night. — 2 Peter iii. 10. 
 
FAMILIAE QUOTATIONS. 
 
 ACQUAINTANCE. 
 
 It is safer to affront some people than 
 to oblige them ; for the better a man de- 
 serves, the worse they will speak of him. — 
 Seneca. 
 
 If we engage into a large acquaintance 
 and various familiarities, we set open our 
 gates to the invaders of most of our time : 
 we expose our life to a quotidian ague of 
 frigid impertinences, which would make a 
 wise man tremble to think of. Now, as 
 for being known much by sight, and point- 
 ed at, I cannot comprehend the honor that 
 lies in that : whatsoever it be, every moun- 
 tebank has it more than the best doctor. — 
 Cowley. 
 
 It is good discretion not to make too 
 much of any man at the first ; because one 
 
XVI FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. 
 
 cannot hold out that proportion. — Lord 
 Bacon. 
 
 What makes us like new acquaintances 
 is not so much any weariness of our old 
 ones, or the pleasure of change, as disgust 
 at not being sufficiently admired by those 
 who know us too well, and the hope of being 
 more so by those who do not know so much 
 of us. — La Bochefoucauld. 
 
 ACQUIREMENT. 
 
 That which we acquire with the most 
 difficulty we retain the longest ; as those 
 who have earned a fortune are usually more 
 careful than those who have inherited one. 
 — Colton. 
 
 ACTING. 
 
 There is no secret in the heart which our 
 actions do not disclose. The most consum- 
 mate hypocrite cannot at all times conceal 
 the workings of the mind. — From the 
 French. 
 
 It is hard to personate and act a part 
 long ; for where truth is not at the bot- 
 tom, Nature will always be endeavoring to 
 return, and will peep out and betray herself 
 one time or other. — Tillotson. 
 
FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. XY11 
 
 ACTION. 
 Deliberate with caution, but act with 
 decision ; and yield with graciousness, or 
 oppose with firmness. — Colton. 
 
 ACTIVITY. 
 
 Lives of great men all remind us 
 
 We can make our lives sublime, 
 And, departing, leave behind us 
 
 Footprints on the sands of Time. 
 Let us then be up and doing ; 
 
 With a heart for any fate, 
 Still achieving, still pursuing, 
 
 Learn to labor and to wait. 
 
 — Longfellow. 
 
 adaptation. 
 
 He alone is wise who can accommodate 
 himself to all the contingencies of life ; but 
 the fool contends, and is struggling, like a 
 swimmer against the stream. — From the 
 Latin. 
 
 As long as you are engaged in the world, 
 you must comply with its maxims ; be- 
 cause nothing is more unprofitable than the 
 wisdom of those persons who set up for re- 
 formers of the age. "Tis a part a man can- 
 
XV111 FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. 
 
 not act long, without offending his friends 
 and rendering himself ridiculous. — St. Ev- 
 remond. 
 
 ADDRESS. 
 
 A man who knows the world, will not 
 only make the most of everything he does 
 know, but of many things he does not know, 
 and will gain more credit by his adroit mode 
 of hiding his ignorance, than the pedant by 
 his awkward attempt to exhibit his erudi- 
 tion. — Colton. 
 
 ADVERSITY. 
 
 Adversity has the effect of eliciting tal- 
 ents which, in prosperous circumstances, 
 would have lain dormant. — Horace. 
 
 Ask the man of adversity, how other men 
 act towards him : ask those others, how he 
 acts towards them. Adversity is the true 
 touchstone of merit in both ; happy if it 
 does not produce the dishonesty of mean- 
 ness in one, and that of insolence and pride 
 in the other. — Lord G-reville. 
 
 advice. 
 He who can take advice is sometimes 
 superior to him who can give it. — Von 
 Knebel. 
 
FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. XIX 
 
 AFFECTATION. 
 
 I will not call vanity and affectation 
 twins, because, more properly, vanity is the 
 mother, and affectation is the darling daugh- 
 ter ; vanity is the sin, and affectation is the 
 punishment ; the first may be called the 
 root of self-love, the other the fruit. Van- 
 ity is never at its full growth till it spread- 
 eth into affectation ; and then it is com- 
 plete. — Saville. 
 
 The unaffected of every country nearly 
 resemble each other, and a page of our Con- 
 fucius and your Tillotson have scarce any 
 material difference. Paltry affectation, 
 strained allusions, and disgusting finery, 
 are easily attained by those who choose to 
 wear them ; they are but too frequently 
 the badges of ignorance, or of stupidity, 
 whenever it would endeavor to please. — 
 Goldsmith. 
 
 age. 
 
 Few people know how to be old. — La 
 
 KOCHEFOUCAULD. 
 
 There cannot live a more unhappy crea- 
 ture than an ill-natured old man who is 
 neither capable of receiving pleasures nor 
 
XX FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. 
 
 sensible of doing them to others. — Sir W. 
 Temple. 
 
 Yet time, who changes all, had altered him 
 In soul and aspect as in age : years steal 
 Fire from the mind as vigor from the limb • 
 And life's enchanted cup but sparkles near 
 the brim. — 'Byron, 
 
 aims. 
 What are the aims, which are at the 
 same time duties ? They are the perfect- 
 ing of ourselves, the happiness of others. — 
 Kant. 
 
 AMBITION. 
 
 Moderation cannot have the credit of 
 combating and subduing ambition — they 
 are never found together. Moderation is 
 the languor and indolence of the soul, as am- 
 bition is its activity and ardor. — La "Roche- 
 foucauld. 
 
 Dreams, indeed, are ambition ; for the 
 very substance of the ambitious is merely 
 the shadow of a dream. And I hold am- 
 bition of so airy and light a quality, that it 
 is but a shadow's shadow. — Shakspeare. 
 
 A slave has but one master, the ambi- 
 tious man has as many masters as there 
 
FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. XXI 
 
 are persons whose aid may contribute to 
 the advancement of his fortune. — La 
 Bruyere. 
 
 ANGER. 
 Fret, till your proud heart break ; 
 Go, show your slaves how choleric you are , 
 And make your bondsmen tremble. Must 
 
 I budge ? 
 Must I observe you ? Must I stand and 
 
 crouch 
 Under your testy bumor ? By the gods, 
 You shall digest the venom of your spleen, 
 Though it do split you : for, from this day 
 
 forth, 
 I'll use you for my mirth, yea, for my 
 
 laughter, 
 When you are waspish. — Shakspeare. 
 
 The continuance and frequent fits of an- 
 ger produce an evil habit in the soul, called 
 wrathfulness, or a propensity to be angry ; 
 which ofttimes ends in choler, bitterness, 
 and morosity ; when the mind becomes ul- 
 cerated, peevish, and querulous, and, like a 
 tbin, weak plate of iron, receives impres- 
 sion and is wounded by the least occur- 
 rence. — Plutarch. 
 
XX11 FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS. 
 
 Had I a careful and pleasant companion, 
 that should show me my angry face in a 
 glass, I should not at all take it ill ; to be- 
 hold a man's self so unnaturally disguised 
 and disordered, will conduce not a little to 
 the impeachment of anger. — Plutarch. 
 
 APPREHENSION. 
 
 Better to be despised for too anxious ap- 
 prehensions, than ruined by too confident a 
 security. — Burke. 
 
 ARTIFICE. 
 There is a certain artificial polish — a 
 common-place vivacity acquired by perpe- 
 tually mingling in the beau Monde, which, 
 in the commerce of the world, supplies the 
 place of natural suavity and good humor, 
 but is purchased at the expense of all orig- 
 inal and sterling traits of character : by a 
 kind of fashionable discipline, the eye is 
 taught to brighten, the lip to smile, and the 
 whole countenance to emanate with a sem- 
 blance of friendly welcome, while the bosom 
 is unwarmed by a single spark of genuine 
 kindness and good-will. — Washington Ir- 
 ving. 
 
CLASSIC QUOTATIONS. 
 
 ADDISON'S STYLE. 
 
 Whoever wishes to acquire a style 
 which is familiar, but not coarse, and ele- 
 gant, but not ostentatious, must give his 
 days and nights to the volumes of Addi- 
 son. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
 ADDISON ON ARISTOTLE, POLYBIUS, AND 
 CICERO. 
 
 I mention Aristotle, Polybius, and 
 Cicero, the greatest philosopher, the most 
 impartial historian, and the most consum- 
 mate statesman of all antiquity. — Addison. 
 
 admiration. 
 1. There is a pleasure in admiration ; 
 and this is that which properly causeth ad- 
 
% Z A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 miration, when we discover a great deal in 
 an object, which we understand to be ex- 
 cellent ; and yet we see (we know not how 
 much) more beyond that, which our under- 
 standings cannot fully reach and compre- 
 hend. — Tillotson. 
 
 2. There is an admiration that is not 
 the daughter of ignorance. This, indeed, 
 stupidly gazeth at the unwonted effect ; 
 but the philosophic passion admires and 
 adores the Supreme Efficient. — Bichard 
 Glanville. 
 
 3. Neither Virgil nor Horace would 
 ' have gained so great reputation, had they 
 
 not been the friends and admirers of each 
 other. — Addison. 
 
 4. Eesearches into the springs of nat- 
 ural bodies and their motions, should awa- 
 ken us to admiration at the wondrous 
 
 wisdom of our Creator, in all the works of 
 
 i 
 
 nature. — Dr. Isaac Watts. 
 
 THE AFFECTIONS. 
 
 Affections,. such as joy, grief, fear, and 
 anger, being, as it were, the sundry fashions 
 and forms of appetite, can neither rise at 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 6 
 
 the conceit of a thing indifferent, nor yet 
 choose, but rise, at the sight of some things. 
 — Dr. Hooker. 
 
 ALMIGHTY POWER. 
 
 1. It is as easy to conceive that an Almigh- 
 ty Power might produce a thing out of no- 
 thing, and to make that exist de novo, which 
 did not exist before ; as to conceive the 
 world to have had no beginning, but to have 
 existed from all eternity. — Dr. South. 
 
 2. Those who are born must die ; the 
 dead are made to live, and the living to be 
 judged ; to know, to make known, and to 
 confess that He, the Almighty God, is the 
 Former, the Creator, the Examiner, Judge, 
 Witness and Complainant ; and that He is 
 the Judge for all times to come. Blessed is 
 He ! in whose presence there is no unright- 
 eousness, no forgetfulness, no respect of 
 persons, no acceptance of bribes, for every 
 thing is his. Know, also, that every thing 
 is done according to account. Let not 
 thine imagination feed thee with the hope, 
 that the grave is a place of refuge for thee : 
 for without thy consent thou wert formed, 
 
4 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 without thy consent thou wert born, with- 
 out thy consent thou livest, without thy 
 consent thou must die, and without thy 
 consent thou must hereafter render a re- 
 sponsible account before the Sovereignty 
 of the King of kings. Blessed be He. — 
 Rabbi Eleazar Hakappar. 
 
 3. In creating and making existent the 
 world universal by the absolute act of his 
 own word, God showed his power and his 
 almightiness. — Sir Walter Raleigh. 
 
 4. In the wilderness, the bittern and the 
 stork, the unicorn and the elk, live upon 
 His provisions, and revere his power, and 
 feel the force of his almightiness. — Jeremy 
 Taylor. 
 
 5. He is God, the Great, the Mighty, 
 the Tremendous, the Merciful, the Gra- 
 cious, the Benign, the Wise, the Faithful, 
 the Just, and the Virtuous. Omniscience, 
 Omnipresence, Omnipotence are His alone, 
 whose Being knew no beginning, and can 
 know no end. — The Mishna Torah. 
 
 AMBITION. 
 Ambition is the most troublesome and 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK, O 
 
 vexatious passion that can. afflict the sons 
 of men. Virtue hath not half so much 
 trouble in it, for it sleeps quietly without 
 startings and affrighting fancies ; it looks 
 cheerfully, smiles with much serenity, and 
 though it laughs not often, yet it is ever 
 delightful in the apprehensions of some 
 faculty. It fears no man, nor no thing, nor 
 is it ever discomposed, and hath no con- 
 cernments in the great alterations of the 
 world ; and entertains Death like a friend, 
 and reckons the issues of it, as the greatest 
 of its hopes. But Ambition is full of dis- 
 tractions ; it teems with stratagems, as 
 Rebecca with struggling twins, and is 
 swelled with expectations as with a tym- 
 pany. It sleeps sometimes as the wind in 
 a storm, still and quiet for a minute, that it 
 may burst out into an impetuous blast till 
 the cordage of his heartstrings crack. It 
 fears when none is nigh, and prevents 
 things that never had intention, and falls 
 under the inevitability of such accidents, 
 which either could not be foreseen or not 
 prevented. It is an infinite labor to make 
 a man's self miserable, and the utmost ac- 
 
D A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 quist is so goodly a purchase, that he makes 
 his days full of sorrow to enjoy the troubles 
 of a three-years' reign. Therefore there is 
 no greater unreasonableness in the world 
 than in the designs of ambition ; for it 
 makes the present certainly miserable, un- 
 satisfied, troublesome and discontented, for 
 the uncertain acquisition of an honor, 
 which nothing can secure ; and besides a 
 thousand possibilities of miscarrying, it 
 relies upon no greater certainty than our 
 life, and when we are dead, all the world 
 sees who was the fool. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 THE AMUSEMENTS OF A PEOPLE. 
 In studying the character of a people, 
 one inquiry should always be, what were 
 their amusements ? We here get hold of 
 great features, which often unriddle the 
 rest. This is indispensably necessary 
 where states have risen to cultivation. In 
 the finer tracts of the temperate regions of 
 the earth, you meet amusements that are 
 elegant, and pleasures that are refined. 
 Departing on either hand, to the south or 
 to the north, you find taste to degenerate, 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 7 
 
 and gratification to become impure. At 
 length arriving at the extremities, refine- 
 ment is utterly lost : — to give pleasure is 
 to stupefy or to intoxicate, here by opium, 
 there by brandy and tobacco. The happy 
 intermediate regions enjoy the yvresse du 
 sentiment. Is the philosopher to set at 
 naught these distinctions ? Is he to lay 
 no stress upon the different state of the 
 arts ? Is he to imagine that it imports not 
 that the peasant in Muscovy subsists on 
 garlic, and solaces himself with ardent 
 spirits ; and in Italy that he feeds on a 
 water-melon, and goes forth with a guitar 
 on his back to the plough? — Du. Robert- 
 son. 
 
 ANAGRAMMATISM. 
 The only quintessence that hitherto the 
 alchymy of wit could draw out of names, 
 is anagrammatism or metagrammatism ; 
 which is a dissolution of a name truly 
 written into its letters as its elements, and 
 a new connection of it by artificial trans- 
 position, without addition, subtraction, or 
 change of any letter, into different words, 
 
O A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 making some perfect sense applicable to 
 the person named.* — Camden. 
 
 OUR ANCESTORS. 
 
 1. These later ages of the world have 
 declined into a softness above the effemi- 
 nacy of Asian Princes, and have contracted 
 customs which those innocent and health- 
 ful days of our Ancestors knew not ; whose 
 piety was natural, whose charity was ope- 
 rative, whose policy was just and valiant, 
 and whose (Economy was sincere and pro- 
 portionable to the dispositions and requi- 
 sites of nature. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. A tenacious adherence to the rights 
 and liberties transmitted from a wife and 
 
 # There are few more complete and applicable ana- 
 grams than that made by Pere Finardi on Magliabechi. 
 A,n,t,o,n,i,u,s, M,a,g,l,i,a,b,e,c,h,i,u,s. Isunusbib- 
 liotheca magna. That on H,o,r,a,t,i,o, N,e,l,s,o,n. Honor 
 est a NilOj is more complete than the former, which has 
 a redundant letter. That on W,i ; l,l,i,a,m, N,o,y, At- 
 torney General to King Charles L, is another good 
 specimen of this alcyhmy of wit, I moyl in law, being 
 expressive of his toilsome drudgery. That also by 
 William Oldys on himself, is good, but less perfect : 
 In word and will I am a friend to you, 
 And one friend Old is worth a hundred new. — Ed. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. V 
 
 virtuous ancestry, public spirit and a love 
 of one's country, are the support and orna- 
 ment of a government. — Addison. 
 
 ANCIENTS AND MODERNS. 
 
 1. To suppose an ancient title, though 
 lesser in degree, is preferable to one of 
 greater rank of later creation, is, as if one 
 should affirm, that an old shilling is better 
 than a new half-crown, though the metal 
 and the impression should be the same in 
 both. — Jere3iy Collier. 
 
 2. Not that the moderns are born with 
 more wit than their predecessors ; but find- 
 ing the world better furnished at their com- 
 ing into it, they have more leisure for new 
 thoughts, more light to direct them, and 
 more hints to work upon. — Ibid. 
 
 3. Those who come last seem to enter 
 with advantage. They are born to the 
 wealth of antiquity. The materials for 
 judging are prepared, and the foundations 
 of knowledge are laid to their hands. Be- 
 sides, if the point was tried by antiquity, 
 antiquity would lose it ; for the present 
 age is really the oldest and has the largest 
 experience to plead. — Ibid. 
 
10 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 ANCIENT KNIGHTHOOD. 
 A cowherd once applied to Arthur the 
 renowned King of Britain, to make his son 
 a knight. " It is a great thing thou askest," 
 said Arthur, and enquired whether this en- 
 treaty proceeded from him or from his son ? 
 The old man replied, "From my son, not 
 from me ; for I have thirteen sons, and 
 they will all perform the work I put them 
 to ; but this boy will not labor for me, for 
 any thing that I and my wife may say; 
 but he will be alway shooting and casting 
 darts, and glad to see battles and to behold 
 knights, and always day and night desireth 
 of me to be made a knight." The king 
 commanded the cowherd to fetch all his 
 sons ; they were all shapen much like the 
 poor man ; but Tor was like none of them 
 in shape or countenance ; and so king 
 Arthur knighted him. — King Arthur, an 
 old British Romance. 
 
 ANGER. 
 1. Leontius Patricius, Bishop of Cy- 
 prus, was one day extremely and unreason- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 11 
 
 ably angry with John the Patriarch of Alex- 
 andria. At evening the Patriarch sent a ser- 
 vant to him with this message, Sir, the sun 
 is set ; upon which Patricius reflecting and 
 the grace of God making the impression 
 deep, visible and permanent, he threw 
 away his anger and became wholly subject 
 to the counsel and spiritual aids of the 
 Patriarch. — Leontius, Bishop of Cyprus. 
 Aatobiog. ch. 14. 
 
 2. Anger is uneasiness or discomposure 
 of the mind, upon the receipt of any injury, 
 with a present purpose of revenge. — Locke. 
 
 3. Anger is a transient hatred, or, at 
 least, very like it. — Dr. South. 
 
 ANGLICISMS AND GALLICISMS. 
 The Abbe Sicard, well known as the 
 humane and intelligent teacher of the deaf 
 and dumb at Paris, took occasion to remark 
 to some travellers, that of all languages the 
 English was the most simple, the most 
 rational, and the most natural in its con- 
 struction. As a proof of this assertion he 
 observed, that his pupils, as they began to 
 learn the means of conveying their thoughts 
 
12 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 by writing, constantly made use of Angli- 
 cisms. — Le Maitre's Paris. 
 
 ARISTOTLE'S MORALITY. 
 Aristotle as a teacher of morality may 
 satisfy your judgment, but he seldom 
 warms your heart. As you read his work, 
 you assent to the proof of his propositions, 
 but he does not rouse you to action. He 
 shows you indeed the beauty of virtue ; 
 but it is in the abstract, not the concrete. 
 How superior to such cold and formal 
 morality is the ardor which the Christian 
 Revelation inspires ! There is more ex- 
 citement to virtuous conduct in the single 
 Parable of The Good Samaritan, than in 
 all the Nicomachean or the great morals of 
 Aristotle. — Henry Kett. 
 
 ARITHMETIC. 
 Nothing amuses more harmlessly than 
 computation, and nothing is more often 
 applicable to real business or speculative 
 inquiries. A thousand stories, which the 
 ignorant hear and believe, die away when 
 the computist takes them within his grasp. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 13 
 
 Numerical inquiries give entertainment in 
 solitude by the practice, and reputation in 
 public by the effect. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
 ARROGANCE. 
 
 1. When Diogenes came to Olympia and 
 perceived some Rhodian youths dressed 
 with great splendor and magnificence, he 
 said with a smile of contempt, " This is 
 all arrogance." Afterwards some Lacede- 
 monians came in his way, as mean and as 
 sordid in their attire, as the dress of the 
 others was rich, " This," said he, " is also 
 arrogance." — JElian. 
 
 2. A man that loves to be peevish and 
 paramount, and to play the sovereign at 
 every turn, does but blast the blessings of 
 life, and swagger away his own enjoy- 
 ments ; and not to enlarge upon the folly, 
 not to mention the injustice of such a 
 behavior, it is always the sign of a little, 
 unbenevolent temper. It is disease and 
 discredit all over, and there is no more 
 greatness in it, than in the swelling of a 
 dropsy. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
14 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 ART. 
 Arts that respect the Mind, were ever 
 reputed nobler than those which serve the 
 body. — Ben Jonson. 
 
 ARTIFICE OF FACTION. 
 To tell the people they are free, is the 
 common artifice of the factious and sedi- 
 tious. These state-gipsies pick the pockets 
 of the ignorant with this species of cant, 
 and with informing them what mighty 
 fortunes they are born to. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 ASSAULTS OF THE DEVIL. 
 Saint Cyprian # often observes and 
 makes much of the discourse, that the 
 Devil when he makes a battery, first views 
 the strengths and situation of the place. 
 His sense, drawn out of the cloud of an 
 allegory, is this. The Devil first considers 
 the constitution and temper of the person 
 he is to tempt, and where he observes his 
 natural inclination apt for a vice, he pre- 
 
 # Serm. de zelo. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 15 
 
 sents him with objects and opportunity, 
 and arguments fitting for his caitive dispo- 
 sition ; from which he is likely to receive 
 the smaller opposition, since there is a 
 party within, that desires his intromission. 
 Thus to lustful natures he represents the 
 softer whispers of the spirit of fornication. 
 To the angry and revengeful he offers to 
 consideration, the satisfactions and content 
 of a full revenge, and the emissions of 
 anger. To the envious he makes pane- 
 gyrics of our rivals and swells our fancies 
 to opinion, and our opinion to self-love, 
 self-love to arrogance, and these are sup- 
 ported by contempt of others, and all 
 determine upon envy and expire in malice. 
 Let us be sure that the Devil take not a 
 helve from our own branches to fit his axe, 
 that so he may cut down the tree. — Jere- 
 my Taylor. 
 
 ASSURANCE. 
 1. The obedient and the man of practice, 
 shall outrun all their doubts and ignoran- 
 ces ; till persuasion pass into knowledge, 
 and knowledge advance into assurance. — 
 Dr. South. 
 
16 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 2. This is not the grace of hope, but a 
 good natural assurance or confidence, Avhich 
 Aristotle observes young men to be full of 
 and old men not so inclined to. — Ham- 
 mond. 
 
 ATHEISM. 
 
 1. God never wrought miracles to con- 
 vince Atheism, because his ordinary works 
 convince it. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 2. Atheism is the result of ignorance 
 and pride ; of strong sense and feeble rea- 
 sons ; of good eating and ill living. It is 
 the plague of society, the corrupter of 
 manners, and the underminer of proper- 
 ty. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. No atheist, as such, can be a true 
 friend, an affectionate relation or a loyal 
 subject. — Dr. Bentley. 
 
 4. An atheist, if you will take his word 
 for it, is a very despicable mortal. Let us 
 describe him by his tenet, and copy him a 
 little from his own original. He is, then, 
 no better than a heap of organized dust, a 
 stalking machine, a speaking head without 
 a soul in it. His thoughts are bound by 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 17 
 
 the laws of motion, his actions, are all pre- 
 scribed. He has no more liberty than the 
 current of a stream or the blast of a tem- 
 pest ; and where there is no choice there 
 can be no merit. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 ATHENIAN JURIES. 
 I have always been of opinion, with the 
 learned antiquary Dr. Pettingal, that the 
 Athenian Judges might with propriety be 
 called Jurymen; and that the Athenian 
 Juries differed from ours in very {ew par- 
 ticulars. — Sir William Jones. 
 
 AVARICE. 
 
 1. Avarice is insatiable and is always 
 pushing on for more. — L' Estrange. 
 
 2. Avarice keeps a man always in the 
 wheel and makes him a slave for his life- 
 time ; and his head or his hands are per- 
 petually employed. When one project is 
 finished his inclinations roll to another, so 
 that his rest is only variety of labor. This 
 evil spirit throws him into the fire and 
 into the water and all sorts of hazards and 
 hardships ; and when he has reached the 
 
18 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 tombs, he sits naked and out of his right 
 mind. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 LORD BACON ON SCIENCE AND LITERATURE. 
 Another defect I note, wherein I shall 
 need some alchymist to help me, which 
 calls upon men to sell their books and to 
 build furnaces ; quitting and forsaking Mi- 
 nerva and the Muses as barren virgins, and 
 relying upon Vulcan. But certain it is, 
 that unto the deep, fruitful and operative 
 study of many sciences, especially Natural 
 Philosophy and Physic, books be not the 
 only instruments, wherein also the benefi- 
 cence of men hath not been altogether 
 wanting : for we see spheres, globes, astro- 
 labes, maps and the like, have been pro- 
 vided as appurtenances to Astronomy and 
 Cosmography, as well as books. We see, 
 likewise, that some places instituted for 
 Physic have annexed the commodity of 
 gardens for simples of all sorts, and do 
 likewise command the use of dead bodies 
 for Anatomies. But these do but respect a 
 few things. In general, there will hardly 
 be any main proficience in the disclosing 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 19 
 
 of Nature, except there be some allowance 
 for expenses about experiments; whether 
 they be experiments appertaining to Vul- 
 canus or Daedalus, furnace or engine, or 
 any other kind. And therefore as secre- 
 taries and spials of Princes and States, 
 bring in bills for intelligence, so you must 
 allow the spials and intelligencers of Na- 
 ture, to bring in their bills ; or you shall 
 be ill advertised. And if Alexander made 
 such a liberal assignation to Aristotle of 
 treasure for the allowance of hunters, fowl- 
 ers, fishers, and the like, that he might 
 compile an history of Nature : much better 
 do they deserve it, who travail in the arts 
 of Nature. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 BAD COMPANY. 
 Bad company is like a nail driven into 
 a post, which, after the first and second 
 blow, may be drawn out with little diffi- 
 culty ; but being once driven up to the 
 head, the pincers cannot take hold to draw 
 it out, but which can only be done by the 
 destruction of the wood. — St. Augustine. 
 
20 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 BAD SOIL. 
 He that sows his grain upon marble, will 
 have many a hungry belly before his har- 
 vest. — Arbuthnot. 
 
 BIBLICAL WRITERS. 
 It doth not appear that it ever came into 
 the mind of these writers, how this or the 
 other action would appear to mankind, 
 or what objections might be raised against 
 them. Bat without at all attending to this, 
 they lay the facts before you, at no pains 
 to think whether they would appear cred- 
 ible or not. If the reader will not believe 
 their testimony, there is no help for it ; 
 they tell the truth and attend to nothing 
 else. Surely this looks like sincerity, and 
 that they published nothing to the world 
 but what they believed themselves. — Du- 
 
 CHAL. 
 
 BIOGRAPHY. 
 
 1. Biography sets before us the whole 
 
 character of a person who has made himself 
 
 eminent, either by his virtues or his vices ; 
 
 shows us how he came first to take a right 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 21 
 
 or a wrong turn, the prospects which invited 
 him to aspire to higher degrees of glory, 
 or the delusions which misled him from his 
 virtues and his peace ; the circumstances 
 which raised him to true greatness, or the 
 rocks on which he split and sunk to infamy. 
 And how can we more effectually, or in a 
 more entertaining manner, learn the impor- 
 tant lesson, what we ought to pursue, and 
 what to avoid. — Dr. Burgh. 
 
 2. A Life which is worth reading, ought 
 never to have been written. — Sir James 
 Mackintosh. 
 
 3. Our Grub-street Biographers, watch 
 for the death of a great man, like so many 
 undertakers, on purpose to make a penny 
 of him. — Addison. 
 
 BLANK VERSE. 
 He who reads Milton's Paradise Lost, 
 with a true relish for its beauties, will 
 never embrace the opinion of the critic 
 who asserted that " blank verse is verse 
 only to the eye." Blank verse is the glory 
 of the English Poetry, which the French 
 language, from its want of energy and 
 
22 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 vigor, cannot support. It gives great free- 
 dom to the poet, and allows him to take 
 the most lofty flights, unshackled by the 
 chains of rhyme. It requires, however, 
 great elevation of thought, splendor of im- 
 agery, and elegance of diction, to prevent 
 him from sinking into prose. And as the 
 poet is under no necessity to close the sense 
 with the couplet, he must " bridle in his 
 struggling muse," lest she be two excursive, 
 and range beyond the proper bounds of de- 
 scription. It gives greater scope of expres- 
 sion, and greater variety of pause, than 
 rhyme, and is well adapted to the strains 
 of the Tragic and the Pastoral, as well as 
 to the Epic Muse : as is evident from Shak- 
 speare's Tragedies and Thomson's Seasons. 
 — Henry Kett. 
 
 BLUNTNESS. 
 Manage disputes with civility ; whence 
 some readers will be assisted to discern 
 a difference betwixt bluntness of speech 
 and strength of reason. — Hon. Robert 
 Boyle. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 23 
 
 BLUSTERING. 
 
 1. Virgil has the majesty of a lawful 
 Prince, and Statins only the blustering of a 
 tyrant. — Dryden. 
 
 2. A coward makes a great deal more 
 blustering than a man of honor. — L' Es- 
 trange. 
 
 BODY AND MIND. 
 A thought strongly encouraged by jus- 
 tice and duty, well warmed by shame and 
 honor, rage and revenge, makes the spirits 
 rush into the nerves with unusual vigor. 
 This sudden effort of the mind, raises the 
 whole of the powers of nature, strains the 
 muscles, and makes every atom, as it were, 
 sally out with it. This I take to be an 
 evidence that the mind has a great com- 
 mand over the body, and can rouse or lay 
 it asleep at pleasure ; and is a good argu- 
 ment to prove the independent liberty of 
 the will, and the distinction between mat- 
 ter and spirit. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 BOLINGBROKE'S IGNORANCE. 
 Lord Bolingbroke seemeth to take a 
 particular pleasure in railing at pedants, at 
 
24 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 the same time that he is himself one of the 
 most pedantic of writers, if it be pedantry 
 to make a vain ostentation of learning, and 
 to quote authors without either reading or 
 understanding them, or even knowing so 
 much as who and what they are. " The 
 Codex Alexandrinus,"* saith he, " we owe 
 to George the Monk." We are indebted 
 indeed to George the Monk, more usually 
 called Syncellus, for what is entitled Vetus 
 Chronicon. f But the Codex Alexandrians 
 is quite another thing ; it is, as all the learned 
 know, the famous Greek MS. of the Old 
 and New Testament, brought originally 
 from Alexandria, and presented to Charles 
 I., and now in the king's library, of which 
 it doth not appear that George the Monk 
 knew anything, and, it is evident, that his 
 Lordship knew nothing. If he meant to 
 say the Chronicum Alexandrinum, that is 
 still another thing, and the work of another 
 author. His Lordship is of opinion, that 
 " Virgil, % in those famous verses, Excndent 
 
 # Letter I. p. 262, 4to. ed. 
 
 f An ancient Chronicle of the Egyptians. — Ed. 
 
 % Letter V. p. 340. —7£. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 25 
 
 alii, &c, might have justly ascribed to his 
 countrymen, the praise of writing History 
 better than the Grecians." But which are 
 the Roman Histories that are to be prefer- 
 red to the Grecian? Why, " the remains, 
 the precious remains," says his Lordship, 
 "of Sallust, of Livy, and of Tacitus!" 
 But it happened that Virgil * died before 
 Livy had written his history, and before 
 Tacitus was born. And is not this an ex- 
 cellent chronologer now, to correct all an- 
 cient history and chronology sacred and 
 profane? His Lordship is likewise pleased 
 to say " that Don Quixote f believed, but 
 even Sancho doubted : " and it may be 
 asserted on the other side, that Sir Isaac 
 Newton believed the prophecies, though 
 his Lordship did not ; the principal reason 
 of which may be found, perhaps, in the 
 different life and morals of the one and the 
 other. Nay, the wisest politicians and his- 
 torians have been believers, as well as the 
 
 * Virgil died a. c. 735. Livy, according to Dodwell, 
 finished his history in 745. Tacitus was Consul in 850. 
 See Fabricius. 
 
 f Letter IV. p. 130 
 
26 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 greatest philosophers. Raleigh and Clar- 
 endon believed ; Bacon and Locke believed ; 
 and where then is the discredit to Revela- 
 tion, if Lord Bolingbroke was an infidel ? 
 " A scorner," as Solomon saith,* "seeketh 
 Wisdom and findeth it not." — Bishop 
 Newton. 
 
 BOOKS. 
 1. Studies serve for delight, for ornament, 
 and for ability. Their chief use for de- 
 light is in privateness and retiring ; for 
 ornament is in discourse, and for ability is 
 in the judgment and disposition of business. 
 For expert men can execute, and, perphaps, 
 judge of particulars, one by one ; but the 
 general counsels and the plots and mar- 
 shalling of affairs, come best from those 
 that are learned. Read not to contradict 
 and confute, but to weigh and consider. 
 Some books are to be tasted, others to be 
 swallowed, and some few to be digested. 
 That is, some books are to be read only in 
 parts, others to be read, but not curiously ; 
 and some few to be read wholly and with 
 
 # Proverbs xiv. 6. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 27 
 
 diligence and attention. Reading maketh 
 a full man, conference a ready man, and 
 writing an exact man. Histories make 
 men wise, poets witty, the mathematics 
 subtile, natural philosophy deep, moral 
 grave, logic and rhetoric able to contend. — 
 Lord Bacox. 
 
 2. Books are a guide in youth, and an 
 entertainment for age. They support us 
 under solitude, and keep us from becoming 
 a burden to ourselves. They help us to 
 forget the crossness of men and things, 
 compose our cares and our passions, and 
 lay our disappointments asleep. When we 
 are weary of the living, we may repair to 
 the dead, who have nothing of peevish- 
 ness, pride or design in their conversation. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 BOOKS v. TRAVELLERS. 
 1. The observations I have made in the 
 countries, through which I have travelled, 
 in general contradict the characters of those 
 nations, commonly ascribed to them in books 
 and in conversation. Thus, for example, 
 in the Spaniards with whom I have been 
 
28 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 acquainted, I could never find the gravity 
 and strictness by which that nation is gen- 
 erally supposed to be distinguished. In the 
 Frenchman I have seldom discovered that 
 winning amiableness of disposition, and 
 that high degree of politeness and delicacy, 
 which are inseparable from it, that are uni- 
 versally attributed to him. I never observed 
 that, in his own country, the Englishman 
 was that melancholy, reserved and gloomy 
 being, for which he is proverbial. The 
 German is by no means the drunkard, or 
 the clownish uncivilized brute, that in many 
 countries he is described to be. Am I to 
 suppose, that all the individuals with whom 
 I was acquainted, were exceptions, and that 
 the observations of so many years were 
 false? Or may it not rather be asserted, 
 that the characters of whole nations, as 
 delineated in early works, from which 
 probably they have got into every one's 
 mouth, are incorrect ? * it is much easier to 
 collect ideas of men and things from books 
 than from real life, and it is inconceivable 
 how ideas once adopted, continue to be 
 propagated. — Charles Gottlob Ku'ittner. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 29 
 
 2. Not long ago the map of the world, 
 in China, was a square plate, the greater 
 part of which was occupied by the provinces 
 of that vast empire, leaving on its skirts a 
 few obscure corners, into which the wretch- 
 ed remainder of mankind were supposed to 
 be driven. If you have not the use of our 
 letters, nor the knowledge of oar books, 
 said a Mandarin to an European Mission- 
 ary, what literature or what science can 
 you have ? — Dr. Adam Ferguson. 
 
 BRAVERY. 
 
 1. A brave man is clear in his discourse, 
 and keeps close to truth. — Aristotle. 
 
 2. It denotes no great bravery of mind 
 to do that out of a desire of fame, which 
 we could not be prompted to by a generous 
 passion for the glory of Him that made us. 
 — Addison. 
 
 THE BRITISH MONARCHY. 
 
 As long as the British Monarchy, not 
 
 more limited than fenced by the orders of 
 
 the State, shall, like the proud Keep of 
 
 Windsor, rising with majesty of proportion, 
 
30 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 and girt with the double belt of its kindred 
 and co-eval towers, as long as this awful 
 structure shall oversee and guard the pro- 
 tected land ; so long* will the British con- 
 stitution last. They who are convinced of 
 this, His (He who gave our nature to be 
 perfected by our virtue) will, which is the 
 Law of laws, and the Sovereign of sove- 
 reigns, cannot think it reprehensible that 
 this our corporate fealty and homage, this 
 our recognition of a Seignory Paramount, 
 I had almost said this oblation of the State 
 itself, as a worthy offering on the high altar 
 of universal praise, should be performed, as 
 all Public solemn acts are performed, in 
 Buildings, in Music, in Decorations, in 
 Oratory, in dignity of Persons, according 
 to the customs of mankind ; taught by 
 their nature, that it is with modest splen- 
 
 # Mr. Burke had evidently in his mind, the saying of 
 the Anglo-Saxon pilgrims, who visited Rome in the 
 eighth century, " Quamdiu stabit Colosseus stabat 
 £oma, quando cadet Colosseus cadet et- Roma ; quando 
 cadet Roma, cadet et Mundus." The first part of 
 which is thus rendered by a modern poet : 
 
 " While stands the Colosseum Rome shall stand." — Ed. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 31 
 
 dor, with unassuming state, with mild 
 majesty and sober pomp. For those pur- 
 poses, some part of the wealth of the 
 country is as usefully employed, as it can 
 be in forwarding the luxury of individuals. 
 It is the public ornament, it is the public 
 consolation, it nourishes the public hope. 
 The poorest man finds his own importance 
 and dignity in it, whilst the wealth and 
 pride of individuals at every moment makes 
 the man of humble rank and fortune sensi- 
 ble of his inferiority, and degrades and 
 vilifies his condition. — Burke. 
 
 BROTHERHOOD. 
 So it be a right to Govern, whether you 
 call it Supreme Fatherhood, or Supreme 
 Brotherhood, will be all one, provided we 
 know who has it. — Locke. 
 
 THE BUSINESS OF A SCHOLAR. 
 To talk in private, to think in solitude, 
 to inquire or to answer inquiries, is the 
 business of a scholar. He wanders about 
 the world without pomp or terror; and is 
 neither known nor valued but by men like 
 himself. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
32 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 CALUMNY. 
 He that lends an easy and credulous ear 
 to calumny, is either a man of very ill 
 morals, or has no more sense and under- 
 standing than a child. — Menander. 
 
 CASTLES IN THE AIR. 
 In all assemblies, though you wedge 
 them ever so close, we may observe this 
 peculiar property, that over their heads 
 there is room enough ; but how to reach it 
 is the difficult point. To this end the phi- 
 losopher's way in all ages has been by 
 erecting certain edifices in the air. But 
 whatever practice and reputation these 
 kind of structures have formerly possessed, 
 or may still continue in, not excepting even 
 that of Socrates, when he was suspended 
 in a basket to help contemplation ; I think, 
 with due submission, they seem to labor 
 under two inconveniences. First, that the 
 foundations being laid too high, they have 
 been often out of sight, and ever out of 
 hearing. Secondly, that the materials being 
 very transitory, have suffered much from 
 the inclemencies of air, particularly in these 
 north-west regions. — Swift. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 63 
 
 CAUSE AND EFFECT. 
 As we use to deny the effect to the in 
 strumental cause, and attribute it to the 
 principal in the manner of speaking, when 
 our purpose is to affirm a thing to be the 
 principal and of chief influence : — so we 
 say, it is not the good lute, but the good 
 hand that makes the music : it is not the 
 body but the soul that is the man, and yet 
 he is not the man without both. — Jeremy 
 Taylor. 
 
 CHANCE. 
 The adequate meaning of Chance, as 
 distinguished from Fortune, is, that the 
 latter is understood to befall only rational 
 agents, but Chance to be among inanimate 
 bodies. Chance is but a mere name, and 
 really nothing in itself; a conception in our 
 minds, and only a compendious way of 
 speaking, whereby we would express, that 
 such effects as are commonly attributed to 
 chance, were verily produced by their true 
 and proper causes, but without the design 
 to produce them. — Dr. Bentley. 
 3 
 
34 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 CHARITY, (RICHES OF.) 
 He hath riches sufficient, who hath 
 enough to be charitable. — Sir Thomas 
 Browne. 
 
 CHARITY SERMONS. 
 
 1. " He that giveth to the poor, lendeth 
 to the Lord," saith the Royal Sage of Judah. 
 There is more rhetoric in that one sentence, 
 than in a library of Sermons ; and indeed 
 if those sentences were understood by the 
 reader with the same emphasis as they 
 were delivered by the author, we needed 
 not those volumes of instructions, but 
 might be honest by an epitome. — Ibid. 
 
 2. As for our Sermons, be they never so 
 sound and perfect, God's word they are not, 
 as the sermons of the prophets were ; no, 
 they are but ambiguously termed his word, 
 because His Word is commonly the subject 
 whereof they treat, and must be the rule 
 whereby they are framed. — Hooker. 
 
 CHATHAM'S ELOQUENCE. 
 Lord Chatham's eloquence was of every 
 kind, and he excelled in the argumentative, 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 35 
 
 as well as the declamatory way. But his 
 invectives were terrible, and uttered with 
 such energy of diction and with such dig- 
 nity of action and countenance, that he 
 intimidated those who were the most willing 
 and the most able to encounter him. Their 
 arms fell out of their hands, and they 
 shrunk under the ascendant which his 
 genius gained over theirs. — Lord Ches- 
 terfield. 
 
 CHEERFULNESS v. MIRTH. 
 I have always preferred cheerfulness to 
 mirth. The latter I consider as an act, the 
 former as a habit of the mind. Mirth is 
 short and transient, cheerfulness fixed and 
 permanent. Those are often raised into 
 the greatest transports of mirth, who are 
 subject to the greatest depressions of mel- 
 ancholy ; on the contrary, cheerfulness, 
 though it does not give the mind such an 
 exquisite gladness, prevents us from falling 
 into any depths of Sorrow. Mirth is like 
 a flash of lightning, that breaks through a 
 gloom of clouds and glitters for a moment ; 
 cheerfulness keeps up a kind of day-light 
 
30 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 in the mind, and fills it with a steady and 
 perpetual serenity. Cheerfulness bears the 
 same friendly regard to the mind as to the 
 body ; it banishes all anxious care and dis- 
 content ; soothes and composes the passions 
 and keeps them in a perpetual calm. — Ad- 
 dison. 
 
 CHOICE OF COUNSELLERS. 
 Beware of acounseller, and know before 
 what use there is of him ; for he will coun- 
 sel for himself; lest he cast the lot upon 
 thee, and say unto thee, thy way is good : 
 and afterwards he stand on the other side, 
 to see what shall befall thee. Consult not 
 with one that suspecteth thee : and hide thy 
 counsel from such as envy thee. Neither 
 consult with a woman touching her of whom 
 she is jealous ; neither with a coward in 
 matters of war ; nor with a merchant con- 
 cerning exchange ; nor with a buyer of sell- 
 ing ; nor with an envious man of thankful- 
 ness ; nor with an unmerciful man touching 
 kindness ; nor with the slothful for any 
 work ; nor with an hireling for a year, of 
 finishing work ; nor with an idle servant of 
 much business ; hearken not unto these in 
 any matter of counsel. — Jesus Ben Sirach. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 37 
 
 CHRISTIAN FORTITUDE. 
 The fortitude of a Christian consists in 
 patience ; not in enterprises which the 
 poets call Heroic, and which are commonly 
 the effects of interest, pride and worldly 
 honor. — Dryden. 
 
 THE CHURCH. 
 
 1. Under the name of Church, I under- 
 stand a body or collection of human per- 
 sons, professing faith in Christ, gathered 
 together in several places of the world, for 
 the worship of the same God, and united into 
 the same Corporation. — Bishop Pearson. 
 
 2. The Church, being a supernatural 
 society, doth differ from natural societies in 
 this ; that the persons unto whom we asso- 
 ciate ourselves, in the one are men, simply 
 considered as men, but they to whom we 
 be joined in the other, are God, angels and 
 holy men. — Hooker. 
 
 CHURCH-MUSIC. 
 The end of Church-music is to relieve 
 the weariness of a long attention, to make 
 
38 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 the mind more cheerful and composed, and 
 to endear the offices of religion. It should 
 therefore imitate the perfume of the Jewish 
 tabernacle, and have as little of the com- 
 position of common use as possible. There 
 must be no voluntary maggots, no military 
 tattoos, no light and galliardizing notes ; 
 nothing that may make the fancy trifling 
 or raise an improper thought ; which would 
 be to profane the service and to bring the 
 play-house into the Church. Religious 
 harmony must be moving but noble withal 
 — grave, solemn and seraphic; fit for a 
 martyr to play, and an angel to hear. It 
 should be contrived so as to warm the best 
 blood within us, and to take hold of the 
 finest part of the affections ; to transport 
 us with the Beauty of Holiness, to raise 
 us above the satisfactions of life, and make 
 us ambitious of the glories of Heaven. And, 
 without doubt, if the morals of the choir 
 were suitable to the design of the music, it 
 were no more than requisite. To come 
 reeling from a tavern, or a worse place, into 
 a Church, is a monstrous incongruity. Such 
 irregular people are much fitter for the ex- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 39 
 
 ercises of penance than of exultation. The 
 use of them dissevers the interests of Re- 
 ligion ; and in effect, is little better than 
 singing the praises of God through the 
 organ of the Devil. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 CHURCH AND STATE. 
 Some men there are, the pests of society 
 I think them, who pretend a great regard 
 for religion in general, but who take every 
 opportunity of declaiming publicly against 
 that system of Religion, or at least against 
 that Church-establishment, which is re- 
 ceived in Britain. Just so them, of whom 
 I have been speaking, affect a great regard 
 to liberty in general ; but they dislike so 
 much the system of liberty established in 
 Britain, that they are incessant in their en- 
 deavors to puzzle the plainest thing in the 
 world, and to refine and distinguish away 
 the life and strength of our constitution, in 
 favor of the little, present, momentary 
 turns, which they are retained to serve. 
 What now would be the consequence, if 
 all these endeavors should succeed ? I am 
 persuaded that the great philosophers, di- 
 
40 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 vines, lawyers, and politicians, who exert 
 them, have not yet prepared and agreed 
 upon the plans of a new religion and of 
 new constitutions in Church and State. 
 We should find ourselves, therefore, with- 
 out any form of religion or civil government. 
 The first set of these missionaries would 
 take off all restraints of religion from the 
 governed ; and the latter set would remove, 
 or render ineffectual, all the limitations and 
 controls which liberty hath prescribed to 
 those who govern ; and disjoint the whole 
 frame of our constitution. Entire dissolu- 
 tion of manners, confusion, anarchy, or, 
 perhaps, absolute monarchy, would follow : 
 for it is possible, nay probable, that in such 
 a state as this, and amidst such a rout of 
 lawless savages, men would choose this 
 government, absurd as it is, rather than 
 have no government at all. — Lord Boling- 
 broke. 
 
 CHURCH UNION. 
 The Church, being a society, hath the 
 self-same original grounds, which other so- 
 cieties have ; the natural inclination which 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 41 
 
 all men have unto social life, and consent 
 to some certain bond of association, which 
 bond is the law that appointeth what kind 
 of order they shall be associated in. — 
 Hooker. 
 
 CLASSIC GROUND. 
 1. To tread on classic ground is a pleasing 
 source of gratification to the Traveller. He 
 has it in his power to adopt the most direct 
 method of illustrating the allusions to man- 
 ners, customs and places, found in his 
 favorite authors, and to supply the defects 
 of commentators and critics by his actual 
 observations. He who relishes the beau- 
 ties of a Virgil or a Horace, will be eager 
 to visit the spots, either marked by their 
 footsteps, or immortalized by their poems. 
 What delight will he experience, when he 
 sees the Po flowing through the meadows of 
 Mantua, and afterwards rushing by various 
 streams into the gulf of Venice ; or, when 
 he traverses the shores of Baiae and wan- 
 ders amid the groves of Umbria ! The Anio 
 dashing its foaming surges through the 
 craggy channels of the rocks and hills of 
 
42 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 Tivoli, interspersed with orchards, olive- 
 groves and corn-fields, recall Horace and 
 Tibullus to his remembrance. These scenes 
 ever endeared to learning and taste, inspired 
 many of the lively and festive Odes of the 
 one, and of the tender and pensive "Elegies 
 of the other. — Henry Kett. 
 
 2. At last we came to Icolmkill. — We 
 were now treading that illustrious island, 
 which was once the luminary of the Cale- 
 donian regions, where savage clans and 
 roving barbarians derived the benefits of 
 knowledge and the blessings of religion. 
 To abstract the mind from all local emotion 
 would be impossible, if it were endeavored ; 
 and would be foolish, if it were possible. 
 Whatever withdraws us from the power of 
 our senses, whatever makes the past, the 
 distant or the future, predominate over the 
 present, advances us to the dignity of 
 thinking beings. Par from me and from 
 my friends be such rigid philosophy, as 
 may conduct us, indifferent and unmoved, 
 over any ground which has been dignified 
 by wisdom, bravery or virtue. That man 
 is little to be envied whose patriotism 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 43 
 
 would not gain force upon the plain of 
 Marathon, or whose piety would not grow 
 warmer among the ruins of Iona. — Dr. 
 Johnson. 
 
 CLASSIC "WRITERS. 
 1. If the student hath formed both his 
 sentiments and his style by the perusal and 
 imitation of the purest classical writers, 
 among whom the historians and orators will 
 best deserve his regard ; if he can reason 
 with precision, and can separate argument 
 from fallacy, the clear simple rules of pure 
 unsophisticated logic ; if he can fix his 
 attention and steadily pursue Truth through 
 any of the most intricate deductions by 
 the use of mathematical demonstration ; if 
 he has enlarged his conceptions of nature 
 and art, by a view of the several branches 
 of genuine experimental philosophy ; if 
 he has impressed on his mind the sound 
 maxims of the Law of Nature, the best 
 and most authentic foundation of human 
 laws ; if, lastly, he has contemplated those 
 maxims, reduced to a practical system in 
 the laws of Imperial Rome ; if he has done 
 
44 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 this, or any part of it, a student thus quali- 
 fied may enter upon his pursuits with 
 incredible advantage and reputation. And 
 if, at the conclusion or during the acqui- 
 sition of these accomplishments, he will 
 afford himself in the University a year or 
 two's further leisure, to lay the foundation 
 of his future labors in a solid scientific 
 method, without thirsting too early to at- 
 tend that practice which it is impossible he 
 can rightly comprehend, he will afterwards 
 proceed with the greatest ease, and will 
 unfold the most intricate points with an 
 intuitive rapidity and clearness. — Sir 
 William Blackstone. 
 
 THE CLERGY. 
 1. All Christians ought to know that St. 
 Peter gave the title of Clergy to all God's 
 people, till Pope Hyginus and the succeed- 
 ing prelates took it from them, appropriating 
 that name to themselves and their priests 
 only; and condemning the rest of God's 
 inheritance to an injurious and alienate 
 condition of laity. — Milton on Church 
 Government. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 45 
 
 2. Of all classes that can read and write, 
 the Clergy, in general, take the worst mea- 
 sure of affairs. — Lord Clarendon. 
 
 CLERICAL FLATTERY. 
 Of all sorts of flattery, that which comes 
 from a solemn character and stands before 
 a sermon is the worst-complexioned. Such 
 commendation is a satire upon the author, 
 makes the text look mercenary, and dis- 
 ables the discourse from doing service. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 CLERICAL POLLUTIONS. 
 Those ecclesiastics who violently affect 
 rich or pompous Prelacies, pollute them- 
 selves with worldly arts, growing covetous 
 as Syrian merchants, ambitious as the Le- 
 vantine princes, factious as the people, 
 revengeful as jealousy, and proud as con- 
 querors and usurpers. By these means 
 beasts are brought into the Temple, and the 
 Temple itself is exposed to sale, and the 
 holy rites as well as the beasts of Sacrifice 
 are made venal. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
40 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 CLERICAL STUDIES. 
 
 1. Literature, and sacred literature in 
 particular, is requisite to a Clergyman, not 
 only as it is necessary to the edifying dis- 
 charge of his pastoral duties, but as it forms 
 and shows the turn of his mind, influences 
 and implies his habits of life, makes him 
 happy at home, detains him from pursuits 
 improper in kind or excessive in degree ; 
 and keeps his mind in a due tone for every 
 work of his ministry. In every view it is 
 a vital part of his character. — Dr. Naple- 
 
 TON. 
 
 2. The imagined presence # of a wise 
 and good man has been recommended as a 
 convenient guard to private conduct. How 
 would this appear to Socrates or Plato or 
 Aristides ? The parochial minister may 
 with equal advantage suppose himself under 
 the ocular inspection of his omniscient 
 Overseer, and anticipate with greater feel- 
 ing his censure or his disapprobation. — Ibid. 
 
 * See Examples. 
 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 47 
 
 CLERICAL WRITINGS. 
 The Clergy are both ready and able to 
 maintain the cause of Christianity, as their 
 many excellent writings in defence of it 
 sufficiently demonstrate. But as the gene- 
 rality of mankind is more governed by 
 prejudice than by reason, their writings are 
 not so universally read or candidly received 
 as they deserve ; because they are supposed 
 to proceed, not from conscience and con- 
 viction, but from interested views, and the 
 common cause of their profession. A sup- 
 position evidently as partial and injurious 
 as that would be, which should impute the 
 gallant behavior of our soldiers to the mean 
 consideration of their pay and their hopes 
 of preferment : exclusive of all the nobler 
 motives of gentlemen, namely, the sense of 
 honor, and love of country. — Gilbert 
 West. . 
 
 COMMERCE. 
 1. In observing the advances of com- 
 merce, we shall find that in its Jirst stages it 
 supplies mutual necessities, prevents mutual 
 
48 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 wants, extends mutual knowledge, eradi- 
 cates mutual prejudice, and spreads mutual 
 humanity. In its middle and more advanced 
 period, it provides conveniences, increases 
 numbers, gives birth to arts and sciences, 
 creates equal laws, diffuses general plenty 
 and general happiness. If we view it in 
 its third and highest stage, we shall see it 
 change its nature and effects. It brings 
 in superfluity and vast wealth, begets ava- 
 rice, gross luxury or effeminate refinement 
 among the higher ranks, together with 
 general loss of principle. — Dr. John Brown. 
 
 2. The sea-coast of Britain, from the 
 figure, in some measure, of the Island, but 
 chiefly from the inlets of the sea and the very 
 irregular indented line which forms its shore, 
 comprehends, allowing for these sinuosities, 
 at least eight hundred marine leagues. In 
 this respect, so beneficial to commerce, it 
 is superior to France, and equal to Spain 
 and Portugal, though Britain is not half the 
 size of that noble peninsula which forms 
 the latter two kingdoms. — Dr. Campbell. 
 
 3. He that first discovered the use of the 
 compass, did more for the supplying and 
 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 49 
 
 increase of useful commodities, than those 
 who built workhouses. — Locke. 
 
 4. Commerce supplies the wants of one 
 country by importing the riches of another, 
 and gives a value to superfluities which they 
 could not otherwise obtain. It increases 
 the revenue of a State, and preserves the in- 
 dependence of a people. — Henry Kent. 
 
 CONSCIENCE. 
 1. There is no word more frequently in 
 the mouths of men, than that of conscience ; 
 and the meaning of it is in some measure 
 generally understood. However, because 
 it is a word extremely abused by many peo- 
 ple, who apply other meanings to it, which 
 God Almighty never intended, I shall ex- 
 plain it in the clearest manner I am able. 
 The word conscience properly signifies that 
 knowledge which a man hath within him- 
 self of his own thoughts and actions ; by 
 comparing them with the law of God, his 
 mind will either approve or condemn him, 
 according as he hath done good or evil ; 
 therefore this knowledge or conscience may 
 properly be called both an accuser and a 
 judge. So that whenever our conscience 
 
 4 
 
50 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 accuseth us, we are certainly guilty : but 
 we are not always innocent when it doth 
 not accuse us ; for very often through the 
 hardness of our hearts, or the fondness 
 and favor we bear ourselves, or through 
 ignorance or neglect, we do not suffer our 
 conscience to take any cognizance of sev- 
 eral sins we commit. — Swift. 
 
 2. The testimony of a good conscience 
 will make the comforts of Heaven descend 
 upon man's weary head, like a refreshing 
 dew or shower upon a parched land. It 
 will give him lively earnests and secret 
 anticipations of approaching joy ; it will 
 bid his soul go out of the body undauntedly, 
 and lift up his head with confidence before 
 saints and angels. The comfort which it 
 conveys is greater than the capacities of 
 mortality can appreciate, mighty and un- 
 speakable, and not to be understood till it 
 is felt. — Dr. South. 
 
 3. A good conscience is to the soul, 
 what health is to the body; it preserves a 
 constant ease and serenity within us, and 
 more than countervails all the calamities 
 and afflictions which can possibly befall us. 
 — Addison. 
 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 51 
 
 COSMOPOLITY OF LITERATURE. 
 A Khan of Tartary admired the art 
 of Moliere, and discovered the TartufFe 
 in the Crimea ; and had this ingenious 
 Sovereign survived the translation which 
 he ordered, the immortal labor of the comic 
 satirist of France might have laid the foun- 
 dations of good taste even among the 
 Turks and the Tartars. We see the Italian 
 Pignotti referring to the opinion of an 
 English critic, Lord Bolingbroke. for deci- 
 sive authority on the peculiar characteristics 
 of the historian Guicciardini : the German 
 Schlegel writes on our Shakspeare like a 
 patriot ; and while the Italians admire the 
 noble scenes which our Flaxman has drawn 
 from their great Poet, they have rejected 
 the feeble attempts of their native artists. 
 Such is the wide and the perpetual influ- 
 ence of this living intercourse of literary 
 minds. — D'Israeli. 
 
 COVETOUSNESS. 
 1. Let never so much probability hang 
 on one side of a covetous man's reasoning, 
 
52 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 and money on the other, it is easy to fore- 
 see which will outweigh. — Locke. 
 
 2. He that is envious or angry at a 
 virtue that is not his own ; at the perfection 
 or excellency of his neighbor, is covetous, 
 not of the virtue, but of the reward and 
 reputation : and then his intentions are pol- 
 luted. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 3. He that takes pains to serve the ends 
 of covetousness, or ministers to another's 
 lust, or keeps a shop of impurities or intem- 
 perance, is idle in the worst sense. — Ibid. 
 
 4. See the reward of covetousness ; it 
 is cheap in its offers, momentary in its 
 possession, unsatisfying in the fruition, 
 uncertain in the stay, sudden in its depar- 
 ture, horrid in the remembrance, and a 
 ruin, a sad and miserable ruin is in the 
 event. — Ibid. 
 
 5. Covetousness debaseth a man's spirit, 
 and sinketh it into the earth. — Archbishop 
 
 TlLLOTSON. 
 
 6. Covetousness is a most obliging lev- 
 eller ; it mingles the great and the small 
 with wonderful condescensions, and makes 
 Lords and valets company for one another. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 53 
 
 It will solicit in the meanest office and 
 submit to any infamous disguise. It turns 
 lions into jackalls, engages honor in the 
 most scandalous intrigues, and make it un- 
 derputter to cheats and sharpers. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 7. The covetous man has many tools to 
 work with. If Deceit suits his purpose, 
 he will use it to the best of his skill ; if 
 Cruelty will save a penny, he will not hesi- 
 tate to kill a poor debtor for the price of 
 his skin. No turn, either in State or 
 Religion, can hurt him ; he receives any 
 impression and runs into any mould the 
 times will give him. He is a Christian at 
 Rome, a Heathen at Japan, and a Turk at 
 Constantinople ; what you will without and 
 nothing within. — Ibid. 
 
 CRITICS. 
 1. If you would succeed as a critic, you 
 must deal with an author as you would 
 with an enemy ; fire the beacon, draw 
 down the posse on the first landing, and 
 charge him while he is staggering on the 
 beach. To give him time to feel his limbs 
 
54 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 and to march, may be of ill consequence : 
 he may be joined by his friends and gain 
 upon the country, and then it may be too 
 late to stop his progress. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 2. Where an author has many beauties 
 consistent with virtue, piety and truth, let 
 not little critics exalt themselves and shower 
 down their ill nature. — Watts. 
 
 3. There is not a Greek or Latin critic, 
 who has not shown, even in the style of his 
 criticisms, that he was a master of all the 
 eloquence and delicacy of his native tongue. 
 
 CRITICISM. 
 
 1. Criticism, as it was first instituted by 
 Aristotle, was meant a standard of judging 
 well. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
 2. If ideas and words were distinctly 
 weighed and duly considered, they would 
 afford us another sort of logic and criticism, 
 than we have been hitherto acquainted 
 with. — Locke. 
 
 3. Meanwhile Momus bent his flight to 
 the region of a malignant deity, called 
 Criticism. She dwelt on the top of a 
 snowy mountain, where Momus found her 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 55 
 
 extended in her den, upon the spoils of 
 numberless volumes half devoured. At 
 her right hand sat Ignorance, her father 
 and husband, blind with age ; at her left 
 Pride, her mother dressing her up in scraps 
 of paper herself had torn. There was 
 Opinion, her sister, light of foot, hood- 
 winked and head-strong, yet giddy and 
 perpetually turning. About her played her 
 children, Noise and Impudence, Dulness 
 and Yanity, Positiveness, Pedantry and 
 Ill-manners. The goddess herself had 
 claws like a cat, her head and ears resem- 
 bled those of an ass ; her teeth had fallen 
 out before ; her eyes turned inward, as if 
 she looked only upon herself, and her diet 
 was the overflowing of her own gall. 
 
 Up rose the Goddess and said, it is I 
 who give wisdom to infants and idiots ; 
 by me children grow wiser than their 
 parents ; by me beaux become politicians, 
 and school-boys judges of philosophy. By 
 me sophisters debate and conclude upon 
 the depths of knowledge ; and coffee-house 
 wits, instinct by me, can correct an author's 
 style, and display his minutest errors, with- 
 
56 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 out understanding a syllable of his matter 
 or of his language. By me striplings spend 
 their judgment as they do their estate, be- 
 fore it comes into their hands. It is I who 
 have deposed wit and knowledge from their 
 empire over Poetry, and advanced myself 
 in their stead. But come my aged parents 
 and you my children hear, and thou my 
 beauteous sister ; let us ascend my chariot, 
 and haste to assist our devout votaries, who 
 are now sacrificing to us a hecatomb, as 
 I perceive by that grateful smell which 
 reaches my nostrils. — Swift. 
 
 4. Listen to the confession of an illus- 
 trious sinner ; the Coryphaeus of the amus- 
 ing and new found art, or artifice, of 
 modern criticism. In the character of 
 Burns, the Edinburgh Reviewer, with his 
 peculiar felicity of manner, attacked the 
 character of the man of genius ; but when 
 Mr. Campbell vindicated his immortal bro- 
 ther with all the inspiration of the family 
 feeling, our critic, who is one of those 
 great artists who acquire at length the ut- 
 most indifference even for their own works, 
 generously avowed, that, "a certain tone 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 57 
 
 of exaggeration is incidental we fear to the 
 sort of writing in which we are engaged. 
 Reckoning a little too much on the dul- 
 lness of our readers, we are often led to 
 overstate our sentiments; when a little 
 controversial warmth is added to a little 
 love of effect, an excess of coloring steals 
 over the canvas, which ultimately offends 
 no eye so much as our own." But what 
 if this love of effect in the critic has been 
 too often obtained at the entire cost of the 
 literary characters, the fruits of whose stu- 
 dious days at this moment lie withering in 
 oblivion, or whose genius the critic has 
 deterred from pursuing the career it had 
 opened for itself! To have silenced the 
 learned, and to have terrified the modest, 
 is the barbarous triumph of a Hun or a 
 Vandal ; and the vaunted freedom of the 
 literary republic departed from us, when the 
 vacillating public blindly consecrated the 
 edicts of the demagogues of literature, 
 whoever they may be. — D' Israeli. 
 
 DEATH. 
 1. It is impossible that any thing, so 
 
58 a thought-book; 
 
 natural, so necessary and so universal as 
 Death, should ever have been designed by 
 Providence as an evil to mankind. — Swift. 
 
 2. The more we sink into the infirmi- 
 ties of age, the nearer we are to immortal 
 youth. All people are young in the other 
 world. That state is an eternal Spring, 
 ever fresh and flourishing. Now to pass 
 from midnight into noon on the sudden ; 
 to be decrepid one minute, and all spirit 
 and activity the next, must be a desirable 
 change. To call this dying, is an abuse 
 of language. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. The sublimity* of wisdom is to do 
 those things living, which are to be desired 
 when dying. For the death of the Right- 
 eous is like the descending of ripe and 
 wholesome fruits from a pleasant and florid 
 tree. Our senses entire, our limbs unbroken, 
 without horrid tortures ; after provision 
 made for our children, with a blessing en- 
 tailed upon posterity, in the presence of 
 our friends, our dearest relative closing our 
 
 * Hie est apex summse sapientise, ea viventem facere, 
 qua? morienti essent appetenda. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 59 
 
 eyes and binding our feet, leaving a good 
 name behind us. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 THE DEATH OF SOCRATES. 
 Having thus spoken, he arose and went 
 into an inner room to wash himself ; Crito 
 following him, enjoined us to stay till his 
 return. We therefore waited, discoursing 
 among ourselves of the things that had been 
 commemorated by him, and conferring our 
 judgments concerning them. And we fre- 
 quently spoke of the calamity that seemed 
 to impend over us by his death ; conclud- 
 ing it would certainly come to pass, that as 
 sons deprived of their father, so should we 
 disconsolately spend the remainder of our 
 life. After he had been washed, and his 
 children had been brought to him, (for he 
 had two sons very young, and a third al- 
 most a youth) and his wives also were 
 come ; he spake to them before Crito, and 
 gave them his last commands : so he gave 
 orders to his wives and children to retire. 
 Then he came back to us. By this time 
 the day had declined almost to the setting 
 of the sun ; for he had staid long in the 
 
CO A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 room where he washed himself. Which 
 done, he returned and sate to repose him- 
 self, not speaking much after that. Then 
 came the Minister of the Eleven, the exe- 
 cutioner ; and addressing himself to him, 
 said, I do not believe, Socrates, that I shall 
 reprehend that in you, which I am wont to 
 reprehend in others ; that they are angry 
 with me, and curse me, when, by com- 
 mand of the magistrates, (who I am by my 
 office bound to obey) I come and give no- 
 tice to them, that they must drink the 
 poison. But I know you to be at all times, 
 and chiefly at this, a man both generous, 
 and most mild and civil ; the best of all 
 men that ever came into this place ; so that 
 I am assured you will not feel displeased 
 with me, but (you know the authors) with 
 them rather. Now therefore, for you know 
 what message I come to bring, farewell ; 
 and endeavor to suffer as patiently and as 
 calmly as you can, that which cannot be 
 avoided ; then breaking forth into tears he 
 departed: and Socrates, converting his eyes 
 upon him said, and farewell thou too ; we 
 will perform all things. Then turning to 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 61 
 
 us again ? how civil is this man, saith he, 
 all this time of my imprisonment, he came 
 to me willingly, and sometimes talked with 
 me respectfully, and hath been the best of 
 all that belong to the prison ; and now how 
 generously doth he weep for me! But, 
 Crito, let us spare him, and let some other 
 bring hither the deadly draught, if it be 
 already bruised ; if not, let him bruise it. 
 Then said Crito, I think the sun shines 
 upon the tops of the mountains, and is not 
 yet quite* down; and/I have seen some 
 delay the drinking of the poison much 
 longer. Nay more, after notice had been 
 given them that they ought to despatch, 
 they have supped and drank largely too, 
 and talked a good while with their friends. 
 Be not then so hasty ; you have yet time 
 enough. Those men of whom you speak, 
 Crito, saith he, did well ; for they thought 
 they gained so much more of life ; but I 
 will not follow their example. For I con- 
 ceive I shall gain nothing in deferring my 
 
 # By the Athenian law, no man was to be put to death 
 until after sunset, lest the sun, for which they had a 
 singular veneration, should be displeased at the sight. 
 
62 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 draught, till it be later in the night ; unless 
 it be to expose myself to be derided, for not 
 being desirous, out of too great a love of 
 life, to prolong the short remainder of it. 
 But well, get the poison prepared quickly, 
 and do nothing else till that be despatched. 
 Crito hearing this, beckoned to a boy that 
 was present ; and the boy going forth and 
 employing himself a while in bruising the 
 poison, returned with him who was to give 
 it, and who brought it ready bruised in a 
 cup : upon whom Socrates casting his eyes, 
 said, be it so, good man, tell me (for thou 
 art well skilled in such matters) what is to 
 be done ? Nothing, said he, but after you 
 have drank, to walk until a heaviness comes 
 upon your legs and thighs, and then to sit ; 
 and this you shall do. And with that he 
 held forth the cup to Socrates, which he 
 readily receiving, and being perfectly sedate, 
 O Echecrates, without trembling, without 
 change either in the color or air of his face, 
 but with the same aspect and countenance, 
 intent and stern (as was usual to him) look- 
 ing upon the man : what sayest thou, saith 
 he, may not a man offer some of this liquor 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 63 
 
 in sacrifice ? We have bruised but so 
 much, Socrates, saith he, as we thought 
 would be sufficient. I understand you, 
 saith he ; but yet it is both lawful and our 
 duty to pray to the gods that our transmi- 
 gration from hence to them may be happy 
 and fortunate. Having spoke those words, 
 and remained silent, for a minute or two, 
 he easily and expeditely drank all that was 
 in the cup. Then many of us endeavored 
 what we could to contain our tears, but 
 when be beheld him drinking the poison, 
 and immediately after, no man was able 
 longer to refrain from weeping : and while 
 I put force upon myself to suppress my 
 tears, they flowed down my cheeks drop 
 after drop. So covering my face, I wept 
 in secret, deploring not his, but my own 
 hard fortune, in the loss of so great a friend 
 and so near a kinsman. But Crito, no 
 longer being able to contend with his grief, 
 and to forbid his tears, rose up before me. 
 And Apollodorus first breaking out into 
 showers of tears, and then into cries, howl- 
 ings and lamentations, left no man from 
 whom he extorted not tears in abundance : 
 
64 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 Socrates himself only excepted : — who 
 said, what do ye my friends ? truly I sent 
 away the women for no other reason, but 
 lest they should in this kind offend. For I 
 have heard, that we ought to die with good 
 men's gratulation : but recompose your- 
 selves and resume your courage and resolu- 
 tion. Hearing this, we blushed with 
 shame, and suppressed our tears. But 
 when he had walked awhile, and told us 
 that his thighs were grown heavy and stu- 
 pid; he lay down upon his back: for so 
 he who had given him the poison had di- 
 rected him to do. Who, a little time after, 
 returns, and feeling him, looked upon his 
 legs and feet : then pinching his foot vehe- 
 mently, he asked him if he felt it ? And 
 when he said no, he again pinched his 
 legs ; and turning to us, told us, that now 
 Socrates was stiff with cold ; and touching 
 him, said he would die so soon as the poi- 
 son came up to his heart ; for the parts 
 about his heart were already grown stiff. 
 Then Socrates, putting aside the garment 
 wherewith he was covered : we owe, saith 
 he, a cock to iEsculapius : but do ye pay 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 65 
 
 him. and neglect not to do it. And these 
 were his last words. It shall be done, saith 
 Crito ; bat see if you have any other com- 
 mand for us. To which he gave no an- 
 swer : but soon after fainting he moved 
 himself often, as if suffering convulsions. 
 Then the servant uncovered him : and his 
 eyes stood wide open ; which Crito perceiv- 
 ing he closed both his mouth and his eyes. 
 This, Echechrates, was the end of our friend 
 and familiar, a man, as we in truth affirm, 
 of all whom we have by use and experience 
 known, the wisest and most just. # — Pla- 
 to's Plicedo. Old translation. 
 
 # On the subject of the importance of the closing 
 scene, or last act of life, upon Eparninondas being 
 asked whether Chabrias, Iphicrates or himself, deserved 
 most to be esteemed? replied, "You must first see us 
 die, before that question can be answered.-' And 
 Erasmus, after quoting a passage of the last discourse 
 of Socrates to his friends, a little before drinking the 
 fatal draught, when he said, " whether or no, God will 
 approve of my actions, I know not ; but this I am sure 
 of, that I have at all times made it my endeavor to 
 please Him, and I have a good hope that this my 
 endeavor will please Him ; " was so much transported 
 with these words of the divine philosopher, that he 
 could scarcely forbear looking upon, him as a saint, and 
 desiring his intercession, saying, " "When I reflect on 
 5 
 
66 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 DEMOCRACY. 
 Lycurgus being asked, why he, who in 
 other respects appeared to be so zealous for 
 the equal rights of men, did not make his 
 Government democratical rather than oli- 
 garchical. " Go you," replied the legislator, 
 "and try a Democracy in your own house." 
 — Plutarch. 
 
 DEPENDENCE. 
 
 1. In an arch each single stone, which, if 
 severed from the rest, would be perhaps 
 defenceless, is sufficiently secured by the 
 solidity and entireness of the whole fabric 
 of which it is a part. — The Hon. Robert 
 Boyle. 
 
 2. Dependence goes somewhat against 
 the grain of a generous mind ; and it is no 
 wonder that it should do so, considering the 
 unreasonable advantage which is often taken 
 of the inequality of fortune. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 such a speech, pronounced by such a person, I can 
 scarcely forbear crying out, Oh ! holy Socrates, pray 
 for us." — Ed. 
 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 67 
 
 DESCRIPTION v. DEFINITION. 
 
 The sort of definition which is made 
 up of a mere collection of the most re- 
 markable parts or properties, is called an 
 imperfect definition, or a description. 
 Whereas the definition is called perfect, 
 when it is composed of the essential differ- 
 ence, added to general nature or genus. — 
 Dr. Isaac Watts. 
 
 DESIRE. 
 Desire is the uneasiness a man finds 
 in himself upon the absence of any thing, 
 whose present enjoyment carries the idea 
 of delight with it. — Locke. 
 
 DESPAIR. 
 
 1. Despair is the thought of the un- 
 attainableness of any good ; it works 
 differently in men's minds, sometimes pro- 
 ducing uneasiness or pain, sometimes rest 
 and indolency. — Locke. 
 
 2. Despair maks a despicable figure and 
 is descended from a mean original. It is 
 the offspring of fear, laziness, and impa- 
 
68 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 tience. It argues a defect of spirit and 
 resolution, and sometimes of honesty too. 
 After all. the exercise of this passion is so 
 troublesome, that nothing but dint of evi- 
 dence and demonstration should force it 
 upon us. I would not despair unless I 
 knew the irrevocable decree was past: saw 
 my misfortune recorded in the Book of 
 Fate, and signed and sealed by necessity. 
 — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 DESPISE NOTHING. 
 
 1. Despise not any man, and do not 
 spurn any thing. For there is no man that 
 hath not his hour, nor is there any thing 
 that hath not its place. — Rabbi Ben Azai. 
 
 2. A certain man who was very much 
 deformed saluted a Rabbi, saying, " Peace 
 be unto thee." The Rabbi did not return 
 the salutation ; but said, " Raca, how ugly 
 this man is ! perhaps all thy townsmen are 
 as deformed as thou art." The other re- 
 plied, " I do not know ; but go thou and 
 say to the Workman who made me, how 
 ugly is this vessel which thou hast made." 
 Upon which the Rabbi dismounted from 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 69 
 
 his ass, knowing that he had sinned, and 
 fell down on his face before the man he 
 had despised, and said unto him, " Forgive 
 me, I beseech thee." But the deformed 
 man answered, " I cannot forgive thee 
 until thou hast been to the Workman who 
 formed me, and said, l How ugly is this 
 vessel which thou hast made.' " — Talmud. 
 
 DESPONDENCY. 
 
 1. To believe a business impossible, is 
 the way to make it so. How many feasi- 
 ble projects have miscarried through de- 
 spondency, and been strangled in the birth, 
 by a cowardly imagination. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 2. There is no surer remedy for super- 
 stitious and desponding weakness, than first 
 to govern ourselves by the best improve- 
 ment of that Reason which Providence has 
 given us for a guide ; and then, when we 
 have done our own parts, to commit all 
 cheerfully for the rest, to the good pleasure 
 of Heaven, with trust and resignation. — 
 L'Estranoe. 
 
 3. Some persons depress their own minds, 
 
70 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 despond at the first difficulty ; and conclude 
 that making any progress in knowledge, 
 farther than serves their ordinary business, 
 is above their capacities. — Locke. 
 
 DETRACTION. 
 
 1. Doth a man reproach thee for being 
 proud or ill-natured, envious or conceited, 
 ignorant or detractive ? consider with thy- 
 self whether his reproaches are true. If 
 they are not, consider that thou art not the 
 person whom he reproaches, but that he 
 reviles an imaginary being, and perhaps 
 loves what thou really art, although he 
 hates what thou appearest to be. If his 
 reproaches are true, if thou art the envious, 
 ill-natured man he takes thee for, give thy- 
 self another turn, become mild, affable and 
 obliging, and his reproaches of thee natu- 
 rally cease. His reproaches may indeed 
 continue, but thou art no longer the person 
 he reproaches. — Epictetus. 
 
 2. If Detraction could invite us, discre- 
 tion surely would contain us from any de- 
 rogatory intention. — Sir Thomas Browne. 
 
 3. If Detraction were a new thing to me, 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 71 
 
 I might not be displeased with the suppres- 
 sion of the first libel that should abuse me : 
 but since there are enough of them to make 
 a small library, I am secretly pleased to see 
 the number increased, and take a delight 
 in raising of the stones that envy hath cast 
 at me without doing me any harm. — De 
 Balzac. 
 
 DEVISERS. 
 The Devisers of useful inventions, the 
 authors of wholesome laws, as were the 
 Philosophers of ancient times, were hon- 
 ored as the Fathers and Prophets of their 
 country. — Grew. 
 
 DIALECTICS. 
 Those dialectical subtleties, that the 
 schoolmen employ, more declare the wit 
 of him that useth them, than increase the 
 knowledge of sober lovers of Truth. — 
 The Hon. Robert Boyle. 
 
 DISCRETION. 
 1. There is no talent so useful towards 
 rising in the world, or which puts men more 
 
72 
 
 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 out of the reach of fortune, than discretion, 
 a species of lower prudence. — Swift. 
 
 2. Without discretion, people may be 
 overlaid with unreasonable affection, and 
 choked with too much nourishment. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 DISCUSSION. 
 Truth cannot be found without some 
 labor and intention of the mind, and the 
 thoughts dwelling a considerable time upon 
 the survey and discussion of each particu- 
 lar. — Dr. South. 
 
 DISPUTATION. 
 Consider what the learning of disputa- 
 tion is, and how they are employed for the 
 advantage of themselves or others, whose 
 business is only the vain ostentation of 
 sounds. — Locke. 
 
 DISSIMULATION. 
 Dissimulation is but a faint kind of poli- 
 cy ; for it asketh a strong wit, and a strong 
 heart, to know when to tell the truth and 
 to do it. — Lord Bacon. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 THE DRAMA. 
 
 1. By the dramatic art could the men of 
 former times, as the living can now, learn 
 the manifold changes of fortune, the great 
 diversities of character, and the events of 
 life. A living historical image of all the 
 virtues and of all the vices was thus brought 
 before the ancients, that they might strive 
 after the one and avoid the other. The 
 dramatist was a teacher of all the virtues, 
 inasmuch as he brought the images of the 
 bad upon the theatre, not that men might 
 form their minds on such a model, but that 
 they might learn to shun them. He acted 
 a feigned part, yet, as a teacher, he repre- 
 sented the truth. — Eustathius, Archbishop 
 of Thessalonica, 1190. 
 
 2. In the Greek poets, as also in Plautus, 
 the oeconomy of poems is better observed 
 than in Terence, who thought the sole 
 grace and virtue of their fable, the sticking 
 in of sentences, as ours do the forcing in 
 of jests. — Ben Jonson. 
 
74 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 DRYDEN ON HOMER AND CHAUCER. 
 As Chaucer is the father of English 
 Poetry, so I hold him in the same degree 
 of veneration as the Grecians held Homer, 
 or the Romans Virgil. 
 
 DUELLING. 
 
 1. To fight a duel, is a thing that all 
 governments are bound to restrain with the 
 highest severity. It is a consociation of 
 many the worst acts that a person, ordinari- 
 ly, can be guilty of. It is a want of charity, 
 of justice, of humility, of trust in God's 
 providence ; and is therefore pride and mur- 
 der and injustice and infinite unreasonable- 
 ness ; nothing of a Christian, nothing of 
 excuse, nothing of honor in it, if God and 
 wise men be admitted Judges of the List. — 
 Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. Duelling is a most dishonorable prac- 
 tice ; for when you have given the best 
 proof of your sufficiency, and killed your 
 man, you are seized by the hands of Jus- 
 tice, treated like an assassin, and condemned 
 to die with circumstances of ignominy. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 7o 
 
 You are not indicted for acquitting your- 
 selves like gentlemen, but for disturbing the 
 peace and murdering the King's subjects. 
 Now the law never loads a man with re- 
 proaches, nor punishes him thus coarsely, 
 for doing a handsome action. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 EDUCATION. 
 Education and instruction are the means, 
 the one by use. the other by precept, to 
 make our natural faculties of reason, both 
 the better and the sooner to judge rightly 
 between truth and error, good and evil. — 
 Dr. Hooker. 
 
 EMULATION. 
 
 1. Emulation is a handsome passion ; it 
 is enterprising, but just withal. It keeps a 
 man within the terms of honor, and makes 
 the contest for glory just and generous. 
 He strives to excel, but it is by raising 
 himself, not by depressing others. — Jere- 
 my Collier. 
 
 2. Aristotle allows that some emula- 
 tion may be good, and may be found in 
 
70 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 some good men ; yet envy he utterly con- 
 demns, as wicked in itself, and only to be 
 found in wicked minds. — Dr. Spratt. 
 
 ENDS OF LANGUAGE. 
 The ends of language are, first, to make 
 known one man's thoughts to another ; 
 secondly, to do it with ease and quickness ; 
 and thirdly, thereby to convey the know- 
 ledge of things. When language fails in 
 any of these requisites, it is abused or defi- 
 cient. He who in conversation uses the 
 words of any language without distinct 
 ideas in his mind to which he applies them, 
 only utters sounds without signification, 
 and is in reality no more advanced in know- 
 ledge than he would be in learning, who 
 had in his library the catalogues of books, 
 without possessing the books themselves. 
 He who has complex ideas, without particu- 
 lar names for them, is embarrassed in his 
 conversation for want of proper terms to 
 communicate his complex ideas, which he 
 is therefore forced to make known by a 
 detail of the simple ones which compose 
 them : and thus is frequently compelled to 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 77 
 
 use twenty words to express what another 
 more fluent and ready man signifies by one. 
 He who annexes not constantly the same 
 word to the same idea, but uses the same 
 word sometimes in one and sometimes in 
 another signification, ought to pass in con- 
 versation for as fair and candid a man as 
 he does in the market, who sells several 
 things by the same name. — Locke. 
 
 ENDS OF 31 AN. 
 Were a man designed only, like a fly, 
 to buzz about here for a time, sucking in the 
 
 air and licking the dew, then soon to van- 
 ish back into nothing, or to be transformed 
 into worms : how sorry and despicable a 
 thing were he ! And such, without Re- 
 ligion, we should be. But it supplieth us 
 with business of a most worthy nature and 
 lofty importance : it setteth us upon doing 
 things great and noble as can be : it en- 
 gageth us to free our minds from all fond 
 conceits, and to cleanse our hearts from all 
 corrupt affections : to curb our brutish ap- 
 petites, to tame our wild passions, to cor- 
 rect our perverse inclinations, to conform 
 
78 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 the dispositions of our soul, and the actions 
 of our life to the eternal laws of righteous- 
 ness and goodness. It putteth us upon the 
 imitation of God, and aiming at the resem- 
 blance of his perfections ; upon obtaining 
 a friendship, and maintaining a correspon- 
 dence with the High and Holy One ; upon 
 fitting our minds for conversation and soci- 
 ety with the wisest and purest spirits above ; 
 upon providing for an immortal state ; upon 
 the acquist of joy and glory everlasting. — 
 Dr. Isaac Barrow. 
 
 THE END OF PLEASURE. 
 The end of pleasure is to support the 
 offices of life, to relieve the fatigues of 
 business, to reward a regular action, and to 
 encourage the continuance. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 ENGLISH HISTORY. 
 If an Englishman has no knowledge of 
 those kings that filled the thrones of Per- 
 sia ; if his memory is not embarrassed with 
 that infinite number of Popes that ruled 
 the Church, we are ready to excuse him. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 79 
 
 Bat we shall hardly have the same indul- 
 gence for him, if he be a stranger to the 
 origin of Parliaments, to the customs of his 
 country, and to the different lines of kings 
 who have reigned in England. — Frederic 
 the Great. 
 
 THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. 
 
 1. The English are the most free people 
 that ever were upon earth. England, of 
 all the nations in the world, is that which 
 has known how to make the most (all at 
 the same time) of those three great things, 
 Religion, Commerce and Liberty. — De 
 Montesquieu. 
 
 2. The English Government, w r hich I 
 have investigated on the spot, appears to 
 me, in spite of its defects, a model for those 
 nations that were desirous to change their 
 governments. The work of M. De Lolme, 
 which is an ingenious panegyric upon this 
 excellent Constitution, was at that time in 
 the hands only of the learned few. It 
 ought to have been made known to my 
 countrymen ; for to make it known was to 
 make it beloved. — Brissot. 
 
80 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 3. Happy Constitution ! which the peo- 
 ple who possess it did not suddenly attain ; 
 it has cost them rivers of blood, but they 
 have not purchased it too dear. — Vattel. 
 
 ENVY. 
 
 1. Envy is an ill-natured vice, and is 
 made up of meanness and malice. It 
 wishes the force of goodness restrained, 
 and the measure of happiness abated. It 
 laments over prosperity, and sickens at the 
 sight of health. It oftentimes wants spirit 
 as well as good nature. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 2. Envy is of all others the most ungrati- 
 fying and disconsolate passion. There is 
 power for ambition, pleasure for luxury, 
 and pelf even for covetousness ; but envy 
 gets no reward but vexation. — Ibid. 
 
 ESTEEM. 
 Esteem generally rises upon the degrees 
 of satisfaction ; and that which is best to 
 us, we are apt to think is best in itself also. 
 — Ibid. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 81 
 
 EVANGELIC RELIGION. 
 What evangelic religion is, is told in 
 two words ; Faith and Charity, or, Belief 
 and Practice. — Milton. 
 
 EVERY MAN HAS HIS PRICE. 
 He (the tempter) hath apples to cozen 
 children and gold for men, the kingdoms 
 of the world for the ambition of princes, 
 and the vanities of the world for the intem- 
 perate. He hath discourses and fair-spoken 
 principles, to abuse the pretenders to Rea- 
 son, and he hath common prejudices for 
 the more vulgar understandings. — Jeremy 
 Taylor. 
 
 EVIDENCE. 
 There are books extant, which we must 
 needs allow of as proper evidence ; even 
 the mighty volumes of visible nature, and 
 the everlasting tables of right reason. — Dr. 
 Bentley. 
 
 EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 1. Having some leisure and more curi- 
 
 6 
 
82 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 osity, I employed them both in resolving a 
 question which seemed to me of some im- 
 portance — whether Christianity was really 
 an imposture, or whether it is what it pre- 
 tends to be, a Revelation communicated to 
 mankind by the interposition of supernatu- 
 ral Power ? On a candid enquiry, I soon 
 found that the first was an absolute impos- 
 sibility ; and that its pretentions to the lat- 
 ter were founded on the most solid grounds. 
 In the further pursuit of my examination, 
 I perceived at every step new lights arising, 
 and some of the brightest from parts of it 
 the most obscure, but productive of the 
 clearest proofs ; because equally beyond 
 the power of human artifice to invent and 
 human reason to discover. These argu- 
 ments, which have convinced me of the 
 divine origin of this Religion, I have put 
 together in as clear and concise a manner 
 as I was able, thinking they might have 
 the same effect upon others ; and being of 
 opinion, that if there were a few more good 
 Christians in the world, it would be bene- 
 ficial to themselves, and by no means detri- 
 mental to the public. — Soame Jenyns. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 83 
 
 2. Christianity came into the world 
 with the greatest simplicity of thought and 
 language, as well as of life and manners ; 
 holding forth nothing but piety, charity 
 and humility, with the belief of the Mes- 
 siah and his kingdom. — Sir William Tem- 
 ple. 
 
 3. Unreasonable it is to expect the 
 same kind of proof and evidence, for every 
 thing, which we have for some things. — 
 Archbishop Tjllotson. 
 
 EXAMPLES. 
 
 1. Every man should propound to him- 
 self the example of a wise and virtuous 
 personage : as Cato, or Socrates, or Brutus ; 
 and by a fiction of imagination, to suppose 
 him present as a witness, and really to take 
 his life as the direction of all our actions. — 
 Seneca. 
 
 2. Example is a motive of very prevail- 
 ing force on the actions of men. — Rogers. 
 
 3. It is a thing to be wished, that every 
 one would study the life of some great man 
 distinguished by employments, to which 
 he may be destined by Providence. — Du 
 Fresnoy. 
 
84 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 EXCELLENCE. 
 Excellence is never granted to man, 
 but as the reward of labor. It argues in- 
 deed no small strength of mind to persevere 
 in habits of industry, without the pleasure 
 of perceiving those advances, which, like 
 the hand of a clock, whilst they make 
 hourly approaches to their point, yet pro- 
 ceed so slowly as to escape observation. — 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds. 
 
 EXCESS. 
 
 1. Goodness answers to the theological 
 virtue Charity, and admits no excess, but 
 error. The desire of power in excess, 
 caused the Angels to fall ; the desire of 
 knowledge in excess, caused man to fall ; 
 but in Charity there is no excess, neither 
 can Angel or man come in danger by it. — 
 Lord Bacon. 
 
 2. There will be need of temperance in 
 diet ; for the body, once heavy with excess 
 and surfeits, hangs plummets on all the no- 
 bler parts. — Dr. Donne. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 85 
 
 EYE OF A PAINTER. 
 It is true that other people may see as 
 well as a Painter, but not with such eyes. 
 A man is taught to see as well as to dance ; 
 and the beauties of nature open themselves 
 to our sight by little and little, after a long 
 practice in the art of seeing. A judicious 
 well instructed eye sees a wonderful beauty 
 in the shapes and colors of the commonest 
 things, and what are comparatively incon- 
 siderable. — Jonathan Richardson. 
 
 FAITH. 
 
 1. Faith is an entire dependence upon 
 the truth, the power, the justice and the 
 mercy of God; which dependence will 
 certainly incline us to obey him in all 
 things. — Swift. 
 
 2. True virtue being united to the 
 Heavenly grace of Faith, makes up the 
 highest human perfection. — Milton. 
 
 3. If God continually revealed himself 
 to men, Faith could have no value, as we 
 could not help believing ; and if He never 
 revealed himself, there could hardly be such 
 a thing as faith. — Pascal. 
 
86 
 
 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 FALSE CONCLUSIONS. 
 From fallacious foundations and misap- 
 prehended mediums, men erect conclusions 
 no way inferable from the premises. — Sir 
 Thomas Browne. 
 
 FARCE. 
 A farce is that in Poetry, which grotesque 
 [caricature) is in Painting. The persons 
 and actions of a Farce are all unnatural, 
 and the manners false ; that is, inconsistent 
 with the characters of mankind ; and gro- 
 tesque painting is the just resemblance of 
 this. — Dryden. 
 
 FATE. 
 The forbearance of God allows demons 
 still to afflict the virtuous, like the poisoned 
 Socrates, and bestow prosperity on the 
 vicious, like Epicurus and Sardanapalus. 
 This must not be ascribed to Fate, as the 
 Stoics do, for Fate would destroy volition ; 
 but angels and men have Free-will, may do 
 right or wrong, therefore the wrong-doer 
 will be punished at last. The very Stoics 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 87 
 
 inculcate moral precepts, which implies 
 Free-will in the disciples. — Justin Martyr. 
 
 FELICITY OF MAN. 
 So conspicuous and refulgent a truth is 
 that of God's being the author of Man's 
 felicity, that the dispute is not so much the 
 matter of the thing, as concerning the man- 
 ner of it. — The Hon. Robert Boyle. 
 
 FELLOWSHIP. 
 God having designed man for a sociable 
 creature, made him not only with an incli- 
 nation and under the necessity to have fel- 
 lowship with those of his own kind, but 
 furnished him also with language, which 
 was to be the great instrument and cementer 
 of society. — Locke. 
 
 FEMALE RHYMES. 
 1. Double rhymes are so called, because 
 in French, from which the term is taken, 
 they end in e weak or feminine. These 
 rhymes are female : 
 
 Th' excess of heat is but a fable ; 
 We know the torrid zone is now found habitable. 
 
 Cowley. 
 
88 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 2. Female rhymes are in use with the 
 Italians in every line, with the Spaniards 
 promiscuously, and with the French alter- 
 nately ; as appears from the Alarique, the 
 Pucelle, or any of their later poems. — 
 Dryden. 
 
 FICKLENESS. 
 Instability of temper ought to be checked 
 when it disposes men to wander from one 
 scheme to another ; since such a fickleness 
 cannot but be attended with fatal conse- 
 quences. — Addison. 
 
 FICTION. 
 Fiction is the essence of Poetry, as well 
 as of painting : there is a resemblance in 
 one, of human bodies, things and actions, 
 which are not real ; and in the other of a 
 true story by a fiction. — Dryden. 
 
 THE FIRMAMENT. 
 
 1. The Almighty whose hieroglyphical 
 
 characters are the unnumbered stars, sun 
 
 and moon, written on these large volumes 
 
 of the firmament. — Sir Walter Raleigh. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 89 
 
 2. What an immeasurable space is the 
 Firmament, wherein a great number of 
 stars are seen with our naked eye, and many 
 more discovered with our glasses. — Der- 
 ham's Astro-Theology. 
 
 3. Let us cast our eyes up to the Firma- 
 ment, where the rich handy-work of God 
 presents itself to our sight, and ask our- 
 selves some such questions as these. What 
 power built over our heads this vast mag- 
 nificent arch, and spread out the Heavens 
 like a curtain ? Who garnished these Hea- 
 vens with such a variety of shining objects, 
 a thousand and ten thousand times ten 
 thousand different stars, new suns, new 
 moons, new worlds, in comparison with 
 which, this earth of ours is but a point, all 
 regular in their motions, and swimming in 
 their liquid ether? Who painted the clouds 
 with such a variety of colors, and in such 
 diversity of shades and figures, as is not in 
 the power of the finest pencil to emulate ? 
 Who formed the sun of such a determinate 
 size, and placed it at such a convenient 
 distance, as not to annoy, but only to re- 
 fresh us, and nourish the ground with its 
 
90 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 kindly warmth ? If it were larger, it would 
 set the earth on fire ; if less, it would leave 
 it frozen ; if it were nearer to us, we should 
 be scorched to death ; if farther from us, we 
 should not be able to live for want of heat. 
 Who then hath made it so commodious a 
 tabernacle, (I speak with the Scriptures, 
 and according to the common notion) out 
 of which it cometh forth, every morning, 
 like a bridegroom out of his chamber, and 
 rejoiceth as a giant to run his course ? For 
 so many ages past it never failed rising at 
 its appointed time, nor once missed sending 
 out the dawn to proclaim its approach. 
 But at whose voice does it arise, and by 
 whose hand is it directed in its diurnal and 
 annual course, to give us the blessed vicis- 
 situdes of day and night, and the regular 
 successions of different seasons ? That it 
 should always proceed in the same straight 
 path, and never once be known to step 
 aside ; that it should turn at a certain de- 
 terminate point, and not go forward in a 
 space, where there is nothing to obstruct 
 it ; that it should traverse the same path 
 back again, in the same constant and regu- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 91 
 
 lar pace, to bring on the seasons by gradual 
 advances ; that the moon should supply the 
 office of the sun, and appear, at set times, 
 to illuminate the air, and give a vicarious 
 light when its brother is gone to carry the 
 day into the other hemisphere : that it 
 should procure, or at least regulate the 
 fluxes and refluxes of the sea, whereby the 
 water is kept in constant motion, and so 
 preserved from putrefaction, and accommo- 
 dated to man's manifold conveniences, be- 
 sides the business of fishing and the use of 
 navigation. In a word, that the rest of the 
 planets, and all the innumerable host of 
 heavenly bodies should perform their courses 
 and revolutions with so much certainty and 
 exactness, as never once to fail, but, for 
 almost these six thousand years, come con- 
 stantly to the same period, in the hundredth 
 part of a minute ; is a clear and incontes- 
 table proof of a Divine Architect, and of 
 that counsel and wisdom wherewith He 
 rules and directs the universe. — Stack- 
 house. 
 
92 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 FLATTERERS. 
 Some praises proceed merely of flattery; 
 and if he be an ordinary flatterer, he will 
 have certain common attributes which may 
 serve every man. If he be a cunning flat- 
 terer, he will follow the arch-flatterer which 
 is a man's self. But if he be an impudent 
 flatterer, look wherein a man is conscious 
 to himself, that he is most defective, and is 
 most out of countenance in himself, that 
 will the flatterer entitle him to, perforce. — 
 Lord Bacon. 
 
 FLATTERY. 
 
 1. Flattery is an ensnaring quality, and 
 leaves a very dangerous impression. It 
 swells a man's imagination, entertains his 
 vanity, and drives him to a doting upon 
 his own person. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 2. When I tell him he hates flattery, 
 He says he does ; being then most flatter'd. 
 — Shakspeare. 
 
 FLUENCY OF SPEECH. 
 The common fluency of speech iu many 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 93 
 
 men and most women, is owing to a scar- 
 city of matter and a scarcity of words ; 
 for whoever is a master of language, and 
 hath a mind full of ideas, will be apt, in 
 speaking, to hesitate upon the choice of 
 both. — Swift. 
 
 FOOD FOR THE MIND. 
 The mind requires not, like an earthen 
 vessel, to be kept full ; convenient food 
 and aliment only, will inflame it with a 
 desire of knowledge, and an ardent love of 
 truth. — Plutarch. 
 
 FORESIGHT. 
 Difficulties and temptations will be 
 more easily borne or avoided, if, with pru- 
 dent forecast, we arm ourselves against 
 them. — Rogers. 
 
 FORMALITIES. 
 1. Ceremonies are not to be omitted to 
 strangers and persons of formal natures; 
 but the exalting them above the mean, is 
 not only tedious, but doth diminish the 
 credit of him that speaks. — Lord Bacon. 
 
94 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 2. It is a ridiculous thing and fit for a 
 satire, to persons of judgment, to see what 
 shifts formalists have, and what prospec- 
 tives to make superficies to seem a body- 
 that hath depth and bulk. — Ibid. 
 
 FORTITUDE. 
 
 1. Fortitude is the guard and support 
 of the other virtues ; and without courage 
 a man will scarce keep steady to his duty, 
 and fill up the character of a truly worthy 
 man. — Locke. 
 
 2. Fortitude implies a firmness and 
 strength of mind, that enables us to do and 
 suffer as we ought. It rises upon an oppo- 
 sition, and, like a river, swells the higher 
 for having its course stopped. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 FREE TRADE. 
 
 All restrictions on Trade are naught ; 
 and no company whatever, whether they 
 trade in a joint-stock, or under regulations, 
 can be for public good, except it may be 
 easy for all or any of his Majesty's subjects 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 95 
 
 to be admitted into them at any time for a 
 very inconsiderable sum. — Sir J. Child. 
 
 FREE-WILL. 
 We have a power to suspend the prose- 
 cution of this or that desire ; this seems to 
 me the source of all liberty ; in this seems 
 to consist that which is improperly called 
 Free-will. — Locke. 
 
 FRIENDS AND ENEMIES. 
 
 1. He that has no friend and no enemy, 
 is one of the vulgar, and without talents, 
 power, or energy. — Lavater. 
 
 2. 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. 
 
 3. A man that is fit to make a friend of, 
 must have conduct to manage the engage- 
 ment, and resolution to maintain it. He 
 must use freedom without roughness, and 
 oblige without design. Cowardice will 
 betray friendship, and covetousness will 
 starve it. Folly will be nauseous, passion 
 is apt to ruffle, and pride will fly out into 
 contumely and neglect. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
96 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 FRIENDSHIP. 
 
 1. Friendship is composed of a single 
 soul, inhabiting two bodies. — Aristotle. 
 
 2. Friendship improves happiness, and 
 abates misery, by the doubling of our joy, 
 and the dividing of our grief. — Cicero. 
 
 3. There is nothing so agreeable to na- 
 ture or so convenient to our affairs, whether 
 in prosperity or adversity, as Friendship. — 
 Ibid. 
 
 4. Friendship is a strong and habitual 
 inclination in two persons to promote the 
 good and happiness of each other. — Addi- 
 son. 
 
 5. Friendship is one of those few things 
 that are the better for wearing. Alphorisus 
 the wise, king of Aragon, tells us that all 
 the acquisitions and pursuits of men, ex- 
 cepting four, were but baubles: — namely, 
 old wood to burn, old wine to drink, old 
 books to read, and old friends to converse 
 with. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 6. A true Friend is distinguished in the 
 crisis of hazard and necessity ; when the 
 gallantry of his aid may show the worth of 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 97 
 
 his soul and the loyalty of his heart. — 
 Ennius. 
 
 7. It has been a difficult question, whe- 
 ther new friends are ever to be preferred to 
 old ones ; as it is usual to esteem young 
 horses above those worn with years and 
 service. A doubt unworthy of a man, for 
 we ought not to be satiated with Friend- 
 ship as with other things. — Cicero. 
 
 8. If thou wouldest get a Friend, prove 
 him, and be not hasty to credit him : for 
 some man is a friend for his own occasion, 
 and will not abide in the day of thy trouble. 
 Some friend is a companion at the table, 
 but will not continue in the day of thy 
 affliction. A faithful friend is a strong de- 
 fence, and he that hath found such an one, 
 hath found a treasure. Nothing doth coun- 
 tervail a faithful friend, and his excellency 
 is invaluable. A faithful friend is the medi- 
 cine of life ; and they that fear the Lord 
 shall find him. Forsake not an old friend, 
 for the new is not comparable to him : a 
 new friend is as new wine : when it is old 
 thou shalt drink it with pleasure. — Jesus 
 Ben Sirach. 
 
 7 
 
98 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 GOD'S CREATURES. 
 
 1. Were it not strange if God should 
 have made such store of glorious creatures 
 on earth, and leave them all to be consumed 
 in secular vanity, allowing none but the 
 baser sort to be employed in his own ser- 
 vice. — Hooker. 
 
 2. Whoever imagines that the wonder- 
 ful order and incredible constancy of the 
 heavenly bodies and their motions, whereon 
 the preservation and welfare of all things 
 depend, is not governed by an intelligent 
 Being, is destitute of understanding. For 
 shall we, when we see an artificial engine, 
 a sphere or dial for instance, acknowledge 
 at first sight, that it is the work of art and 
 understanding ; and yet, when we behold 
 the Heavens moved and whirled about 
 with incredible velocity, constantly finish- 
 ing their annual vicissitude, make any 
 doubt, that these are the performances, not 
 only of reason, but of a certain excellent 
 and Divine reason. — Cicero. 
 
 3. I wonder much at the boldness with 
 which some persons endeavor to demon- 
 
I 
 
 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 99 
 
 strate to the unbelieving, the existence of 
 God. from the works of nature. I would 
 not so much wonder at this attempt, if they 
 addressed themselves to the believing ; for 
 to them, who have a living faith in the 
 heart, every thing that is, manifestly ap- 
 pears as the work of the God whom they 
 adore. But it is very different with those 
 in whom this living light is extinct and 
 sought to be revived — those destitute of 
 faith and grace, who, while searching with 
 all their light, all they see in nature, which 
 might lead them to the knowledge of God, 
 yet find only obscurity and darkness. To 
 say to such that they have only to behold 
 the least of the things which surround 
 them, and they will find God revealed 
 therein, as at once a proof of this great and 
 important truth ; to point to the course of 
 the moon or the planets, and profess thus 
 to have accomplished its demonstration, is 
 truly to afford them ground for believing 
 that the evidences of our Religion are very 
 weak, and I am assured from reason and 
 experience, that nothing is more fitted to 
 inspire them with contempt of those evi- 
 dences. — Pascal. 
 
100 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 A GOOD MAN. 
 He is a good man who grieves rather for 
 him that injures him, than for his own suf- 
 fering ; who prays for him that wrongs 
 him, forgiving all his faults ; who sooner 
 shows mercy than anger ; who offers vio- 
 lence to his appetite, in all things endeavor- 
 ing to subdue the flesh to the spirit. This 
 is an excellent abbreviative of the whole 
 duty of a Christian. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 A GOOD NAME. 
 There are three crowns; the crown of 
 the law, the crown of the priesthood, and 
 the crown of royalty : but the crown of a 
 good name is superior to them all. — Tal- 
 mud Ti\ Aboth. 
 
 * 
 
 GOODNESS. 
 
 1. Goodness is generous and diffusive; 
 it is largeness of mind, and sweetness of 
 temper — balsam in the blood, and justice 
 sublimated to a richer spirit. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 2. If for any thing he loved greatness, 
 
 i 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 101 
 
 it was because therein he might exercise 
 his goodness. — Sir Philip Sidney. 
 
 GOOD INTENTIONS. 
 
 A sad principle, pregnant with sin, and 
 fruitful in monsters, is a weak pretence, 
 which unwary and credulous persons take 
 as a ground for their confidence and incor- 
 rigible pursuance of their courses ; that 
 they have a good meaning, that they intend 
 sometimes well, and sometimes not ill, and 
 this shall be sufficient to sanctify their ac- 
 tions, and to hallow their sin. And this is 
 of worse malice, when Religion is the 
 color for a war ; and the preservation of 
 Faith made the warrant for destruction of 
 Charity; and a zeal for God, made the false 
 light to lead us to disobedience to man : 
 and hatred of Idolatry is the hnissier of 
 Sacrilege ; and the destruction of Supersti- 
 tion, the introducer of Profaneness ; and 
 Reformation made the color for a Schism : 
 and Liberty of conscience the way to a 
 bold and saucy Heresy : — for the end may 
 indeed hallow an indifferent. action, but can 
 never make straight a crooked and irregu- 
 lar. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
102 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 GOODNESS OF GOD. 
 To consider God as the Governor of the 
 world, in the light wherein we ordinarily 
 behold him, is that which gives us the 
 clearest conception we can entertain of 
 him, which best answers all useful pur- 
 poses ; and has this peculiar advantage, that 
 it represents his Goodness, the attribute we 
 are most interested with, in the fairest col- 
 ors, as attentive to produce all the happi- 
 ness possible for his creatures in the nature 
 and constitution of things. This, when 
 well inculcated, satisfies the minds of the 
 Vulgar, and would satisfy the minds of the 
 Speculative too, if they would abstain from 
 idle questions concerning Creation, and for- 
 bear to ask why things are not otherwise 
 constituted, so that more happiness might 
 have been produced, than is now possible. 
 For if we survey so much of nature as lies 
 within the reach of our observation and 
 reason, we shall find there is a balance of 
 Food, sufficient to content any reasonable 
 man. — Search. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 103 
 
 GOVERNMENT. 
 
 1. There seems to be but two general 
 kinds of Government in the world ; the 
 one exercised according to the arbitrary 
 commands and will of some single person ; 
 and the other according to certain orders 
 and laws introduced by agreement or cus- 
 tom, and not to be changed without the 
 consent of many. — Sir William Temple. 
 
 2. Were every one permitted to carve 
 out his own satisfaction, people would be 
 apt to pursue the injury too close, and strike 
 immediately on receiving the blow. They 
 would often do themselves right at the first 
 smart of an affront, when the provocation 
 was fresh, and the anguish most stinging. 
 Passing too eagerly upon a provocation, 
 loses the guard, and lays open the body : 
 calmness and leisure and deliberation do 
 the business much better. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. When any one person or body of men, 
 seize into their hands the power in the last 
 resort, there is properly no longer a Govern- 
 ment ; but what Aristotle and his followers 
 call the abuse and corruption of one. — 
 Swift. 
 
104 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 GRAY'S OPINION OF TACITUS. 
 A man who could join the brilliancy of 
 wit and concise sententiousness peculiar to 
 that age,* with the truth and gravity of 
 better times, and the deep reflection and 
 good sense of the moderns, cannot choose 
 but have something to strike yon. Yet 
 what I admire in him, f above all this, is 
 his detestation of tyranny and the high 
 spirit of liberty, that every now and then 
 breaks out, as it were, whether he would 
 or no. I remember a sentence in his Agri- 
 cola, that, concise as it is, I always admired, 
 for saying so much in a little compass. He 
 speaks of Domitian, who, upon seeing the 
 last will of Agricola, wherein he had made 
 him co-heir with his wife and daughter, 
 " Satis constabat laetatem velut honore judi- 
 cioque ; tarn caeca et corrupta mens assiduis 
 adulationibus erat, ut nesciret a bono patre 
 non scribi hseredem, nisi malum princi- 
 pem." — Gray's Letters to West. 
 
 # The Post- Augustan, 
 f Tacitus. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 105 
 
 GREATNESS. 
 
 1. We can have no positive idea of any 
 space or duration, which is not made up 
 of, and commensurate to, repeated numbers 
 of feet or yards, or days or years, and 
 whereby we judge of the greatness of these 
 sort of quantities. — Locke. 
 
 2. In her, every thing was goodly and 
 stately ; yet so that it might seem, that 
 great-mindedness was but the ancient-bearer 
 to the humbleness. — Sir Philip Sidney. 
 
 3. A great man is affable in his conver- 
 sation, generous in his temper, and immove- 
 able in what he has maturely resolved upon. 
 And as prosperity does not make him haugh- 
 ty and imperious, so neither does adversity 
 sink him into meanness and dejection : for 
 if ever he shows more spirit than ordinary, 
 it is when he is ill-used, and the world is 
 frowning upon him. In short, he is equally 
 removed from the extremes of servility and 
 pride, and scorns either to trample on a 
 worm, or cringe to an Emperor. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
108 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 HEREDITARY FAME. 
 
 1. Great actions in which we had no 
 share, cannot properly be any part of our 
 commendation, especially if we want abili- 
 ties to imitate them. It is a sign that a man 
 is very poor when he has nothing of his 
 own to appear in, but is forced to patch up 
 his figure with the relics of the dead, and 
 rifle tomb-stones and monuments for repu- 
 tation. If a man could bequeath his virtues 
 by will, and settle his sense and learning 
 and resolutions upon his children, as cer- 
 tainly as he can his lands, a brave ancestor 
 would be a mighty privilege. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 2. The second natural division of power, 
 is of such men, who have acquired large 
 possessions, and, consequently, dependen- 
 cies ; or descend from ancestors, who have 
 left them great inheritances, together with 
 an hereditary authority and title ; these per- 
 sons usually unite in thoughts and opinions. 
 Thus commences a great Council or Senate 
 of Nobles, for the weighty affairs of the 
 nation. — Swift. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 107 
 
 3. In the founders of great families, 
 titles or attributes of honor are generally- 
 correspondent with the virtues of the per- 
 son to whom they are applied ; but in their 
 descendants they are too often the marks 
 rather of grandeur than of merit. The 
 stamp and denomination still continues, but 
 the intrinsic value is frequently lost. — Ad- 
 dison. 
 
 HERESY. 
 For my own part, I adhere to the Holy 
 Scriptures alone — I follow no other heresy 
 or sect. I had not even read any of the 
 works of heretics so called, when the mis- 
 takes of those who are reckoned for or- 
 thodox, and their incautious handling of 
 Scripture, first taught me to agree with 
 their opponents whenever those opponents 
 agreed with Scripture. If this be heresy, 
 I agree with St. Paul,* " that after the way 
 which they call heresy, so worship I the 
 God of my fathers, believing all things 
 which are written in the Law and the 
 Prophets:" to which I add, whatever is 
 
 * Acts xxiv. 14. 
 
108 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 written in the New Testament. Any other 
 judges or chief interpreters of the Christian 
 belief, together with all implicit faith, as it 
 is called, I, in common with the whole 
 Protestant Church, refuse to recognize. 
 With good and religious reason, therefore, 
 all Protestant Churches with one consent, 
 and particularly the Church of England, 
 in her thirty-nine articles, Article 6th, 19th, 
 20th, 21st, and elsewhere, maintain these 
 two points, as the main principles of true 
 religion; that the rule of true religion is 
 the Word of God only : and that this faith 
 ought not to be an implicit faith, that is to 
 believe, though as the Church believes, 
 against or without express authority of 
 Scripture. — Milton. 
 
 HEROES. 
 It were well if there were fewer Heroes ; 
 for I scarcely ever heard of any, excepting 
 Hercules, but did more mischief than good. 
 These overgrown mortals commonly use 
 their will with their right hand, and their 
 reason with their left. Their pride is their 
 title, and their power puts them in posses- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 109 
 
 sion. Their pomp is furnished from rapine, 
 and their scarlet is dyed with human blood. 
 If wrecks and ruins and desolation of king- 
 doms are marks of greatness, why do we 
 not worship a tempest, and erect a statue 
 to the plague ? A panegyric upon an 
 earthquake is every jot as reasonable, as 
 upon such conquests as these. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 HESIOD'S THEOGONY. 
 The fables of Homer I value not — 
 their beginning and end is woman. The 
 theogony of Hesiod is no better. Saturn 
 usurps the throne of his father, and Jupiter 
 does the same by Saturn, and divides the 
 empire of the universe with Neptune and 
 Pluto. Pluto ravishes Proserpina, and Nep- 
 tune Melanippa and the Nereids, and Jupi- 
 ter Antiope, as a satyr, Danae as gold, 
 Europa as a bull, and Leda as a fawn ; and 
 Semele and Ganymede prove his impurity 
 and wake the jealousy of his wife. Apollo 
 the prophet was a liar, Minerva a virago, 
 Bacchus effeminate, and Venus a courtezan. 
 Read over to Jupiter the laws against dis- 
 
110 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 respect to parents, and against adultery ; to 
 Minerva and Diana, those describing female 
 duties to females, to Bacchus those for men. 
 Look at Hercules and his labors and his 
 loves, and his being shamefully * whipped 
 by Lyde, and his death by his own hand. 
 Vulcan's well-grounded jealousy, too, shows 
 what these gods were. — Justin Martyr. 
 
 HOLLOW CHURCH-PAPISTS. 
 Hollow Church-papists are like the 
 roots of nettles, which themselves sting 
 not ; but bear all the stinging leaves. — 
 Lord Bacon. 
 
 HOLLOWNESS. 
 
 People young and raw and soft-natured, 
 think it an easy thing to gain love ; and 
 reckon their own friendship a sure price of 
 any man's : but when experience shall 
 have shown them the hardness of most 
 hearts, the hollowness of others, and the 
 baseness and ingratitude of almost all, they 
 will then find that a true friend is the gift 
 
 # u y.(XTa yl.ovzcov Tvniopsrog" — HeS. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. Ill 
 
 of God, and that He only who made hearts 
 can unite them. — Dr. South. 
 
 HOME. 
 Something like Home, that is not home, 
 is to be desired ; it is to be found in the 
 house of a friend. — Sir William Temple. 
 
 HOMER'S RELIGION. 
 
 1. It gives us pleasure to trace in Homer 
 the important doctrine of a supreme God, a 
 Providence, a free agency in man, supposed 
 to be consistent with fate or destiny ; a 
 difference between moral good and evil, 
 inferior gods or angels, some favorable to 
 men, others malevolent ; and the immortal- 
 ity of the soul. But it gives us pain to 
 find these notions so miserably corrupted, 
 that they must have had a very weak in- 
 fluence to excite men to virtue, and to 
 deter them from vice. — Dr. Jortin. 
 
 2. The Grecian poets are censurable, 
 because of their ridiculous Theogonies. 
 Homer, for instance, ascribing the origin 
 of the gods to water, making them arbiters 
 of war ; Jupiter guilty of perjury, a help- 
 
112 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 less tool in the hands of Fate, unable to 
 defend himself on a memorable occasion 
 from outrage by the other gods, given to 
 many impure loves. Mars, Venus, Juno 
 and Pluto wounded by mortals, and the 
 god of war once bound by giants for thir- 
 teen months ; the gods, too, all at variance 
 with each other. — Justin Martyr. 
 
 HOMONYMA v. SYNONYMA. 
 
 1. As words signifying the same thing 
 are called synonymous, so equivocal words, 
 or those which signify several things, are 
 called homonymous or ambiguous ; and 
 when persons use such ambiguous words 
 with a design to deceive, it is called equi- 
 vocation. When two or more words sig- 
 nify the same thing, as wave and billow, 
 mead and meadow, they are usually called 
 synonymous words. — Dr. Isaac Watts. 
 
 2. Wisdom and understanding are syno- 
 nymous words ; they consist of two proposi- 
 tions, which are not distinct in sense, but 
 one and the same thing variously expressed. 
 — Archbishop Tillotson. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 113 
 
 HONOR. 
 
 1. No man of honor, as that word is 
 usually understood, did ever pretend, that 
 his honor compelled him to be chaste or 
 temperate, to pay his creditors, to be useful 
 to his country, to do good to mankind, to 
 endeavor to be wise or learned, to regard 
 his word, his promise, or his oath ; or if 
 he hath any of these virtues, they were 
 never learned in the catechism of honor; 
 which contains but two precepts: the 
 punctual payment of debts contracted at 
 play, and the right understanding of the 
 several degrees of an affront, in order to 
 avenge it by the death of an adversary. — 
 Swift. 
 
 2. If I may defend my life with the 
 sword, or with any thing which nature and 
 the laws forbid not, why not also mine 
 honor, which is as dear as my life '? For 
 to be reputed a coward and one that will 
 take affronts, is to be miserable and scorned, 
 and to invite all insolent persons to do me 
 injuries. May it not be permitted to fight 
 for mine honor, and to wipe off the stains 
 
114 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 of my reputation? Honor is as dear as 
 life, and sometimes dearer. To this I have 
 many things to say ; for that which men 
 in this question call honor, is nothing but 
 a reputation among persons vain, unchris- 
 tian, empty and ignorant, who count that 
 the standard of honor, which is the instru- 
 ment of reprobation, as if to be a Gentle- 
 man were not to be a Christian. They 
 that have built their reputation upon such 
 societies must take new estimates of it, 
 according to the wine, or fancy, or custom, 
 or some great fighting person shall deter- 
 mine it ; and whatsoever invites a quarrel 
 is a rule of honor. But it is a sad consid- 
 eration to remember, that it is accounted 
 honor not to recede from any thing we have 
 said or done ; it is honor not to take the 
 lie, but it is not dishonorable to tell a lie, 
 but to be told so, and not to kill him that 
 says so. A mistress's favor, an idle dis- 
 course, a jest, a jealousy, a health, a gaiety, 
 any thing, must engage two lives in hazard, 
 two souls in ruin, or else they are dishon- 
 ored. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 3. A man is an ill husband of his honor, 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 115 
 
 that entereth into any action, the failing 
 wherein may disgrace him more than the 
 carrying of it through can honor him. — 
 Lord Bacon. 
 
 4. A man of honor will rather starve 
 than be false to a solemn engagement. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 5. Numbers engage their lives and labors, 
 some to heap together a little dirt that shall 
 bury them in the end ; others to gain an 
 honor, that at best can be celebrated but 
 by an inconsiderable part of the world, and 
 is envied and calumniated by more than it 
 is truly given. — Archbishop Wake. 
 
 6. Ti3iogenes would smile at a man's 
 jest who ridiculed his Maker, and at the 
 same time run a man through the body 
 that spoke ill of his friend. He would 
 scorn to betray a secret, that was intrusted 
 to him, though the fate of his country de- 
 pended upon the discovery of it. Timo- 
 genes took away the life of a young man 
 in a duel, for having spoken ill of a lady 
 whom he chose to consider under his pro- 
 tection, but afterwards abandoned to want 
 and ignominy. To close his character, 
 
116 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 Timogenes, after having ruined several 
 poor tradesmen's families, who had trusted 
 him, sold his estate, on pretence of satisfy- 
 ing his creditors ; but like a man of honor, 
 disposed of all the money in paying off his 
 play debts, or, to speak in his own language, 
 his debts of honor. — Addison. 
 
 HOPE. 
 Hope is a vigorous principle ; it is fur- 
 nished with light and heat to advise and 
 execute. It sets the head and heart to 
 work, and animates a man to do his utmost. 
 And thus by perpetually pushing and assur- 
 ance, it puts a difficulty out of countenance, 
 and makes a seeming impossibility give 
 way. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 HUMAN LIFE. 
 Human life is like a game at dice ; where 
 we ought not to throw for what is most 
 commodious to us, but to be content with 
 our casts, let them be never so unfortu- 
 nate. — Plato. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 117 
 
 HUMAN NATURE. 
 1. The best and most excellent of the 
 old lawgivers and philosophers among the 
 Greeks, had an alloy of viciousness, and 
 could not be exemplary all over. Some 
 were noted for flatterers, as Plato and Aris- 
 tippus ; some for incontinency, as Aristotle, 
 Epicurus, Zeno, Theognis, Plato and Aris- 
 tippus again ; and Socrates, whom their 
 Oracle affirmed to be the wisest and most 
 perfect man, yet was noted for extreme in- 
 temperance, both in words and actions. 
 And those Romans who were offered to 
 them for # examples, although they were 
 great in reputation, yet they had also great 
 vices. Brutus dipped his hand in the blood 
 of Ceesar his Prince, and father by love, 
 endearments and adoption. And Cato was 
 but a wise man all day, for at night he was 
 used to drink too liberally ; and both he 
 and Socrates did give their wives unto their 
 friends. The Philosopher and the Censor 
 were procurers of their wives' unchastity : 
 
 # See Example. 
 
118 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 and yet these were the best among the 
 Gentiles. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. The writings of the Grecian poets 
 are monuments of human passion and folly. 
 Agamemnon, to redeem the worthless wife 
 of his brother, carried off by a paltry shep- 
 herd, consents that his own daughter should 
 be put to death : quarrels with Achilles 
 about another silly woman : while the great 
 hero himself, the conqueror of Troy, in his 
 turn becomes captive to Polyxena. — Jus- 
 tin Martyr. 
 
 3. What is this life but a circulation of 
 little mean actions? We lie down and 
 rise again, dress and undress, feed and grow 
 hungry, work or play, and are weary ; and 
 then we lie down again and the circle re- 
 turns. — Bishop Burnett. 
 
 HUMILITY. 
 1. Humility is the Hall-mark of Wis- 
 dom. Socrates, whom the Oracle, that is, 
 the united opinion of the world in which 
 he moved, pronounced to be the wisest 
 man, was content with the title of a lover, 
 rather than a professor of wisdom. — Jer- 
 emy Collier. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 119 
 
 2. Humility is truth, and Pride a lie ; 
 the one glorifies God. the other dishonors 
 him. Humility makes men to be like an- 
 gels, Pride makes angels to become devils. 
 Pride is folly, Humility is the temper of a 
 holy spirit and excellent wisdom. Humility 
 is the way to glory, Pride to ruin and con- 
 fusion ; Humility makes saints on earth, 
 Pride undoes them. Humility beatifies the 
 Saints in Heaven, and the Elders lay down 
 their crowns at the foot of the throne ; 
 Pride disgraces a man among all the socie- 
 ties on earth. God loves the one, and 
 Satan solicits the cause of the other. — 
 Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 3. He saw a cottage with a double coach- 
 
 house, 
 A cottage of gentility ; 
 And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin 
 Is Pride that apes Humility. 
 
 Coleridge. 
 
 4. Humility does not make us either 
 servile or insensible : it does not oblige us 
 to be ridden at the pleasure of every cox- 
 comb. We may show our dislike of an 
 imperious humor, as well as of any other 
 
120 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 foolish action ; both for the benefit of others, 
 and in vindication of our own rights. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 5. Let every one in his own station 
 exercise himself in goodness, the true genu- 
 flection is internal humility. Instead of 
 many genuflections, be skilled only in man- 
 ifold virtues. In God's sight this will not 
 be of less value than genuflections ; for to 
 proceed in a manner well pleasing to Him, 
 is more in harmony with nature, and more 
 suited to active life, than bowing the knee. 
 — Archbishop Eustathtus. 
 
 HYPOCRITES. 
 1. I hold it better to appear as a drunk- 
 ard than to pretend to fast ; I know not 
 whether any one can so detest hypocrisy 
 and hypocrites as I do ; more especially the 
 assumed sanctity of the monks. Such 
 persons are an untruth from head to foot. 
 They deprive the gift of speech of all natu- 
 ralness ; they falsify it. For the most part 
 they are silent, but if they are pleased to 
 speak, they lisp in an undertone, so that 
 one can hardly tell whether they are speak- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 121 
 
 ing or not. They make a show as if by 
 the severities practised on themselves they 
 had lost the power of utterance. What 
 profit can be gained from the discourse of 
 such persons, those know best who have 
 heard it ; but I have no wish to be one of 
 them. By such practices the ignorant man 
 conceals his ignorance, for these people are 
 altogether uncultivated ; they would fain 
 be silent, or say little, that they might not 
 reveal their poverty, for monks who are 
 really wise, men of literature, men of vir- 
 tue, inducted into all good culture, exercise 
 their voice, and give dignity to language ; 
 with their thoughtful discourses they make 
 glad the cities of God ; with their whole 
 appearance in harmony with nature, they 
 represent the truth of Creation, as they 
 strive by their actions to attain the image 
 of God. — Archbishop Eustathtus. 
 
 2. It is difficult to act a part long ; for 
 where truth is not at the bottom, nature 
 will always be endeavoring to return ; and 
 will peep out and betray itself one time or 
 other. — Dr. South. 
 
122 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 IDEAS. 
 
 1. The idea of so much is positive and 
 clear ; the idea of greater is also clear, but 
 it is only a comparative idea. — Locke. 
 
 2. We know that our thoughts, although 
 so numerous, are all contained within our 
 own breasts, and are invisible. But as the 
 Supreme Being formed mankind for a state 
 of society, he has provided us with organs 
 proper for framing articulate sounds, and 
 has given us also a capacity of using those 
 sounds, as signs of all the thoughts we 
 wish to communicate. From hence are 
 derived words and languages. For any 
 sound being once determined upon to stand 
 as the sign of an Idea, custom by degrees 
 establishes such a connection between them, 
 that the appearance of the idea in the mind, 
 always brings to our remembrance the 
 name by which it is expressed ; and in like 
 manner the hearing of the name never fails 
 to excite the idea which it is intended to 
 denote. — Henry Kett. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 123 
 
 IDLENESS. 
 
 1. Children generally hate to be idle; 
 all the care then is, that their busy humor 
 should be constantly employed in something 
 of use to them. — Locke. 
 
 2. Idleness is an inlet to disorder, and 
 makes way for licentiousness. People that 
 have nothing to do, are quickly tired of 
 their own company. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 IDOLATRY. 
 Idolatry is not only an accounting or 
 worshipping that which is not God, but it 
 is also a worshipping the true God, in a 
 way unsuitable to His nature ; and particu- 
 larly by the mediation of saints, images and 
 corporeal resemblances. — Dr. South. 
 
 IGNORANCE. 
 
 1. Tell an Ignoramus, in place and 
 power, that he has a wit and understanding 
 above all the world, and he will readily 
 admit the commendation. — Ibid. 
 
 2. Our power is often confined because 
 of our ignorance ; because we know not 
 
1*24 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 how to make the most of things, and put 
 actives and passives together. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 IMAGINATION. 
 
 1. Imagination has no limits, but when 
 it is confined we find the shortness of the 
 tether. — Swift. 
 
 2. Some people are strangely overset by 
 their imagination ; they lose their health 
 with anxiety to preserve it, and kill them- 
 selves through fear of dying. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 3. Imagination I understand to be, the 
 representation of an individual thought. 
 Imagination is of three kinds ; joined with 
 belief of that which is to come ; joined 
 with memory of that which is past ; and of 
 things present. For I comprehend in this 
 imagination feigned and at pleasure ; as if 
 one should imagine such a man to be in 
 the vestments of a Pope, or to have wings. 
 — Lord Bacon. 
 
 IMMATERIALITY OF THE SOUL. 
 1. No man that owns the existence of 
 an infinite Spirit, can doubt the possibility 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 125 
 
 of a finite spirit ; that is, such a thing as is 
 immaterial, and does not contain any prin- 
 ciple of corruption. — Archbishop Tillot- 
 son. 
 
 2. When we know cogitation is the 
 prime attribute of a Spirit, we infer its 
 immateriality, and thence its immortality. — 
 Tsaac Watts. 
 
 3. Immateriality resembles the shell of 
 the Building. Now there is no arguing 
 from the outside to the inside. What if 
 the case of a row of houses be the same, 
 does this hinder the furniture from being 
 different ? Angels are allowed to be spirits 
 of a superior kind, notwithstanding the 
 common privilege of incorporiety ; and for 
 the same reason there may, for aught we 
 know, be some original disputes between 
 human souls. — JerexMY Collier. 
 
 4. So natural is the knowledge of the 
 soul's immortality, and of some ubi for its 
 future reception, that we find some tract or 
 other of it in most barbarous nations. — 
 Dr. Heylin. 
 
126 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 INDEPENDENCE. 
 
 1. Let fortune do her worst, whatever 
 she makes us lose, as long as she never 
 makes us lose our honesty and our inde- 
 pendence. — Pope. 
 
 2. He that has the business of life at his 
 disposal, and has nobody to account to for 
 his minutes, but God and himself, may, if 
 he pleases, be happy without drudging for 
 it. He needs not flatter the vain, nor be 
 tired with the impertinent, nor stand to the 
 courtesy of knavery and folly. He needs 
 not dance after the caprice of a humorist, 
 nor bear a part in the extravagance of 
 another. His fate does not hang upon any 
 man's face ; a smile will not transport him, 
 nor a frown ruin him ; for his fortune is 
 better fixed than to float upon the pleasure 
 of the nice and changeable. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 INFANCY OF SCIENCE. 
 In the beginning of the world, men had 
 more corporeal force than afterwards. The 
 reason of this allotment was probably to 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 127 
 
 supply their defect of skill. In those early 
 ages, they were more giants in their limbs 
 than their understandings. In this infancy 
 of science, extraordinary strength seems 
 but necessary ; how otherwise, when in- 
 vention was not come forward, when they 
 wanted instruments, when they had little 
 of mathematical direction, could they have 
 cultivated the earth, built houses, or man- 
 aged their carriages ? But when the mind 
 grew large, the body grew less, and busi- 
 ness went on as well as formerly. — Ibid. 
 
 INNATE PRINCIPLES. 
 Had they, who would persuade us that 
 there are innate principles, considered sep- 
 arately the parts out of which these propo- 
 sitions are made, they would not, perhaps, 
 have been so forward to believe they were 
 innate. — Locke. 
 
 INSTINCT, NATURAL AND ARGUMENTATIVE. 
 Every creature hath something in it suffi- 
 cient to propagate the kind, and to conserve 
 the individuals from perishing in confusions 
 and general disorders, which in beasts we 
 
128 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 call instinct) that is, an habitual or prime 
 disposition to do certain things which are 
 proportionable to the end whither it is de- 
 signed. Man also, if he be not more im- 
 perfect, must have the like, and because he 
 knows and makes reflections upon his own 
 acts, and understands the reason of it, that 
 which in them is instinct, in him is natural 
 reason, which is, a desire to preserve him- 
 self and his own kind ; and differs from 
 instinct, because he understands his instinct, 
 and the reasonableness of it, and they do 
 not. But because man being a higher 
 thing even in the order of Creation, and 
 designed to a more noble end, in his natu- 
 ral capacity, his argumentative instinct is 
 larger than the natural instinct of beasts. 
 For he hath instincts in him in order to 
 the conservation of society ; and therefore 
 hath principles, that is, he hath natural de- 
 sires to it for his own good ; and because 
 he understands them, they are called Prin- 
 ciples and Laws of Nature, but are no 
 other than what I have now declared. For 
 beasts do the same things we do, and have 
 many of the same inclinations, which in 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 129 
 
 us are the Laws of Nature, even all which 
 we have in order to our common end. But 
 that which is in beasts is Nature and im- 
 pulsive force, in us must be duty and an 
 inviting power. We must do the same 
 things with an actual or habitual designa- 
 tion of that end to which God designs 
 beasts (supplying by his wisdom their want 
 of understanding), and then what is mere 
 nature in them, in us is natural reason. — 
 Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 INTELLECTUAL POWERS. 
 These abilities, wheresoever they be 
 found, are the inspired gift of God, rarely 
 bestowed, but yet to some (though most 
 abuse) in every nation; and are of power, 
 beside the office of a pulpit, to inbreed and 
 cherish in a great people the seeds of virtue 
 and public civility, to allay the perturbations 
 of the mind, and set the affections in right 
 tune ; to celebrate in glorious and lofty 
 hymns the throne and equipage of God's 
 Almightiness, and what he works and what 
 he suffers to be wrought with high Provi- 
 dence in his Church; to sing victorious 
 9 
 
130 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 agonies of martyrs and saints, the deeds 
 and triumphs of just and pious nations 
 doing valiantly through faith, against the 
 enemies of Christ ; to deplore the general 
 relapses of kingdoms and states from justice 
 and God's true worship. Lastly, whatso- 
 ever in Religion is holy and sublime, in 
 virtue amiable and grave, whatsoever hath 
 passion or admiration in all the changes of 
 that which is called fortune from without, 
 or the wily subtleties and refluxes of man's 
 thoughts from within ; all these things with 
 a solid and treatable smoothness to point 
 out and describe ; teaching over the whole 
 book of sanctity and virtue, through all the 
 instances of example, with such delight, to 
 those especially of soft and delicious tem- 
 per, who will not so much as look upon 
 truth herself, unless they see her elegantly 
 dressed, that whereas the paths of honesty 
 and good life appear now rugged and diffi- 
 cult, though they be indeed easy and pleas- 
 ant, they will then appear to all men both 
 easy and pleasant, although they be rugged 
 and difficult indeed. — Milton. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 131 
 
 INTELLECTUAL PLEASURES. 
 Intellectual pleasures are of a nobler 
 kind than any others. They belong to 
 Beings of the highest order. They are 
 the inclinations of heaven, and the enter- 
 tainment of the Deity. — Ibid. 
 
 INTEMPERANCE. 
 Intemperance is a dangerous companion. 
 It throws people off their guard, betrays 
 them to a great many indecencies, to ruin- 
 ous passions, to disadvantages in fortune : 
 makes them discover secrets, drive foolish 
 bargains, engage in play, and often to stag- 
 ger from the tavern to the stews. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 JOHNSON'S DICTIONARY. 
 Dr. Johnson published his Dictionary ; 
 and as the weight of truth and reason is 
 irresistible, its authority has nearly fixed 
 the external form of our language, and 
 from its decisions few appeals have yet 
 been made. Indeed so convenient is it to 
 have one acknowledged standard to recur 
 
132 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 to — so much preferable in matters of this 
 nature, is a trifling degree of irregularity to 
 a continual change and a fruitless pursuit 
 of unattainable perfection ; that it is earn- 
 estly to be hoped no author will henceforth, 
 on slight grounds, be tempted to innovate. 
 Dr. Johnson is every where the declared 
 enemy of unnecessary innovation : and the 
 principles on which he founds his improve- 
 ments, are the stable ones of etymology 
 and analogy. The former science will not 
 soon be more completely understood than 
 it was by him ; and if in the latter a few 
 steps may have been made beyond the 
 limits of his observations, they have been 
 gained only by the pursuit of minute re- 
 searches, inconsistent with the greatness of 
 his undertaking. — Archdeacon Nares. 
 
 JOHNSON'S LIVES OF THE POETS. 
 Johnson's lives of the poets merit great 
 attention, and contain as many excellent 
 principles of morality as of taste. They 
 give useful hints to young men, as to the 
 conduct of life ; and show them how fre- 
 quently the powers of Genius and the rage 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 133 
 
 of dissipation have been united in the favor- 
 ites of the Muses. Whence they may in- 
 fer that a sound judgment is more desirable 
 than a fine imagination, and that abilities 
 without prudence cannot secure them from 
 disgrace and penury. — Henry Kett. 
 
 KNAYERY. 
 
 1. Most men rather brook their being 
 reputed knaves, than, for their honesty, be 
 accounted fools ; knave, in the mean time, 
 passing for a name of credit. — Dr. South. 
 
 2. The knavery of covetous men is 
 as indisputable as an axiom ; and ought to 
 be supposed as a postulatum in business. 
 They are false by necessity of principle, 
 and want nothing but an occasion to show 
 it. Conscience and covetousness are never 
 to be reconciled ; like fire and water they 
 always destroy each other, according to the 
 predominancy of the element. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 KNOWLEDGE. 
 1. Knowledge, which is the highest 
 degree of the speculative faculties, consists 
 
134 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 in the perception of the truth of affirmative 
 or negative propositions. — Locke. 
 
 2. Knowledge is the consequence of 
 time, and multitude of days are fittest to 
 teach wisdom. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 KNOWLEDGE NOT ALWAYS POWER. 
 
 1. Though power is often the conse- 
 quence of knowledge, yet it is far from 
 being the same thing, as some have affirmed. 
 A man may know how to fence, when his 
 arms are cut off, yet the idea of the art 
 will not enable him for the practice. He 
 may know how to build a ship, when nei- 
 ther wood nor iron is near him ; but the ' 
 skill in his head and his hand will not do 
 his business ; therefore knowledge alone is 
 not power. — Ibid. 
 
 2. Alexander the Great wrote to his 
 tutor, Aristotle, complaining of that philoso- 
 pher's publishing some of his writings that 
 made known to the world those secrets in 
 learning which he had communicated to 
 him in private lectures ; concluding " that 
 he had rather excelled the rest of mankind 
 in knowledge than in power." — Addison. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 135 
 
 3. Ignorance is the curse of God, 
 
 Knowledge the wing with which we 
 fly to Heaven. : — Shakspeare. 
 
 LAW. 
 
 1. Of Law there can be no less acknow- 
 ledged, than that her seat is the bosom of 
 God, her voice the harmony of the world, 
 all things in heaven and earth do her ho- 
 mage, the very least as feeling her care, 
 and the greatest as not exempted from her 
 power, both angels and men and creatures 
 of what condition soever, though each in 
 different sort and manner, yet all with uni- 
 form consent, admiring her as the mother 
 of their peace and joy. — Hooker. 
 
 2. Laws are like spiders' webbs, that 
 will catch flies, but not wasps and hornets. 
 — Anacharsis. 
 
 LAZINESS. 
 1. Watch him at play, when following 
 his own inclinations ; and see whether he 
 be stirring and active, or whether he lazily 
 and listlessly dreams away his time. — 
 Locke. 
 
136 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 2. That instance of fraud and laziness, 
 the unjust steward, who pleaded that he 
 could neither dig nor beg, would quickly 
 have been brought to dig and to beg too, 
 rather than starve. — Dr. South. 
 
 3. Wicked condemned men will ever 
 live like rogues, and not fall to work, but 
 be lazy and spend victuals. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 LEADERS. 
 The understandings of a Senate are 
 enslaved by three or four leaders, set to get 
 or keep employments. — Swift. 
 
 LEARNING. 
 
 1. The end of learning is to repair the 
 ruins of our first parents, by regaining to 
 know God aright, and out of that knowl- 
 edge to love him, to imitate him, to be like 
 him, as we may the nearest, by possessing 
 our souls of true virtue, which being united 
 to the heavenly grace of Faith, makes up 
 the highest perfection. — Milton. 
 
 2. Learning gives us a fuller conviction 
 of the imperfections of our nature ; which, 
 one would think, might dispose us to mod- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 137 
 
 esty : for the more a man knows, the more 
 he discovers his ignorance. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 3. Learning hath its infancy, when it is 
 almost childish ; then its youth, when luxu- 
 rious and juvenile; then its strength of 
 years, when solid ; and lastly its old age, 
 when dry and exhaust. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 4. Till a man can judge whether they 
 be truths or no, his understanding is but 
 little improved ; and thus men of much 
 reading are greatly learned, but may be lit- 
 tle knowing. — Locke. 
 
 5. And verily they be fewest in number, 
 that be happy or wise by unlearned experi- 
 ence. And look well upon the former life 
 of those few, whether your example be old 
 or young, who, without learning, have 
 gathered by long experience, a little wisdom 
 and some happiness : and when yon do con- 
 sider what mischief they have committed, 
 what dangers they have escaped, (and twen- 
 ty to one do perish in the adventure,) then 
 think well with yourself, whether ye would 
 that your own son should come to wisdom 
 and happiness by the way of such experi- 
 ence or no. — Roger Ascham. 
 
138 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 6. When men of learning are actuated 
 by a knowledge of the world, they give a 
 reputation to literature, and convince the 
 world of its usefulness. — Addison. 
 
 LIBERTY, EQUALITY AND FRATERNITY. 
 
 1. If a preacher should discourse, that 
 there ought to be a parity among Christians, 
 and that their goods should be in common ; 
 all men will apprehend, that not princes and 
 rich persons, but the poor and the servants, 
 would soonest become disciples, and believe 
 the doctrines ; because they are the only 
 persons likely to get by them, and it con- 
 cerns the other not to believe him, the 
 doctrine being destructive of their in- 
 terests. Just such a persuasion is every 
 persevering love to a vicious habit, it hav- 
 ing possessed the understanding with fair 
 opinions of it, and surprised the will with 
 passion and desires, whatsoever doctrine be 
 its enemy, will, with infinite difficulty be 
 entertained. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. Liberty is the power in any agent, to 
 do or forbear any particular action, accord- 
 ing to the determination or thought of the 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 139 
 
 mind, whereby either of them is preferred 
 to the other. — Locke. 
 
 3. Liberty is a latitude of practice, with- 
 in the compass of law and religion, a 
 standing clear of inferior dependencies and 
 private jurisdictions. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 4. According to the equality wherein 
 God hath placed all mankind, with regard 
 to himself, in all the relations between man 
 and man, there is a mutual dependence. — 
 Swift. 
 
 5. It is a necessary rule in alliances, so- 
 cieties, and fraternities, and all manner of 
 civil contracts, to have a strict regard to the 
 humor of those we have to do with. — 
 
 L'ESTRANGE. 
 
 LITERARY REWARD. 
 
 1. That lasting fame and perpetuity of 
 praise which God and good men have con- 
 sented, shall be the reward of those whose 
 published works advance the good of man- 
 kind. — Milton. 
 
 2. To estimate the value of Newton's 
 discoveries, or the delight communicated 
 by Shakspeare and Milton, by the price 
 
140 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 at which their works have sold, would be but 
 a poor measure of the degree in which they 
 have elevated and enchanted their country. 
 Some unproductive labor is of much more 
 use and importance than productive labor, 
 but is incapable of being the subject of the 
 gross calculations which relate to national 
 wealth ; contributing to other sources of 
 happiness besides those which are derived 
 from matter. — Malthus. 
 
 3. Knowledge was conferred on man, 
 for a nobler purpose than to be made a mere 
 instrument to supply his temporal wants. 
 Its source is in heaven, its aspirings are 
 celestial, and it is an outrage on the dignity 
 of the Donor, were we to degrade that glo- 
 rious gift, which He intended to shine as 
 a light to the world, into a mere kitchen 
 fire, by which to warm our earthen pot. 
 Therefore our teacher, Rabbi Zadock, tells 
 us, Prostitute not thy talents; look not 
 upon them as given thee for the purpose 
 only of enabling thee to gain the pittance 
 thou requirest for thy daily support. What ! 
 though thou art poor as thou art learned, 
 though thy unremitting toil does not pro- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 141 
 
 cure thee wherewithal to supply the wants 
 of thy sinking frame, still persevere in thy 
 noble disinterestedness ; be firm in the re- 
 liance on thy God, and do not endanger 
 thy eternal happiness for a few short and 
 fleeting enjoyments of this life. Hillel,* 
 who was himself so poor, that his utmost 
 labor as a wood-cutter barely supplied him 
 with food, has left thee a precept which de- 
 mands thy full attention. He said, " who- 
 soever abuseth the Crown perisheth — 
 not in this world only, for here it is the 
 common lot of all mankind to die ; but he 
 deprives himself of life everlasting, and 
 shuts himself up from that happiness, which 
 is the certain reward of him who has fought 
 the good fight of virtue and piety, not in- 
 fluenced by vanity, or subdued by poverty, 
 but upheld by the grace of his God." He 
 farther said in another place, " consider not 
 thy learning as a diadem for thy aggrandize- 
 ment, nor as a hatchet to labor with." Hil- 
 
 # A learned Rabbi, who reformed the Jewish Calen- 
 dar, and was one of the authors of that portion of the 
 Talmud called " Gemara," about A. D. 306.— Ed. 
 
142 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 lei, likewise, used to say, " he who abuseth 
 the crown perisheth." Hence thou art 
 taught that whosoever degrades the Law 
 into a mere source of profit, depriveth him- 
 self of life. — Ethics of the Fathers. 
 
 4. No difference is so easily perceived as 
 that which a knowledge or an ignorance of 
 ancient literature creates in the manner, the 
 look, the voice, and the language of men, 
 who attempt upon any occasion to utter 
 their opinions in public ; and this even when 
 nature may not have been liberal in the gift 
 of eloquence. Under the influence of the 
 former there is a lucid order, a chastity of 
 sentiment, and a language of appropriate 
 manliness and harmony. The manner will 
 be composed and independent, the tones of 
 the voice firm, and adapted to the occasion. 
 In short, such a man shall say but very few 
 words, before you are thoroughly convinced, 
 that he has formed an intimate acquaint- 
 ance with those great characters, who have 
 justly obtained an immortal name. — Sir 
 William Blackstone. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 143 
 
 THE LORD'S PRAYER. 
 
 1. The Lord's Prayer is short, mysteri- 
 ous, and, like the treasures of the Spirit, 
 full of wisdom and latent senses ; it is not 
 improper to draw forth those excellencies, 
 which are intended and signified by every 
 petition, that by so excellent an authority, 
 we may know what it is lawful to beg of 
 God. — Jere^iy Taylor. 
 
 2. Si tamen recte et congruenter oramus, 
 nihil aliud dicere possumus quam quod in 
 Oratio Dominica continetur. — St. Augus- 
 tine. 
 
 LOVE. 
 Loye is the greatest instrument of na- 
 ture, the bond and cement of Society, the 
 spirit and spring of the Universe. Love is 
 such an affection as cannot so properly be 
 said to be in the soul as the soul to be in 
 that : it is the whole man wrapt up into one 
 desire. — Dr. South. 
 
 LOVE OF MONEY. 
 The love of money is a vertiginous pool, 
 sucking all into it to destroy it. It is trou- 
 
144 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 bled and uneven, giddy and unsafe, serving 
 no end but its own, and that also in a 
 restless and uneasy motion. But the love 
 of God is a holy fountain, limpid and pure, 
 sweet and salutary, lasting and eternal. 
 The love of God spends itself upon him 
 to receive again the reflections of grace and 
 benediction : the love of money spends all 
 its desires upon itself to purchase nothing 
 but unsatisfying instruments of exchange, 
 or supernumerary provisions, and ends in 
 dissatisfaction, emptiness of spirit, and a 
 bitter curse. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 LOVE OF TRUTH. 
 The enquiry after Truth, which is the 
 love-making or wooing of it, the knowl- 
 edge of Truth, the preference of it ; and 
 the belief of Truth, the enjoying of it, is 
 the sovereign good of human nature. — 
 Lord Bacon. 
 
 MAMMON. 
 God of the world and worldlings, 
 Great Mammon ! greatest god below the sky. 
 
 Spenser. 
 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 145 
 
 MASTERS AND SERVANTS. 
 Masters must correct their servants with 
 gentleness, prudence and mercy ; not with 
 upbraiding and disgraceful language, but 
 with such only as may express and reprove 
 the fault and amend the person. — Jeremy 
 Taylor. 
 
 MATHEMATICS. 
 
 Mathematics is a way to settle in the 
 mind a habit of reasoning closely and in 
 train. Not that I think it necessary that 
 all men should be deep mathematicians ; 
 but that having got the way of reasoning, 
 which that study necessarily brings the 
 mind to, they might be able to transfer it 
 to other parts of knowledge as they have 
 occasion. — Locke. 
 
 MATTER OF PRAYER. 
 1. Our first inquiry must be, the matter 
 of our prayers : for our desires are not to be 
 the rule of our prayers, unless Reason and 
 Religion be the rule of our desires. The 
 old Heathens prayed to their gods for such 
 10 
 
146 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 things which they were ashamed to name 
 publicly before men ; and these were their 
 private* prayers, which they durst not, for 
 their indecency or iniquity, make public. — 
 Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. Thy pray'rs the test of heaven will 
 
 bear ; 
 Nor need'st thou take the gods aside to 
 
 hear : 
 While other e'en the mighty men of Rome, 
 Big swelPd with mischief to the temples 
 
 come ; 
 And in low murmurs and with costly 
 
 smoke, 
 Heav'n's help, to prosper their black vows, 
 
 invoke. 
 
 So boldly to the gods mankind reveal 
 
 What from each other they, for shame, con- 
 ceal. 
 
 Give me good fame, ye pow'rs, and make 
 me just. 
 
 Thus much the rogue to public ears will 
 trust, 
 
 # See Addison's apologue of Menippus in Olympus ; 
 Spectator, No. 391. Ed. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 147 
 
 In private, then — when wilt thou, mighty 
 
 Jove, 
 My wealthy uncle from this world remove ? 
 Or — O thou thunderer's son, great Her- 
 cules, 
 That once thy bounteous deity would please 
 To guide my rake upon the chinking sound 
 Of some vast treasure hidden under ground ! 
 
 were my pupil fairly knock'd o' th' head. 
 
 1 should possess th' estate if he were dead. 
 
 Persius, Sat. ii. v. 3. Dryden's trans. 
 
 3. The vanity of men's wishes, which 
 are the natural prayers of the mind, as well 
 as many of those secret devotions which 
 they offer to the Supreme Being, are well 
 exposed by Socrates and Plato, not to men- 
 tion Juvenal and Persius, who have made 
 the finest satires in their works upon this 
 subject. Among other reasons for set forms 
 of Prayers. I have often thought it a very 
 good one. that by this means the folly and 
 extravagance of men's desires may be kept 
 within due bounds, and not break out in 
 absurd and ridiculous petitions on so great 
 and solemn an occasion. — Addison. 
 
148 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 MEDITATION. 
 Meditation is the tongue of the Soul 
 and the language of our Spirit ; and our 
 wandering thoughts in prayer are but the 
 neglects of meditation and recessions from 
 that duty ; and according as we neglect 
 meditation, so are our prayers imperfect; 
 meditation being the soul of prayer and 
 the intention of our Spirit. — Jeremy Tay- 
 lor. 
 
 MEN OF KNOWLEDGE AND MEN OF TASTE. 
 South, in his* oration at the opening of 
 the Sheldonian theatre at Oxford, passed 
 this bitter sarcasm on the naturalists, — 
 " mirantur nihil nisi puliccs ; pediculos — 
 et se ipsos ; " they admire nothing except 
 lice; fleas — and themselves. The illus- 
 trious Sloane endured a long persecution 
 from the bantering humor of Dr. King. 
 One of the most amusing declaimers against 
 what he calls les sciences des faux Sg avails 
 is Father Malebranche ; he is far more se- 
 
 # See Elmes's Life of Wren, p. 271. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 149 
 
 vere than Cornelius Agrippa, and he long 
 preceded Rousseau, so famous for his invec- 
 tives against the sciences. The seventh 
 chapter of his fourth book is an inimitable 
 satire. •• The principal excuse. 7 ' says he, 
 ••which engages men in false studies, is, 
 that they have attached the idea of learned 
 where they should not." Astronomy, an- 
 tiquarianism, history, ancient poetry, and 
 natural history, are all mowed down by his 
 metaphysical scythe. When we become 
 acquainted with the idea Father Male- 
 branche attaches to the term learned, we 
 understand him — and we smile. — DTs- 
 
 RAELI. 
 
 MEN v. BOOKS. 
 To take measures wholly from Books 
 without looking into men and business, is 
 like travelling in a map: where, although 
 countries and cities are well enough dis- 
 tinguished, yet villages and private seats 
 are either overlooked, or too generally 
 marked for a stranger to find : and there- 
 fore, he that would be a master must draw 
 from the life, as well as copy from origi- 
 
150 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 nals, and join theory and experience to- 
 gether. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 MEN OF VALOR. 
 
 For men there are to be considered the 
 valor and the numbers, the old observation 
 is not untrue, that the Spaniards' valor 
 lieth to the eye of the looker-on, but the 
 English valor lieth about the soldier's 
 heart. — Lord Bacon's Spanish War. 
 
 MENTAL PLEASURES. 
 Pleasures of the mind are more at com- 
 mand than those of the body. A man 
 may think of a handsome performance or 
 of a notion that pleases him, at his leisure. 
 This entertainment is ready, with little 
 warning or expense ; a short recollection 
 brings it upon the stage, brightens the idea 
 and makes it shine as much as when it was 
 first stamped upon the memory. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 MENTAL PRAYER. 
 Mental prayer, when our spirits wan- 
 der, is like a watch standing still, because 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 151 
 
 the spring is down ; wind it up again and 
 it goes on regularly. But in vocal prayer, 
 if the words run on and the spirit wanders, 
 the clock strikes false, the hand points not 
 to the right hour, because something is in 
 disorder, and the striking is nothing but 
 noise. In mental prayer we confess God's 
 omniscience, in vocal prayer we call an- 
 gels to witness. In the first our spirits 
 rejoice in God, in the second the angels 
 rejoice in us. Mental prayer is the best 
 remedy against lightness and indiffereney 
 of affections, but vocal prayer is the aptest 
 instrument of communion. That is more 
 Angelical, but yet is fittest for the state of 
 separation and glory: this is but human, 
 but it is apter for our present constitution. 
 They have their distinct proprieties, and 
 may be used according to several accidents, 
 occasions or dispositions. — Jeremy Tay- 
 lor. 
 
 MILTON'S CHILDHOOD. 
 
 When I was yet a child, no childish play 
 
 To me was pleasing : all my mind was set 
 
 Serious to learn and know, and thence to 
 
 do 
 
1 152 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 What might be public good : myself I 
 
 thought 
 Born to that end, born to promote all truth, 
 All righteous things. — Milton. 
 
 MILTON'S PRAYER FOR THE CHURCH. 
 
 Which way to get out, or which way to 
 end I know not, unless I turn mine eyes 
 and lift up my hands, to that eternal and 
 propitious throne, where nothing is readier 
 than grace and refuge to the distresses of 
 mortal suppliants. And it were a shame 
 to leave these serious thoughts less piously 
 than the heathen were wont to conclude 
 their graver discourses. 
 
 Thou, therefore, that sittest in light and 
 glory unapproachable, Parent of Angels 
 and men ! Next thee I implore, omnipo- 
 tent King, Redeemer of that lost remnant 
 whose nature thou didst assume, ineffable 
 and everlasting Love ! And thou, the third 
 subsistence of divine infinitude, illuming 
 Spirit, the joy and solace of created things ! 
 One tripersonal Godhead ! Look upon this 
 thy poor and almost spent and expiring 
 Church : leave her not a prey to these im- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 153 
 
 portunate wolves, that wait and think long 
 till they devour thy tender flock : these 
 wild boars that have broke into thy vine- 
 yard, and left the print of their polluting 
 hoofs on the souls of thy servants. O let 
 them not bring about their damned designs, 
 that stand now at the entrance of the bot- 
 tomless pit, expecting the watch-word to 
 open and let out those dreadful locusts and 
 scorpions, to re-involve us in that pitchy 
 cloud of infernal darkness, where we shall 
 never more see the sun of thy truth again, 
 never hope for the cheerful dawn, never 
 more hear the bird of morning sing. — 
 Milton. 
 
 AlIXD YOUR OWN BUSINESS. 
 Have you so much leisure from your 
 own business, that you can take care of 
 other people's that does not at all belong to 
 you ? — Terence. 
 
 MIRACLES. 
 
 1. Is it not extravagant to expect a mira- 
 cle ? Not at all. I believe we are assisted 
 with many more miracles than we are 
 
 
154 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 aware of. A man in a storm, prays that 
 he may escape being wrecked. I desire to 
 know whether he thinks it possible for 
 him to be the better for his devotions ? 
 If he does not, he is an impertinent atheist 
 for using them : if he does, he must be- 
 lieve that Providence will interpose and 
 disarm nature, or divert her violence. Now, 
 to check second causes in their career, to 
 change their motion, or to lay them asleep 
 before they are spent, is no less a miracle 
 than to act without them. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 2. The evidence of our Saviour's mis- 
 sion from Heaven is so great, in the multi- 
 tude of miracles he did, before all sorts of 
 people, (which the Divine Providence and 
 Wisdom has so ordered, that they never 
 were, nor could be denied by any of the 
 enemies and opposers of Christianity,) that 
 what he delivered cannot but be received 
 as the Oracles of God. — Locke. 
 
 3. The miracles of our Lord are pecu- 
 liarly eminent above the lying wonders of 
 demons, in that they were not made out of 
 vain ostentation of power, arM to raise un- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 155 
 
 profitable amazement ; but for the real ben- 
 efit and advantage of men, by feeding the 
 hungry, healing all sorts of diseases, eject- 
 ing of devils and reviving the dead. — Dr. 
 Bentley. 
 
 MODERATION. 
 
 Let our life be moderate, our desires 
 reasonable, our hopes little, our ends none 
 in eminency and prelation above others. 
 For as the rays of light passing through 
 the thin air, end in a small and undiscern- 
 ible pyramis ; but reflected upon a wall 
 are doubled and increase the warmth to a 
 scorching and troublesome heat ; so the 
 desires of man, if they pass through an 
 even and an indifferent life toAvards the 
 issues of an ordinary and necessary course, 
 they are little and within command ; but 
 if they pass upon an end or aim of diffi- 
 culty or ambition, they duplicate and grow 
 to a disturbance ; and we have seen the 
 even and temperate lives of indifferent 
 persons continue in many degrees of 
 innocence ; but the temptations of busy 
 designs is too great even for the best of 
 dispositions. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
156 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 MONKISH HATRED OF LITERATURE. 
 The Emperor Manuel Comnenus en- 
 dowed a monastery founded by himself, 
 with no estates, fields or vineyards, but in- 
 stead thereof assigned it a fixed income 
 from the Imperial Treasury ; and commit- 
 ted to the secular magistrates the manage- 
 ment of all the other monastic revenues, 
 that the monks might not be seduced to 
 busy themselves with things foreign to 
 their profession. Ye cannot serve God 
 and Mammon. Too many of ye have 
 turned monks for a livelihood, and are 
 totally ignorant of that Divine Wisdom, 
 by which man is brought into connec- 
 tion with God; and possess a thorough 
 hatred of literature.* If a man of literary 
 attainments come to them to retire as into 
 a haven from the storms of the world, they 
 all look shy upon him ; such a sort of per- 
 son, they say, is of no use to them, they 
 want no grammarian. They throw open 
 their doors to ignorance and welcome it as 
 
 Lib. vii. p. 270. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 157 
 
 a fit companion to their sanctity, yet they 
 banish far away the scribes of the King- 
 dom of Heaven. — Nicenas Chaniates. 
 
 MORAL EFFECTS OF SEASONS OF MOURNING 
 UPON NATIONS. 
 
 It is ,a sad calamity to see a kingdom 
 spoiled and a church afflicted ; the priests 
 slain with the sword, and the blood of no- 
 bles mixed with cheaper sand ; religion 
 made a cause of trouble, and the best 
 men most cruelly persecuted ; government 
 turned and laws ashamed ; judges decree- 
 ing in fear and covetousness, and- the min- 
 isters of Holy Things setting themselves 
 against all that is sacred. And what shall 
 make recompense for this heap of sorrows 
 when God shall send such swords of fire ? 
 Even the mercies of God, which shall then 
 be made public, when the people shall have 
 suffered for their sins. For so I have 
 known a luxuriant vine, swell into irregu- 
 lar twigs and bold excrescences, and spend- 
 itself in leaves and little rings, and afford 
 but few blusters to the wine-press ; but 
 when the Lord of the Vineyard had caused 
 
158 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 the dressers to cut the wilder plant and 
 make it bleed, it grew temperate in its vain 
 expense of useless leaves, and knotted into 
 fair and juicy branches, and made account 
 of that loss of blood, by the return of fruit. 
 It is thus of an afflicted kingdom, cured of 
 its surfeits and punished for its sins ; it 
 bleeds for its long riot, and is left ungov- 
 erned for its disobedience, and is chastised 
 for its wantonness ; and when the sword 
 hath let forth the corrupted blood and the 
 fire hath purged the rest, then it enters into 
 the double joys of restitution and gives 
 God thanks for his rod, and confesses the 
 mercies of the Lord in making the smoke 
 to be changed into fire, and his anger into 
 mercy. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 MORALITY OF THE GOSPEL. 
 In morality there are books enough 
 written both by ancient and modern philoso- 
 phers, but the morality of the Gospel doth 
 so exceed them all, that to give a man a 
 full knowledge of true morality, I shall 
 send him to no other Book than the New 
 Testament. — Locke. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 159 
 
 NATURAL RELIGION. 
 
 1. Concerning the precepts of Religion 
 that Jesus taught us, he took of those many 
 superinduced rites, which God enjoined to 
 the Jews, and reduced us to the Natural 
 Religion, that is, to such expressions of 
 duty, which all wise men and nations used ; 
 save only that he took away the rite of 
 sacrificing beasts, because it was now de- 
 termined in the great sacrifice of himself, 
 which efficiently reconciled all the world 
 to God. All the other things, as Prayer 
 and Adoration and Eucharist, and Faith in 
 God, are of a natural order and an unalter- 
 able expression ; and in the nature of the 
 thing, there is no other way of address to 
 God than these ; no other expression of 
 His Glories and our needs. — Jeremy Tay- 
 lor. 
 
 2. I call that Natural Religion, which 
 men might know, and should be obliged 
 unto, by the mere principles of Reason, 
 improved by consideration and experience, 
 without the help of Revelation. — Bishop 
 
 WlLKJNS. 
 
160 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 NATURE. 
 
 1. By grace divine, 
 
 Not otherwise, O nature, are we thine. 
 Wordsworth. 
 
 2. Nature, sometimes means the Author 
 of Nature, or natura naturans ; as Nature 
 hath made man partly corporeal, and partly 
 immaterial. For Nature, in this sense, 
 may be used the word Creator. Nature 
 sometimes means that, on whose account a 
 thing is what it is and is called ; as when 
 we define the nature of an angel. For 
 nature in this sense may be used, essence 
 or quality. 
 
 Nature sometimes means what belongs 
 to a living creature at its nativity, or ac- 
 crues to it at its birth ; as when we say, a 
 man is noble by nature, a child is naturally 
 forward. This may be expressed by say- 
 ing, the man was born so, the thing was 
 generated such. Nature sometimes means 
 an internal principle of local motion : as 
 we say, the stone falls, or the flame rises, 
 by nature ; for this we may say, that the 
 motion up or down is. spontaneous, or pro- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 161 
 
 duced by its proper cause. Nature some- 
 times means the established course of things 
 corporeal ; as nature makes the night suc- 
 ceed the day. This may be termed estab- 
 lished order, or settled course. 
 
 Nature sometimes means the aggregate 
 of the powers belonging to a body, espe- 
 cially a living one ; as when physicians 
 say, that nature is strong, or nature left to 
 herself will do the cure. For this, may 
 be used, constitution, temperament or struc- 
 ture of the body. Nature is put likewise 
 for the system of the corporeal works of 
 God; as there is no Phoenix or Chimera 
 in Nature. For nature, thus applied, we 
 may use the world or the universe. Nature 
 is sometimes indeed taken for a kind of 
 semi-deity. In this sense it is better not 
 to use it at all. — The Hon. Robert Boyle's 
 Free Enquiry into the received Notion of 
 Nature, 
 
 3. Although life is often lavished away 
 to ill purposes, yet it is not good to strain 
 Nature too much, and set her upon the ten- 
 ters. A man may be too covetous of un- 
 11 
 
162 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 derstanding, and a miser in his head as well 
 as in his pocket. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 NATURE AND ART. 
 Should a man live under ground, and 
 there converse with works of art and me- 
 chanism, and should afterwards be brought 
 into the open day, and see the several glo- 
 ries of Heaven and earth, he would imme- 
 diately pronounce them to be the works of 
 such a Being as we define God to be. — 
 Aristotle. 
 
 OLD WISE SPIRITS. 
 I consider that the wisest persons, and 
 those who know how to value and entertain 
 the more noble faculties of their soul and 
 their precious hours, take more pleasure in 
 reading the productions of those old wise 
 spirits, who preserved natural reason and 
 religion, in the midst of the Heathen dark- 
 ness. Such as Homer, Euripides, Orpheus, 
 Pindar and Anacreon ; iEschylus and Me- 
 nander, and all the Greek Poets ; Plutarch 
 and Polybius, Xenophon and all those other 
 excellent persons of both faculties, whose 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 163 
 
 choicest dictates are collected by Stobaeus; 
 Plato and his scholars, Aristotle, and after 
 him Porphyry and all his other disciples : 
 Pythagoras and his, especially Hierocles. 
 All the old Academics and Stoics within 
 the Roman schools : — more pleasure I say, 
 in reading these, than the triflings of many 
 of the later Schoolmen, who promoted the 
 petty interest of a family, or an unlearned 
 opinion with great earnestness, but added 
 nothing to Christianity, but trouble, scruple 
 and vexation. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 OPIATES. 
 
 1. Pleasant retrospections, easy thoughts, 
 and comfortable presages, are admirable 
 opiates. They help to assuage the anguish, 
 and disarm the distemper, and almost make 
 make a man despise his misery. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 2. Some fly to atheism as an opiate, to 
 still those frightening apprehensions of a 
 future state of rewards and punishment, 
 by inducing a dulness and lethargy of 
 mind, rather than to make use of that na- 
 tive and salutary medicine, a hearty repen- 
 tance. — Bentley. 
 
164 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 OPINION. 
 Opinion is alight, vain, crude and imper- 
 fect thing, settled in the imagination, but 
 never arriving at the understanding, there 
 to obtain the tincture of Reason. — Ben 
 Jonson. 
 
 ORIGIN OF MAHOMETANISM. 
 When the Religion formerly received is 
 rent by discords, and when the Holiness of 
 Professors of Religion is decayed and full 
 of scandal, and withal, the times be stupid, 
 ignorant and barbarous, you may doubt the 
 springing up of a new sect ; if then also 
 there should arise any extravagant and 
 strange spirit, to make himself author there- 
 of ; all which held when Mahomet pub- 
 lished his law. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 ORIGIN OF THE MIND. 
 1. The mind is Heaven-born, and comes 
 immediately out of the hands of God ; so 
 that to speak properly, we are nearer re- 
 lated to the Supreme Being than to father 
 and mother. Nemo est tarn Pater, says 
 Tertullian. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 165 
 
 2. The Mind being also used for the 
 soul, giving life, is attributed absolutely to 
 madmen, when we say they are of a dis- 
 tracted mind, instead of a broken under- 
 standing ; which word, mind, we use also 
 for opinion, as, I am not of this or that 
 mind; and sometimes for men's conditions 
 or virtues ; as, he is of an honest mind, or, 
 a man of a just mind ; sometimes for affec- 
 tion, as, I do this for my mind's sake ; 
 sometimes for the knowledge of principles 
 which we have, without discourse ; often- 
 times for Spirits, Angels and Intelligences. 
 But when it is used in the proper significa- 
 tion, including both the understanding 
 agent and passible, it is described to be a 
 pure, simple, substantial act, not depending 
 upon matter, but having relation to that 
 which is intelligible, as to its first object, 
 or more at large, thus ; a part or particle of 
 the soul, whereby it doth understand, not 
 depending upon matter, nor needing any 
 organ, free from passion coming from with- 
 out, and apt to be dissevered, as eternal, 
 from that which is mortal. — Sir Walter 
 Raleigh. 
 
166 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 ORIGIN OF POWER. 
 Some philosophers have placed the origin 
 of Power, in the Admiration, either of sur- 
 passing form, great valor, or superior under- 
 standing. — Sir William Davenant. 
 
 PERFECTION. 
 
 1. There is not one grain in the Uni- 
 verse, either too much or too little, nothing 
 to be added, nothing to be spared : nor so 
 much as any .one particle of it, that man- 
 kind may not be either the better or the 
 worse for, according as it is applied. — 
 L' Estrange. 
 
 2. Man doth seek a triple perfection ; first 
 a sensual, consisting in those things which 
 very life itself requireth, either as neces- 
 sary supplements, or as ornaments thereof: 
 then an intellectual, consisting in those 
 things which none underneath man is ca- 
 pable of; lastly, a spiritual and divine, 
 consisting in those things whereby we tend 
 by supernatural means here, but cannot here 
 attain. — Hooker. 
 
 3. God, though he be omnipotent, can- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 167 
 
 not make any created being absolutely per- 
 feet ; for what is absolutely perfect, must 
 necessarily be self-existent. But it is in- 
 cluded in the very notion of a creature, as 
 such, not to exist of itself, but of God. 
 An absolutely perfect creature, therefore, 
 implies a contradiction ; for it would be of 
 itself and not of itself at the same time. 
 Absolute perfection, therefore, is peculiar 
 to God, and should he communicate his 
 own peculiar perfection to another, that 
 other would be God. Imperfection must 
 therefore be tolerated in creatures, notwith- 
 standing the Divine Omnipotence and 
 goodness ; for contradictions are no objects 
 of power. God indeed might have re- 
 frained from acting, and continued alone 
 self-sufficient and perfect to all eternity ; 
 but infinite goodness would by no means 
 allow of this, and therefore since it obliged 
 him to produce external things, which 
 things could not possibly be perfect, it pre- 
 ferred these imperfect things to none at all ; 
 whence it follows, that imperfection arose 
 from the Infinity of Divine Goodness. — 
 Archbishop King. 
 
163 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 POST-AUGUSTAN WRITERS. 
 In the writers who flourished after the 
 Augustan age, the decay of taste is remark- 
 able, although we should be deficient in 
 justice not to acknowledge, that they 
 possess a considerable share of beautiful 
 imagery, lively description, and just obser- 
 vation, both in poetry and prose. Seneca 
 degraded the dignity of his moral treatises, 
 by sentences too pointed, and ornaments of 
 rhetoric, too numerous and studied ; and 
 Pliny gave too labored and epigrammatic 
 a turn to his Epistles. Lucan indulged 
 the extravagance and wildness of his ge- 
 nius in puerile flights of fancy ; and Taci- 
 tus fettered the powers of his judgment, 
 and obscured the brightness of his imagi- 
 nation, by elaborate brevity, and by dark 
 and distant allusions.* Such affectation was 
 in vain substituted for the charms of nature 
 
 # The character given by King to Timanthes, may be 
 justly applied to Tacitus. " In omnibus ejus operibus 
 intelligitur plus semper quam pingitur ; et cum ars sum- 
 ma sit ; ingenium tamen ultra artem est." — Lib. xxxv. 
 c. 10. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 169 
 
 and simplicity. So fruitless is the attempt 
 to supply, by gaudy ornaments of dress, and 
 artificial beauty of complexion, the want of 
 genuine charms, and the native bloom of 
 youth. — Kett. 
 
 POSTHUMOUS FAME. 
 
 1. In our present miserable and divided 
 condition, how just soever a man's preten- 
 sions may be to a great or blameless repu- 
 tation, he must, with regard to his posthu- 
 mous character, content himself with such 
 a consideration, as induced the famous Sir 
 Francis Bacon, after having bequeathed 
 his soul to God, and his body to the earth, 
 to leave his fame to foreign nations. — 
 Addison. 
 
 2. It is a glorious privilege to have one's 
 memory gloriously handed down to after 
 ages, and to stand upon record to the latest 
 periods of time. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. Those who despise Fame, seldom de- 
 serve it. We are apt to undervalue the 
 purchase we cannot reach, to conceal our 
 poverty the better. It is a spark which 
 kindles upon the best fuel, and burns 
 brightest in the bravest breast. — Ibid. 
 
170 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 PRAYER. 
 
 1. Three-fold are the prayers of man 
 to God, and their efficacy is also ascending 
 in its degrees. The quiet prayer of the 
 heart is acceptable to the All-merciful ; He 
 hears and graciously receives it from the 
 moving lip. The loud cry of distress in 
 the hour of need, pierces the sky, and heaps 
 burning coals on the head of the oppressor. 
 But more mighty than these is the mute 
 tear of the sufferer, who steadfastly cleaves 
 to his God, even though he dies. It forces 
 the gates of Heaven, bursts locks and bolts, 
 appears before the throne of mercy, and 
 calls down the look of Him, who indeed 
 seeth. — Talmud. 
 
 2. The solemn worship of God is neg- 
 lected in many congregations ; and instead 
 thereof, an indigested form and conception 
 of extemporal prayer is substituted. — Dr. 
 White. 
 
 3. Prayer is public or private; in the 
 communion or society of saints, or in our 
 closets. These prayers have less tempta- 
 tion to vanity, the other have more advan- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 171 
 
 tages of charity, example, fervor and energy. 
 In public offices we avoid singularity, in the 
 private we avoid hypocrisy ; those are of 
 more edification, these of greater retiredness 
 and silence of spirit : those serve the need 
 of all the world in the first intention, and 
 our own by consequence. These serve our 
 own need first, and the public only by a 
 secondary intention: these have more plea- 
 sure, they more duty. These are the best 
 instruments of repentance, where our con- 
 fessions may be more particular, and our 
 shame less scandalous ; the other the better 
 for eucharist and instruction, for edification 
 of the Church, and glorification of God. — 
 Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 PRE-EMINENCE. 
 If you would have your pre-eminence 
 admired in yourself, and not for your pre- 
 decessor's worth, give some specimen of 
 personal merit, that may signalize your 
 character more than those honors which 
 we have always given to them from whom 
 you derive your nobility. — Juvenal. 
 
172 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 PREJUDICE. 
 Prejudice is an equivocal term, and 
 may as well mean right opinions taken 
 upon trust, and deeply rooted in the mind, 
 as false and absurd opinions so derived and 
 grown into it. The former of these will 
 do no hurt ; on the contrary, perhaps, the 
 very best part of education is employed in 
 the culture of them. — Bishop Hurd. 
 
 PREROGATIVE. 
 
 1. They are the best laws, by which 
 the King hath the justest prerogative, and 
 the People the best liberty. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 2. Prerogative, in the hands of a Prince, 
 is a sceptre of gold ; but in the hands of 
 the people a rod of iron. — Thomas Hall. 
 1691. 
 
 PRIDE. 
 Pride is so unsociable a vice, and does 
 all things with so ill a grace, that there is 
 no closing with it. A proud man will be 
 sure to challenge more than belongs to him ; 
 you must expect him stiff in his conversa- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 173 
 
 tion, fulsome in commending himself, and 
 bitter in his reproofs. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 PRUDENCE. 
 
 1. Prudence is that virtue by which we 
 discern what is proper to be done under the 
 various circumstances of time and place. — 
 Milton. 
 
 2. Prudence is a necessary ingredient in 
 all the virtues, without which they degene- 
 rate into folly and excess. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 CHARACTER OF QUEEN ANNE. 
 When was there ever a better Prince on 
 the throne than the present* Queen ? I do 
 not talk of her government, her love of the 
 people, or qualities that are purely regal; 
 but her piety, charity, temperance and con- 
 jugal love. — Swift. 
 
 READING. 
 1. Though reading and conversation 
 may furnish us with many ideas of men 
 
 * What was true in 1704 is equally true in 1851, 
 and Swift's character of Queen Anne is equally appli- 
 cable to Queen Victoria. — Ed. 
 
174 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 and things ; yet it is our own meditation 
 that must form our judgment. — Dr. Isaac 
 Watts. 
 
 2. Reading maketh a full man ; confer- 
 ence a ready man, and writing a correct 
 man ; and therefore, if a man write little, 
 he had need of a great memory ; if he con- 
 fer little, he need have a present wit ; and 
 if he read little, he need have much cun- 
 ning, to seem to know that he doth not. — 
 Lord Bacon. 
 
 3. A man may as well expect to grow 
 stronger by always eating, as wiser by 
 always reading. Too much overcharges 
 nature ; and turns more into disease than 
 nourishment. It is thought and digestion 
 which makes Books serviceable and gives 
 health and vigor to the mind. Books well 
 chosen, neither dull the appetite nor strain 
 the memory ; but refresh the inclinations, 
 strengthen the powers, and improve under 
 experiments. By reading a man does, as it 
 were, ante-date his life and makes himself 
 contemporary with past ages. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 175 
 
 REALITY. 
 The best accounts of the appearances 
 of nature, in any single instance that hu- 
 man penetration can reach, comes infinitely 
 short of its reality and internal constitu- 
 tion ; for who can search out the Almighty's 
 works to perfection? — Dr. Cheyne. 
 
 REASON. 
 1. Many there be that complain of Di- 
 vine Providence, for suffering Adam to 
 transgress. Foolish tongues ! when God 
 gave him Reason, he gave him freedom to 
 choose, for reason is but choosing ; he had 
 been else a mere artificial Adam, such an 
 Adam as he is in the motions.* We our- 
 selves esteem not of that obedience, or 
 love, or gift, which is of force. God there- 
 fore left him free, set before him a provok- 
 ing object, ever almost in his eyes ; herein 
 consisted his merit, herein the right of his 
 reward, the praise of his abstinence. — 
 Milton. 
 
 * In olden times, a puppet-show. — Ed. 
 
170 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 2. Reason is the glory of human nature, 
 and one of the chief eminences whereby 
 we are raised above our fellow creatures, 
 the beasts, in this lower world. — Isaac 
 Watts. 
 
 3. There are few things Reason can dis- 
 cover with so much certainty and ease, as 
 its own insufficiency. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 4. Reason is the director of man's will, 
 discovering in action what is good ; for the 
 laws of well-doing are the dictates of right 
 reason. — Hooker. 
 
 5. It would be well if people would not 
 lay so much weight on their own Reason in 
 matters of Religion, as to think every thing 
 impossible and absurd which they cannot 
 conceive. How often do we contradict 
 the right rules of reason in the whole course 
 of our lives ? Reason itself is true and just, 
 but the reason of every particular man is 
 weak and wavering, perpetually swayed 
 and turned by his interests, his passions, 
 and his vices. — Swift. 
 
 6. Reason in the English language is 
 sometimes taken for true and clear princi- 
 ple ; sometimes for clear and fair deduc- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 177 
 
 tions; sometimes for the cause, particularly 
 the final cause. — Locke. 
 
 7. Reason elevates our thoughts as high 
 as the stars, and leads us through the vast 
 spaces of this mighty fabric : yet it comes 
 far short of the real extent of our corpo- 
 real being. — Ibid. 
 
 THE REFORMATION. , 
 
 It is a singular circumstance, that the 
 Reformation should be indebted for its full 
 establishment in Germany, to the same 
 hand which had formerly brought it to the 
 brink of destruction ; and that both events 
 should be accomplished by the same arts of 
 dissimulation. The ends however which 
 Maurice, the Elector of Saxony, had in 
 view at these different junctures, seem to 
 have been more attended to. than the means 
 by which he attained them. It is no less 
 worthy of observation, that the French king, 
 a Monarch zealous for the Catholic Faith, 
 should at the very same time when he was 
 persecuting his own Protestant subjects 
 with all the fierceness of bigotry, employ 
 his power in order to maintain and protect 
 12 
 
178 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 the Reformation in the empire ; and that 
 the league for this purpose which proved so 
 fatal to the Romish Church, should be ne- 
 gotiated and signed by a Roman Catholic 
 Bishop. So wonderfully doth the wisdom 
 of God superintend and regulate the caprice 
 of human passions, and render them sub- 
 servient towards the accomplishment of his 
 own purposes. — Dr. Robertson. 
 
 REFORMERS. 
 
 t. I can but think it a subject of laugh- 
 ter as well as of wonder, that you take upon 
 yourself to play the Censor, and set up for 
 a reformer of mankind ; for he that assumes 
 a pretension of correcting others, ought to 
 be free from the imputations of the least 
 propensity to vice himself. — Phalaris, 
 Ep. to Cleostratus. 
 
 2. Public Reformers had need first 
 practise on their own hearts, that which 
 they purpose to try on others. — King 
 Charles. 
 
 REGALITY. 
 
 The Majesty of England might hang 
 like Mahomet's tomb, by a magnetic charm, 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 179 
 
 between the privileges of the two Houses, 
 in airy imagination of Regality. — Ibid. 
 
 RELIGION. 
 
 1. By Religion, I mean that general habit 
 of reverence towards the Divine Nature, 
 whereby we are enabled and. inclined to 
 worship God after such a manner as we 
 conceive most agreeable to his will, so as 
 to procure his favor and blessing. — Bishop 
 
 WlLKINS. 
 
 2. Religion is a public virtue, it is the 
 ligature of souls and the great instrument 
 of the conservation of Bodies politic ; and 
 is united in a common object, the God of 
 all the world, and is managed by pub- 
 lic ministeries, by sacrifice, adoration and 
 prayer ; in which, with variety of circum- 
 stances indeed, but with infinite consent 
 and unity of design, all the sons of xldam 
 are taught to worship God. No man can 
 hinder our private addresses to Him, every 
 man can build a chapel in his breast, him- 
 self the Priest, his heart the sacrifice, and 
 the earth he treads on the Altar. — Jeremy 
 Taylor. 
 
180 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 REMORSE. 
 Remorse of conscience is like an old 
 wound : a man is in no condition to fight 
 under such circumstances. The pain abates 
 his vigor and takes up too much of his at- 
 tention. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 REVELATION. 
 
 1. Revelation claims to be the voice of 
 God ; and our obligation to attend to His 
 voice is surely moral in all cases. And as 
 it is insisted that its evidence is conclusive, 
 upon thorough consideration of it ; so it 
 offers itself to us with manifest obvious 
 appearances of having something more than 
 human in it, and therefore in all reason re- 
 quires us to have its claims most seriously 
 examined. — Bishop Butler. 
 
 2. Many writers upon the subject of 
 Moral Philosophy, divide too much the law 
 of nature from the precepts of Revelation ; 
 which appears to me to be much the same 
 defect, as if a commentator on the laws of 
 England, should content himself with stat- 
 ing upon each head the common law of the 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 181 
 
 land, without taking any notice of Acts of 
 Parliament : or should choose to give his 
 readers the common law in one book and 
 the statute law in the other. "When the 
 obligations of morality are taught," says 
 Dr. Johnson in his preface to the Preceptor, 
 "let the sanctions of Christianity never be 
 forgotten ; by which it will be shown that 
 they give strength and lustre to each other ; 
 Religion will appear to be the voice of Rea- 
 son, and Morality the voice of God.*' — 
 Archdeacon Paley. 
 
 3. As the Gospel appears, in respect of 
 the law, to be a clearer Revelation of the 
 mystical part : so is it a far more benign dis- 
 pensation of the practical part. — Bishop 
 Sprat. 
 
 4. The principles of Christianity deeply 
 engraven in the heart, would be infinitely 
 more powerful than the false honor of mon- 
 archies, the human virtues of Republics or 
 the servile fears of Despotic States. — De 
 Montesquieu. 
 
 REVENGE. 
 1. A pure and simple Revenge does in 
 no way restore man towards the felicity 
 
1S2 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 which the injury did interrupt. For revenge 
 is but doing a simple evil, and does not in 
 its formality imply reparation ; for the mere 
 repeating of our own right is permitted to 
 them that will do it by charitable instru- 
 ments. All the ends of human felicity are 
 secured without revenge, for without it we 
 are permitted to restore ourselves ; and 
 therefore it is against natural reason to do 
 an evil, that no way co-operates the proper 
 and perfective end of human nature. And 
 he is a miserable person, whose good is the 
 evil of his neighbor ; and he that revenges, 
 in many cases, does worse than he that did 
 the injury : — in all cases as bad. — Jeremy 
 Taylor. 
 
 2. Revenge, when improved into habit 
 and inclination, is the temper of a tyrant. 
 It is a strong composition of pride and cru- 
 elty, impatient of the least provocation and 
 unconcerned at the mischiefs of a return. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. If revenge was general, and allowed 
 to man, the evil would never end. If the 
 angry wife shall kill her husband, the son 
 will revenge his father's death, the brother 
 will kill his mother's murderer, and he will 
 
A TIIOUGHT-BOOK. 183 
 
 also meet with an avenger for slaying his 
 brother. — Euripides. 
 
 4. Revenge is an act of passion ; ven- 
 geance of justice. Injuries are revenged. 
 crimes are avenged. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
 REVERIES. 
 If the minds of men were laid open, we 
 should see but little difference between that 
 of the wise man and that of the fool ; there 
 are infinite reveries and numberless extrav- 
 agances pass through both. — xIddison. 
 
 RICHES. 
 
 1. Riches do not consist in having more 
 gold and silver, but in having more in pro- 
 portion than our neighbors ; whereby we 
 are enabled to procure to ourselves a greater 
 plenty of the conveniences of life, than 
 comes within their reach, who, sharing the 
 gold and silver of the world in a less pro- 
 portion, want the means of plenty and 
 power, and so are poorer. — Locke. 
 
 2. What riches give us, let us first in- 
 
 quire, 
 Meat, fire and clothes ; what more ? 
 meat, clothes and fire. — Pope. 
 
184 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 RISE AND FALL OF ROME. 
 We have left the Empire of Rome, the 
 last of the four great Monarchies of the 
 world, flourishing in the middle of the 
 field, having rooted up or cut down all 
 that kept it from the eyes and admiration 
 of the world. But after some continuance, 
 it shall begin to lose the beauty it had ; 
 the storms of ambition shall beat her great 
 boughs and branches one against another, 
 her leaves shall fall off, her limbs wither, 
 and a rabble of barbarous nations shall 
 enter the field and cut her down. — Sir 
 Walter Raleigh. 
 
 RIVALRY. 
 It is the privilege of posterity, to set 
 matters right between those antagonists, 
 who, by their rivalry for greatness, divided 
 a whole age. — Addison. 
 
 ROBBERY. 
 The robber must run, ride, and use all 
 the desperate ways of escape he can find ; 
 and probably, after all, his crime betrays 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 185 
 
 him to the gaol, and from thence advances 
 him to the gibbet. — Dr. South. 
 
 RUDIMENTS. 
 Could it be believed, that a child should 
 be forced to learn the rudiments of a lan- 
 guage, which he is never to use, and neg- 
 lect the writing a good hand, and casting 
 accounts ? — Locke. 
 
 SAGACITY. 
 Sagacity finds out the intermediate ideas, 
 to discover what connection there is in each 
 link of the chain, whereby the extremes 
 are held together. — Locke. 
 
 SAPIENCE. 
 By Sapience, I mean what the ancients 
 did by philosophy, the habit or disposition 
 of mind which importeth the love of Wis- 
 dom. — Grew. 
 
 SARCASMS. 
 When an angry master says to his ser- 
 vant, it is bravely done, it is one way of 
 giving a severe reproach ; for the words are 
 
186 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 spoken by way of sarcasm or irony. — Dr. 
 Isaac Watts. 
 
 SATIRE. 
 
 1. He that hath a satirical vein, as 
 maketh others afraid of his wit, so he need 
 be afraid of others' memory. — Lord Ba- 
 con. 
 
 2. All vain pretenders have been con- 
 stantly the topics of the most candid satir- 
 ists, from the Codrus of Juvenal to the 
 Damon of Boileau. — Cleveland. 
 
 3. Should a writer single out and point 
 his raillery at particular persons or satirize 
 the miserable, he might be sure to please a 
 great part of his readers ; but he must be a 
 very ill man if he could please himself. — 
 Addison. 
 
 4. Satire and invective are the easiest 
 kind of wit. Almost any degree of it will 
 serve to abuse and find fault. For wit is 
 a keen instrument, and every one can cut 
 and thrust with it ; but to carve a beauti- 
 ful statue, and to polish it, requires great 
 art and dexterity. To praise any thing 
 well, is an argument of much more wit 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 18? 
 
 than to abuse. A little wit and a great 
 deal of ill nature will furnish a man for 
 satire, but the greatest instance of wit is to 
 commend well. And perhaps the best 
 things are the hardest to be duly com- 
 mended. For although there be a great 
 deal of matter to work upon, yet there is 
 great judgment required to make choice, 
 and where the subject is great and excel- 
 lent, it is difficult not to sink below the 
 dignity of it. — Archbishop Tillotson. 
 
 5. It is as hard to satirize well a man of 
 distinguished vices, as to praise well a man 
 of distinguished virtues. — Swift. 
 
 6. On me, when dunces are satiric 
 
 I take it for a panegyric. — Ibid. 
 
 7. You must not think, that a satiric 
 style allows of scandalous and brutish 
 words. — Roscommon. 
 
 8. A satire should expose nothing but 
 what is corrigible ; and should make a due 
 discrimination between those that are, and 
 those that are not the proper objects of it. 
 — Addison. 
 
188 A TEOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 SELF-CONCEIT. 
 Self-conceit is a weighty quality, and 
 will sometimes bring down the scale when 
 there is nothing else in it. It magnifies a 
 fault beyond proportion, and swells every 
 omission into an outrage. — Jeremy Col- 
 lier. 
 
 SELF-DENIAL. 
 J Tis much the doctrine of the times that 
 men should not please themselves, but deny 
 themselves every thing they take delight 
 in ; not to look upon Beauty, wear no good 
 clothing, eat no good meat. The truth is, 
 they that preach against them cannot make 
 use of them themselves ; and then again, 
 they gain esteem by seeming to contemn 
 them. But, mark it while you live, if they 
 do not please themselves as much as they 
 can. — Selden. 
 
 SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 
 1. We must regard ourselves as crimi- 
 nals, whose prison is filled with represen- 
 tations of their deliverers, and with the 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 189 
 
 requisite directions for obtaining their free- 
 dom. But it must be confessed that we 
 cannot read these sacred symbols without 
 a supernatural light ; for as all things speak 
 of God to those who know Him, and reveal 
 Him to those who love Him ; these very 
 things yet tend to obscure him from those 
 who know him not. — Pascal. 
 
 2. Pleasure of what kind soever, is but 
 an agreement between the object and the 
 faculty. This description, if well applied, 
 will give us the true height of ourselves 
 and tell us what size we are. If little 
 things will please us, we may conclude 
 that we are none of the biggest people. 
 Children are as well known by their diver- 
 sions, as by their stature. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 SELF-PRAISE. 
 A man's praises have very musical and 
 charming accents in another's mouth ; but 
 very flat and untuneable in his own. — 
 Xenophon. 
 
 SELF-TEACHING. 
 
 Yert few men are wise by their own 
 counsel, or learned by their own teaching; 
 
190 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 for he that was only taught by himself, 
 had a fool for a master. — Ben Jonson. 
 
 THE SENSES. 
 1. The Creator has given us eyes, by 
 the assistance of which, we discern the 
 works of creation. He has, moreover, 
 endowed us with the power of tasting, by 
 which we perceive the parts entering into 
 the composition of bodies : of smelling, 
 that we may catch their subtle exhalations ; 
 of hearing, that we may receive the sound 
 of bodies around us ; and of touching, 
 that we may examine their surfaces ; and 
 all for the purpose of our comprehending, 
 in some measure, the wisdom of His works. 
 The same instruments of sensation are be- 
 stowed on many other animals, who see, 
 hear, smell, taste and feel ; but they want 
 the faculty, which is granted us, of com- 
 bining these sensations, and from thence 
 drawing universal conclusions. When we 
 subject the human body to the knife of the 
 anatomist, in order to find in the structure 
 of its internal organs, something which we 
 do not observe in other animals, to account 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 191 
 
 for this operation, we are obliged to own 
 the vanity of our researches ; and must 
 therefore necessarily ascribe this preroga- 
 tive to something altogether immaterial, 
 which the Creator has given to man alone, 
 and which we call Soul. — Linnjeus. 
 
 2. Of the five senses, two are usually 
 and most properly called the Senses of 
 Learning, as being most capable of receiv- 
 ing communication of thought and motions, 
 by selected signs : and these are hearing 
 and seeing. — Dr. Holder. 
 
 3. The lower your senses are kept, the 
 better you may govern them. Appetite 
 and Reason are commonly like two buck- 
 ets, when one is at the top, the other is at 
 the bottom. Now of the two, I had rather 
 the Reason-bucket be uppermost. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 SENSUALITY. 
 1. We are so incorporated to the desires 
 of sensual objects, that we feel no relish 
 or gust of the spiritual. It is as if a lion 
 should eat hay, or an ox venison ; there is 
 no proportion between the object and the 
 
192 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 appetite, till, by mortification of our first 
 desires, our wills are made spiritual, and our 
 apprehensions supernatural and clarified. 
 For as a cook told Dionysius the Tyrant, 
 the black broth of Lacedemon would not 
 do well at Syracuse, unless it be tasted by 
 a Spartan palate ; so neither can the excel- 
 lencies of Heaven be discerned, but by a 
 spirit disrelishing the sottish appetites of 
 the world, and accustomed to diviner ban- 
 quets. And this was mystically signified 
 by the two altars in Solomon's Temple ; 
 in the outer court whereof, beasts were 
 sacrificed, in the inner court an altar of 
 incense; the first representing Mortification, 
 or slaying of our beastly appetites ; the 
 second the offering up of prayers, which 
 are not likely to become a pleasant offertory, 
 unless our impurities be removed by the 
 atonement made by the previous sacrifices. 
 — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. Men in general are too partial in favor 
 of a sensual appetite, to take notice of 
 Truth, when they have found it. — L'Es- 
 
 TRANGE. 
 
A THOUGHT-LOOK. 193 
 
 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY'S LAST WORDS. 
 After long * and severe suffering from 
 the wound he had received, finding himself 
 past all hope of recovery, he prepared for 
 death with the greatest composure, and as- 
 sembled the clergymen of divers nations, 
 who were there, he made a full confession 
 of his Christian faith. The closing scene 
 of his life was the parting with his brother, 
 Sir Robert Sidney, of whom he took leave 
 in these words: "Love my memory, cher- 
 ish my friends ; their faith to me may assure 
 you they are sincere : but above all. govern 
 your will and affections by the will and 
 word of your Creator ; in me beholding 
 the end of the world, and all her vanities." 
 — Sir Fulk Greville. 
 
 SLANDER. 
 
 1. Slander is a secret propensity of the 
 
 mind to think ill of all men, and after- 
 
 * He was wounded on the 22d September, 1585, at 
 Zutphen, in the Netherlands, and died the 17th Octo- 
 ber following, at Arnheim. — Ed. 
 13 
 
194 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 wards to utter such sentiments in scanda- 
 lous expressions. — Theophrastus. 
 
 2. If any one speak ill of thee, consider 
 whether he hath truth on his side ; and if 
 so, reform thyself, that his censures may 
 not affect thee. — Epictetus. 
 
 3. As for those terrible names of secta- 
 ries and schismatics, which ye have got 
 together, we know your manner of fight; 
 when the quiver of your arguments, which 
 is ever thin and weakly stored, after the 
 first brunt is quite empty, your course is to 
 betake ye to your other quiver of slander, 
 wherein lies your best archery. And whom 
 you could not move by sophistical arguing, 
 then you think to confute by scandalous 
 misnaming ; thereby inciting the blinder 
 sort of people to mislike and deride sound 
 doctrine and good Christianity, under two 
 or three vile and hateful terms. — Milton. 
 
 4. We ought not to be dejected by the 
 slanders and calumnies of bad men ; be- 
 cause our integrity will be declared by Him 
 who cannot err in judgment. — Nelson. 
 
 5. As by flattery a man opens his bosom 
 to his mortal enemy ; so by detraction and 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 195 
 
 slander, he shuts the same to his best 
 friends. — Dr. South. 
 
 SLOTH. 
 
 1. The very soul of the slothful does 
 effectually but lie drowsing in his body, 
 and the whole man is totally given up to 
 his senses. — L'Estrange. 
 
 2. Sloth is an inlet to disorder, and 
 makes way for licentiousness. People that 
 have nothing to do, are quickly tired of 
 their own company. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. Excess is not the only thing which 
 breaks men in their health, and in the com- 
 fortable enjoyment of themselves ; but many 
 are brought into a very ill and languishing 
 habit of body, by mere sloth ; and sloth is 
 in itself both a great sin, and the cause of 
 many more. — Dr. South. 
 
 SLOVENLINESS. 
 Slovenliness is a lazy and beastly negli- 
 gence of a man's own person, whereby he 
 becomes so sordid as to be offensive to 
 those about him. — Theophrastus. 
 
196 A THOUGHT-LOOK. 
 
 SLUGGISHNESS. 
 It is of great moment to teach the mind 
 to shake off its sluggishness, and vigorously 
 employ itself about what Reason shall di- 
 rect. — Locke. 
 
 SLUMBER. 
 From carelessness it will fall into slum- 
 ber, and from a slumber it will settle into a 
 deep and long sleep ; till at last, perhaps, 
 it will sleep itself into a lethargy, and that 
 such one, that nothing but Hell and Judg- 
 ment can awake it. — Dr. South. 
 
 SMILES. 
 1. Sweet intercourse 
 
 Of looks and smiles ; for smiles from 
 
 reason flow, 
 
 To brute denied, and are of love the 
 
 food. — Milton. 
 
 2. Of all the appearances of the human 
 
 countenance, methinks a smile is the most 
 
 extraordinary. It plays with a surprizing 
 
 agreeableness in the eye, breaks out with 
 
 the brightest distinction, and sits like a 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 197 
 
 glory upon the countenance. What sun is 
 there within us, that shoots his rays with 
 so sudden a vigor? To see the soul flash 
 in the face at this rate, one would think 
 would convert an atheist. By the way, 
 we may observe that smiles are much more 
 becoming than frowns. This seems a natu- 
 ral encouragement to good humor ; as much 
 as to say, if people have a mind to be hand- 
 some, they must not be peevish and un- 
 toward. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 SOLITUDE. 
 
 1. He that is pleased with solitude must 
 be either a wild beast or a god. — Aris- 
 totle. 
 
 2. Eagles fly alone, and they are but 
 sheep which always herd together. — Sir 
 Philip Sidney. 
 
 3. The Solitude of a youth of genius 
 has a local influence ; it is full of his own 
 creations of his unmarked passions, and his 
 uncertain thoughts. The titles which he 
 gives his favorite haunts, often intimate the 
 bent of his mind — its employment or its 
 purpose ; as Petrarch called his retreat Lin- 
 
19S A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 tenium, after that of his hero Scipio ; and 
 a young poet, from some favorite descrip- 
 tion in Cowley, called a spot he loved to 
 muse in "Cowley's walk." — D'Israeli. 
 
 4. Solitude is a good school, but the 
 world is the best theatre ; the institution is 
 best there, but the practice here ; the wil- 
 derness hath the advantage of discipline, 
 and society opportunities of perfection. — 
 Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 5. It had been hard to have put more 
 truth and untruth together, in a few words, 
 than in that speech, " Whosoever is de- 
 lighted with solitude, is either a wild beast 
 or a god." — Lord Bacox. 
 
 6. Such only can enjoy the country, 
 who are capable of thinking when they are 
 there : then they are prepared for solitude, 
 and in that, solitude is prepared for them. — 
 Dryden. 
 
 7. You subject yourself to solitude : the 
 sly enemy that doth separate a man from 
 well doing. — Sir Philip Sidney. 
 
 SOUL AND BODY. 
 If one had nothing but a soul to keep, 
 he need not go to service to maintain it. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 199 
 
 But a body is a very indigent sort of a 
 thing, it cannot subsist upon its own growth, 
 but stands in want of continual supplies. 
 This circumstance of eating and drinking, 
 is a cruel check upon many a man's digni- 
 ties, and makes him hold his life by a very 
 servile tenure. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 SPIRITUAL LEARNING. 
 
 Of spiritual learning I may say, that the 
 secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven are not 
 truly and thoroughly understood, but by 
 the Sons of the Kingdom; and by them in 
 several degrees and to various purposes. 
 But to evil persons the whole system of this 
 wisdom is insipid and flat ; dull as the foot 
 of a rock, and unlearned as are the elements 
 of our mother tongue. But so are mathe- 
 matics to a Scythian* boor and music to a 
 camel. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 * The learned Prelate probably alludes to the ancient 
 proverb Anacharsis inter Scythos, meaning a scarce per- 
 son, Anacharsis being the only philosopher on record, 
 who was a native of that rude country. — Ed. 
 
200 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 SUBLIMITY. 
 
 1. In respect of God's incomprehensible 
 sublimity and purity, this is also true, that 
 God is neither a mind nor a spirit like other 
 spirits, nor a light such as can be seen. — 
 Sir W alter Raleigu. 
 
 2. Of all the descriptions I ever read, 
 there is no one that seems to me so awful 
 and so tremendous, as the descent of God 
 upon Mount Horeb and the amazing phce- 
 nomena that attended it. The pomp pre- 
 tended to by Pagan deities, when set off by 
 the grandeur of Poetry and the magic of 
 numbers, is uncouth, ridiculous and pro- 
 fane. The procession of Bacchus as de- 
 scribed by Ovid (lib. iii.) is neither more 
 nor less than a downright drunken riot, or 
 the brutal pastime of a disorderly country 
 wake. The boisterous expedition of Nep- 
 tune, even as painted by the great master 
 Homer (Iliad xiii.) represents nothing more 
 august than the roaring of London bridge, 
 or a rabble of sea monsters frisking in a 
 storm. Nay, that famous speech of Jupiter 
 (Iliad xviii.) where he maintains his super- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 201 
 
 eminence by shaking Olympus with his 
 imperial nod, and menacing his refractory 
 offspring, in case they should rebel, though 
 it certainly is embellished with the ut- 
 most force of words and stretch of art, is, 
 at the best, but a lame and imperfect copy, 
 in the main strokes of it. from the native 
 majesty of the unlabored prose of the nine- 
 teenth chapter of Exodus. It must be ad- 
 mitted, however, that our English Poet 
 Milton has, in several places, described the 
 usual display of the Divine Majesty in a 
 very magnificent manner : 
 
 " Clouds began 
 To darken all the hill, and smoak to roll 
 In dusky wreathes, reluctant flames, the sight 
 Of wrath awak'd : nor with less dread the loud 
 Etherial trumpet from on high 'gan blow, 
 At which command the powers militant, 
 That stood for Heav'n, in mighty quadrate join'd 
 Of union irresistible, mov'd on 
 In silence their bright legions, to the sound 
 Of instrumental harmony." 
 
 Again, 
 
 " He on his impious foes right onward drove 
 Gloomy as night : under his burning wheels 
 The stedfast Empyrean shoots throughout, 
 All but the throne of God." 
 
202 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 And again, 
 
 " He ended, and the sun gave signal high 
 To the bright minister that watch 'd ; he blew 
 His trumpet, heard on Oreb, since perhaps 
 When God descended, and perhaps once more 
 To sound the general doom." 
 
 Par. Lost. Lib. vi. and xi. 
 Stackhouse. 
 
 SUCCESS. 
 
 1. Success produces confidence, confi- 
 dence relaxes industry, and negligence 
 ruins that reputation which accuracy had 
 raised. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
 2. He that would relish success to a good 
 purpose, should keep his passions cool, and 
 his expectations low ; and then, it is possi- 
 ble that his fortune might exceed his fancy ; 
 for an advantage always rises by surprise, 
 and is almost always doubled by being un- 
 looked for. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. An opinion in the success of a work, 
 is as necessary to found a purpose of under- 
 taking it, as the authority of commands or 
 the persuasiveness of promises. — Dr. Ham- 
 mond. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 203 
 
 SUDDEN DEATH. 
 Since God hath not told us we shall not 
 die suddenly, is it not certain he intended we 
 should prepare for sudden death, as well as 
 against death clothed in any other circum- 
 stances? Fabius Pictor was choked with 
 a hair in a mess of milk, Anacreon with a 
 raisin, Cardinal Colonna with figs crusted 
 with ice, Adrian the Fourth with a fly, Dru- 
 sus Pompeius with a pear, Domitius Afer, 
 Quintilianus' tutor, with a full cup, Casimir 
 the Second, king of Polonia, with a little 
 draught of wine, Amurath with a full gob- 
 let, Tarquinius Priscus with a fish-bone. 
 For as soon as a man is born, that which 
 in nature only remains to him, is to die ; 
 and if we differ in the way or time of our 
 abode, or the manner of our exit, yet we 
 are even at last : and since it is not deter- 
 mined by a natural cause, which way we 
 shall go, or at what age ; a wise man will 
 suppose himself always upon his death-bed ; 
 and such supposition is like making his 
 Will ; he is not nearer death for making 
 it, but he is the readier for it when it 
 comes. 
 
204 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 Saint Jerome said well : " He deserves 
 not the name of a Christian, who will live 
 in that state of life in which he would not 
 die : " and indeed it is a great venture to 
 be in an evil state of life ; because every 
 minute of it hath a danger. And therefore 
 a succession of actions, in every one of 
 which he may as well perish as escape, is a 
 boldness that hath no mixture of wisdom or 
 probable venture. How many persons have 
 died in the midst of an act of sport, or at a 
 merry meeting ? Grimcaldus, a Lombard 
 king, died with shooting a pigeon ; Thales, 
 the Miletian, in the theatre; Lucia, the sister 
 of Aurelius the Emperor, playing with her 
 little son, was wounded in the breast with 
 a needle, and died. Benno, Bishop of Adel- 
 berg, with great ceremony and joy conse- 
 crating St. Michael's church, was crowded 
 to death by the people ; so was the Duke 
 of Saxony at the inauguration of* Albert 
 I. The great lawyer f Baldus, playing 
 with a little dog, was bitten upon the lip, 
 instantly grew mad and perished. Charles 
 
 # Cranzius, Lib. iii. Cap. 51. 
 | Matthiolus, in Dioscorides. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 205 
 
 the eighth of France, seeing certain men 
 play at tennis-court, swooned and recovered 
 not. Henry the Second was killed running 
 . at tilt ; Ludoyjco Borgia with riding the 
 great horse : and the old Syracusan Archi- 
 medes was slain by a rude soldier, as he 
 was making diagrams in the sand, which 
 was his greatest pleasure. How many 
 men have died laughing, or in the ecstasies 
 of a great joy?* Phillipides the come- 
 dian, and Dyonisius the tyrant of Sicily, 
 died with joy at the news of a victory, j" 
 Diagorus of Rhodes, and Chilon the phi- 
 losopher, expired in the embraces of their 
 sons, crowned with an Olympic laurel. J 
 Polycrita Maxia, being saluted the sa- 
 viouress of her country ; Marcus Jovius, 
 when the Senate decreed him honors ; the 
 Emperor § Conrad the Second, when he 
 triumphed after the Conquest of Italy, had 
 a joy bigger than their heart, and their 
 fancy swelled it till they burst and died. 
 
 * Plin. Lib. vii. cap. 53. 
 
 f Cicero. Tusc. quaest. i. 
 
 % Pixt. et Gell. de illust. niulier. 
 
 § CuSPDflAN. 
 
206 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 Death can enter in at any door ; Philis- 
 tion of Nice, died with excessive laughter ; 
 so did the poet Philemon, being provoked 
 to it only by seeing an ass eat figs. And 
 the number of persons who have been 
 found suddenly dead in their beds is so 
 great, that it engages many to a more cer- 
 tain and regular devotion for their compline, 
 so it were well it were pursued to the ut- 
 most intention of God ! that is, that all the 
 parts of religion should, with zeal and assi- 
 duity, be entertained and finished, that, as 
 it becomes wise men, we never be surprised 
 with that which we are sure will some time 
 or other happen. A great general in Italy, 
 at the sudden death of Alphonzo of Fer- 
 rara, and Ludovico Corbinelli, at the sight 
 of the sad accident upon Henry II. of 
 France, before mentioned, turned religious, 
 and did what God intended in those deaths. 
 It concerns us to be curious of single ac- 
 tions, because even in those shorter periods 
 we may expire and find our graves. But 
 if the state of life be contradictory to our 
 hopes of Heaven, it is like affronting a 
 cannon before a beleaguered town a month 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 207 
 
 together. It is a contempt of safety, and a 
 rendering all reason useless and unprofitable. 
 But he only is wise, who, having made 
 death familiar to him by expectation and 
 daily apprehension, does at all instants go 
 forth to meet it. The wise virgins went 
 forth to meet the bridegroom, for they were 
 ready. Excellent, therefore, is the advice 
 of the son of Sirach,* " use physic or ever 
 thou be sick ; before judgment examine 
 thyself, and in the day of visitation thou 
 shalt find mercy. Humble thyself before 
 thou be sick, and in the time of sins show 
 repentance ; let nothing hinder thee to pay 
 thy vows in due time, and defer not until 
 death to be justified." — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 SUPERSTITION. 
 
 There is superstition in shunning super- 
 stition, and he that disdains to follow Reli- 
 gion in the open and trodden path, may 
 chance to lose his way in the trackless 
 wilds of experiment, or in the obscure laby- 
 rinths of speculation. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 * Ecclus. xviii. 19, et seq. 
 
20S A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 SUSPICION. 
 
 1. Suspicion disposes kings to tyranny 
 and husbands to jealousy. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 2. Suspicions among thoughts are like 
 bats amongst birds — they ever fly to twi- 
 light : they are to be repressed, or, at least, 
 well guarded, for they cloud the mind. — 
 Ibid. 
 
 SWEARING. 
 
 1. Of all men, a philosopher should be 
 no swearer : for an oath, which is the end 
 of controversies in law, cannot determine 
 any here, where reason only must induce. 
 — Sir Thomas Browne. 
 
 2. Take not His name, who made thy 
 
 tongue, in vain; 
 It gets thee nothing, and hath no 
 excuse. 
 Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, 
 
 TALENTS MISPLACED. 
 Vainly is wit lavished upon fugitive top- 
 ics ; little can Architecture secure duration 
 if the ground is false. — Dr. Johnson. 
 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. '209 
 
 TALK. 
 
 1. How cometh it to pass, that Ceesar's 
 and Cicero's talk is so natural and plain, 
 and Sallust's writing so artificial and dark, 
 when all three lived at one time ? I will 
 freely tell you my fancy herein. Surely 
 Caesar and Cicero, beside a singular prerog- 
 ative of natural eloquence given unto them 
 by God : both two, by use of life, were 
 daily orators among the common people, 
 and greatest counsellors in the Senate- 
 house ; and therefore gave themselves to 
 use such speeches as the meanest should 
 well understand, and the wisest best allow : 
 following carefully that good counsel of 
 Aristotle, Loqaendiim ad multi, sapiendum 
 ut paaci. — Roger Ascham. 
 
 2. It is a difficult thing to talk to the 
 purpose, and to put life and perspicuity into 
 our discourses. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 TEMPERANCE. 
 
 1. Beware of such food as persuades a 
 man, though he be not hungry, to eat them ; 
 and those liquors that will prevail with a man 
 14 
 
210 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 to drink them, when he is not thirsty. — 
 Socrates. 
 
 2. Make Temperance thy companion, 
 so shall health sit on thy brow. — Dodsley. 
 
 3. Observe 
 The rule of not too much ; by tem- 
 perance taught 
 
 In what thou eat'st and drinlrst : seek- 
 ing from thence 
 
 Due nourishment, not gluttonous de- 
 light. — Milton. 
 
 4. Temperance, that virtue without 
 pride and fortune without envy, gives 
 health of body and tranquillity of mind ; 
 the best guardian of youth and support of 
 old age. — Sir William Temple. 
 
 5. Temperance keeps the senses clear 
 and unembarrassed, and makes them seize 
 the object with more keenness and satisfac- 
 tion. It appears with life in the face, and 
 decorum in the person ; it gives you the 
 command of your head, secures your health 
 and preserves you in a condition for busi- 
 ness. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 211 
 
 TEMPLES TO THE DEITY. 
 
 1. ;: The Heaven is my throne and the 
 earth is my footstool, where is the house 
 that ye build unto me ? " # All civilized 
 nations dwell in houses: thence the idea 
 naturally arose in the minds of men to build 
 a House for God, in which they can adore 
 Him and seek Him, both in their fears and 
 in their hopes. Nothing, indeed, can be 
 more consoling to the hearts of men, than 
 to assemble in one place, where they all, 
 with one accord, give utterance to those 
 supplications which their wants and a sense 
 of their weakness dictate. — De Montes- 
 quieu. 
 
 2. God has created me, God is within 
 me, I carry him about every where. Shall 
 I defile him with obscene thoughts, unjust 
 actions, or infamous desires ? My duty is 
 to thank God for every thing, to praise him 
 for every thing, and to thank, praise and 
 serve him continually while I have life. — 
 Epictetus. 
 
 # Isaiah Lxvi. 1. 
 
212 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 3. " Know ye not that ye are the Tem- 
 ple of God, and that the spirit of God 
 dwelleth in you." # — St. Paul. 
 
 4. Most sacrilegious murther hath broke 
 
 ope 
 The Lord's anointed Temple, and 
 
 stole thence 
 The life o' th' Building. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 TEMPORAL ENDS. 
 Call not every temporal end a defiling 
 of the intention, but only when it contra- 
 dicts the ends of God, or when it is princi- 
 pally intended ; for sometimes a temporal 
 end is part of our duty ; and such are all 
 the actions of our calling. — Jeremy Tay- 
 lor. 
 
 THE NUMBER TEN. 
 Ten has been extolled as containing 
 even, odd, long and plain, quadrate and 
 cubical numbers ; and Aristotle observed, 
 that Barbarians as well as Greeks used a 
 numeration unto ten. — Sir Thomas Brown. 
 
 * 1 Cor. iii. 16. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 213 
 
 THOUGHT. 
 
 1. Thought, if translated truly, cannot 
 be lost in another language ; but the words 
 that convey it to our apprehension, which 
 are the image and ornament of that thought, 
 may be so ill chosen as to make it appear 
 unhandsome. — Dryden. 
 
 2. One may often find as much thought 
 on the reverse of a medal as in a canto of 
 Spenser. — Addison. 
 
 TIME. 
 
 1. Time is like a river, in which metals 
 and solid substances are sunk, while chaff 
 and straws swim upon the surface. — Lord 
 Bacon. 
 
 2. Time, which consisteth of parts, can 
 be no part of infinite duration or of eter- 
 nity ; for then there would be an infinite 
 time past to-day, which to-morrow would 
 be more than infinite. Time is one thing, 
 and infinite duration is another. — Grew. 
 
 3. This consideration of duration, as set 
 out by certain periods, and marked by cer- 
 tain measures or epochs, is that which most 
 properly we call Time. — Locke. 
 
214 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 4. We may gain the idea of Time, or 
 duration, by reflecting on that train of 
 thoughts which succeed one another in our 
 minds. That for this reason, when we 
 sleep soundly without dreaming, we have 
 no perception of time or of the length of 
 it whilst we sleep ; and that the moment 
 wherein we leave off to think till the mo- 
 ment we begin to think again, seems to 
 have no distance. And so I doubt not but 
 it would be to a waking man, if it were 
 possible for him to keep only one idea in 
 his mind without variation and the succes- 
 sion of others: and we see that one who 
 fixes his thoughts very intently on one 
 thing, so as to take but little notice of the 
 succession of ideas that pass in his mind 
 whilst he is taken up with that earnest con- 
 templation, lets slip out of his account a 
 good part of that duration, and thinks that 
 time shorter than it is. — Ibid. 
 
 5. The answer to one who asked, What 
 is Time ? was, si non rogas intelligo ; that 
 is, the more I think of Time the less I un- 
 derstand it, might persuade one that Time 
 which reveals all other things, is itself not 
 to be discovered. — Ibid. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 215 
 
 6. It is possible that some creatures may 
 think half an hour as long as a thousand 
 years ; or look upon that space of duration, 
 which we call a minute, as an hour, a week, 
 a month, or a whole age. — Pere Male- 
 
 BRANCHE. 
 
 TIMIDITY. 
 I confess that I am exceedingly timo- 
 rous ; for I dare not do an evil thing. — 
 Xenophanes. 
 
 TITLES. 
 1. As Virtue is the most reasonable and 
 genuine source of Honor, we expect to find 
 in titles an intimation of some particular 
 merit that should recommend men to the 
 high stations which they possess. Holi- 
 ness is ascribed to the Pope ; Majesty to 
 Kings ; Serenity, or mildness of temper, to 
 Princes ; Excellence, or perfection, to Am- 
 bassadors ; Grace to Archbishops ; Honor 
 to Peers ; Worship, or venerable behavior, 
 to Magistrates ; and Reverence, which is 
 of the same import as the former, to the 
 inferior Clergy. The death-bed shows the 
 
216 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 emptiness of titles in a true light. A poor 
 dispirited sinner lies trembling under the 
 apprehensions of the state he is entering 
 on ; and is asked by a grave attendant how 
 his Holiness does? Another hears himself 
 addressed under the title of Highness or 
 Excellency, who lies under such mean cir- 
 cumstances of mortality, as appear almost a 
 disgrace to human nature. Titles, at such 
 a time, look rather like insults and mockery 
 than respect. The truth is, Honors are 
 not, in this world, under sufficient regula- 
 tion ; true quality is frequently neglected, 
 virtue oppressed, and vice triumphant. The 
 last Day will rectify this disaster, and assign 
 to every one a station suitable to the dig- 
 nity of his character ; ranks will then be 
 adjusted, and precedency set right. — Addi- 
 son. 
 2. Man over men 
 
 He made not Lord : such title to himself 
 Reserving. — Milton. 
 
 TRANSMIGRATION OF SCIENCE. 
 I cannot better compare the transmigra- 
 tions of science and art, than to the circu- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 217 
 
 lation of the blood : and I foresee that they 
 Avill one time or another forsake England, 
 France and Germany, and settle among us, 
 for many ages, to return into Greece, their 
 first abode. — Peter the Great. 
 
 TRANSLATION. 
 
 1. Whosoever wishes to translate a work 
 faithfully, must avoid rendering it literally, 
 and must not be tied down by the too 
 anxious study to adhere to the precise word- 
 ing of the original. He should, on the 
 contrary, seize upon the precise meaning of 
 entire sentences, and then render that mean- 
 ing in such phrases as are most in accord- 
 ance with the idiom and genius of the 
 language in which he is writing. — Mai- 
 
 MONIDES. 
 
 2. No translation our own country ever 
 yet produced, hath come up to that of the 
 Old and New Testament; and I am per- 
 suaded that the translators of the Bible 
 were masters of an English style, much 
 fitter for that work, than any we see in our 
 present writings : the which is owing to 
 the simplicity that runs through the whole. 
 — Ibid. 
 
218 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 t 
 
 TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 
 
 1. How is a Romanist prepared easily to 
 swallow, not only against all probability, 
 but even the clear evidence of his senses, 
 the doctrine of transubstantiation ? — Locke. 
 
 2. The substance of the body of Christ 
 was not every where seen, nor did it every 
 where suffer death ; every where it could 
 not be entombed ; it is not every where 
 now, being exalted into Heaven. — Dr. 
 Hooker. 
 
 3. Consubstantiation,* and above all 
 the Papistical doctrine of transubstantiation, 
 or rather anthropophagy, for it deserves no 
 better name, are irreconcileable, not only 
 with reason and common sense, and the 
 habits of mankind, but with the testimony 
 of Scripture, with the nature and end of a 
 Sacrament, with the analogy of baptism, 
 with the ordinary forms of language, with 
 the human nature of Christ, and, finally, 
 with the state of glory in which he is to 
 remain till the day of Judgment. — Milton. 
 
 # The Lutherans hold consubstantiation ; an error 
 indeed, but not mortal. — J. M. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 219 
 
 TRAVEL. 
 
 1. Travel, in the younger sort, is a part 
 of education ; in the elder, a part of expe- 
 rience. — Lord Bacon. 
 
 2. He that travelleth a country before 
 he hath some entry into the language, 
 goeth to school, and not to travel. — Ibid. 
 
 3. In those vernal seasons of the year, 
 when the air is calm and pleasant, it were 
 an injury and sullenness against nature, not 
 to go out and see her riches, and partake in 
 her rejoicings with heaven and earth. I 
 should not therefore be a persuader to them * 
 of studying much then, after two or three 
 years that they have laid their grounds, but 
 to ride out in companies with prudent and 
 staid guides, to all quarters of the land, 
 learning and observing all places of strength, 
 all commodities of building and of soil for 
 towns and tillage, harbors and ports for 
 trade ; sometimes taking sea as far as to our 
 navy, to learn there also what they can on 
 the practical knowledge of sailing and of 
 sea fight. These \tays would try all their 
 
 * His pupils. 
 
220 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 peculiar gifts of nature ; and if there were 
 any secret excellence among them, would 
 fetch it out, and give it fair opportunities 
 to advance itself by, which could not but 
 mightily redound to the good of the nation, 
 and bring into fashion again those old ad- 
 mired virtues and excellencies, with far 
 more advantage, now in this purity of 
 Christian knowledge. But if they desire 
 to see other countries at three or four and 
 twenty years of age, not to learn principles, 
 but to enlarge experience, and to make 
 wise observations, they will, by that time, 
 be such as shall deserve the regard and 
 honor of all men where they pass, and the 
 society and friendship of those in all places, 
 who are best and most eminent ; and, per- 
 haps, then other nations will be glad to 
 visit us for their breeding, or else to imitate 
 us in their own country. — Milton. 
 
 4. Cicero did not set out on his travels 
 until he had completed his education at 
 home ; and after he had acquired, in his 
 own country, whatever was proper to form 
 a worthy citizen and magistrate of Rome, 
 he was confirmed by a maturity of age and 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 221 
 
 reason, against the impressions of vice. In 
 a tour the most delightful of the world, he 
 saw every thing that could entertain a cu- 
 rious traveller ; yet stayed nowhere any 
 longer than his benefit, not his pleasure, 
 detained him. By his previous knowledge 
 of the laws of Rome, he was able to com- 
 pare them with those of other cities, and 
 to bring back with him whatever he found 
 useful, either to his country or himself. 
 He was lodged wherever he came, in the 
 houses of the great and eminent, not so 
 much for their birth and wealth, as for their 
 virtue, knowledge and learning. These 
 he made the constant companions of his 
 travels. It is therefore no wonder that he 
 brought back every accomplishment that 
 could improve and adorn a man of sense. — 
 Dr. Conyers Middletox. 
 
 5. I am of opinion that Travels belong 
 to History and not to Romance. I have, 
 therefore, not described countries as more 
 beautiful than they appeared to me ; I have 
 not represented their inhabitants more vir- 
 tuous nor more wicked than I found them. 
 — Count de Volney. 
 
222 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 6. It is not uncommon to meet with 
 travellers, who are ignorant of many things 
 in their oivn country, with which they 
 might be acquainted without difficulty. 
 The French are remarkable for this defect, 
 and the English are far from being exempt 
 from it. Too many of our countrymen, 
 who go abroad, are unacquainted, not only 
 with places remote from that in which 
 they were born or educated, but with many 
 things, to which they had it in their power 
 to be familiarized from their infancy. An 
 Englishman once discovered very great 
 surprise, when he was informed at Rome, 
 that the church of St. Stephen, Walbrook, 
 in London, was one of the most elegant 
 specimens of modern architecture. Such 
 ignorance exposes the traveller to the ridi- 
 cule, and, perhaps, contempt of intelligent 
 foreigners ; and may induce him to express 
 his admiration even of inferior productions 
 abroad, where he may be informed that 
 finer specimens of art are to be seen in his 
 own country. — Henry Kett. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 223 
 
 TRAVELLING COMPANIONS. 
 
 1. Much of the success to be derived 
 from travel, depends on the choice of the 
 tutor or Travelling Companion. He should 
 be a grave respectable man. of a mature 
 age. A very young man, or a man of levity, 
 however great his merit, learning or ingenui- 
 ty, will not be proper ; because he will not 
 have that natural authority and personal 
 dignity, that will command attention and 
 obedience. A grave and good man will 
 watch over the morals and religion of his 
 pupil ; both of which are, according to the 
 present # mode of conducting travel, com- 
 monly shaken from the basis, and levelled 
 with the dust, before the end of the pere- 
 grination. A tutor of character and princi- 
 ple will resolve to bring his pupil home, if 
 it be possible, not worse in any respect 
 than he was on his departure. — Dr. Vices- 
 imus Kxox. 
 
 2. It is vainly expected by parents, that 
 the authority of a travelling tutor will be 
 
 * About 1794. 
 
224 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 sufficient to prevent the indiscretion of their 
 son, and confine his attention to the proper 
 objects of improvement, but admitting every 
 tutor to be a Mentor, every pupil may not 
 be a Telemachus. — Henry Kett. 
 
 3. In your travels, these documents I 
 will give you, not as mine, but his* prac- 
 tices. Seek the knowledge of the estate 
 of every prince, court and city that you 
 pass through. Address yourself to the 
 company to learn this of the elder sort, and 
 yet neglect not the younger. By the one 
 you will gather learning, wisdom and 
 knowledge: by the other acquaintance, 
 languages and exercise. This he effectu- 
 ally observed, with great gain of under- 
 standing. — Sir Henry Sidney. 
 
 TRIUNITY OF JUSTICE. 
 By a threefold justice the world has been 
 governed from the beginning : by a justice 
 Natural, by which the parents and elders 
 of families governed their children ; in 
 which the obedience was called natural 
 
 * His brother, the accomplished Sir Philip Sidney. — 
 Ed. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 225 
 
 piety. Again by a justice Divine, drawn 
 from the laws of God ; and the obedience 
 was called conscience : and lastly, by a 
 justice Civil, begotten by both the former: 
 and the obedience to which we call duty. — 
 Sir Walter Raleigh. 
 
 TKIUXITIES OF POETRY. 
 
 The three excellencies of Poetry, are 
 simplicity of language, simplicity of sub- 
 ject, and simplicity of invention. 
 
 The three indispensable purities of Poe- 
 try, are pure truth, pure language, and pure 
 manners. 
 
 Three things must be avoided in Poetry, 
 the frivolous, the obscure, and the superflu- 
 ous. 
 
 Three things all Poetry should be ; thor- 
 oughly erudite, thoroughly animated, and 
 thoroughly natural. 
 
 The three primary requisites of poetic 
 Genius, are an eye that can see nature, a 
 heart that can feel nature, and a resolution 
 that dares follow nature. 
 
 The three things that constitute a Poet : 
 genius, knowledge and impulse. 
 
 15 
 
226 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 The three foundations of Genius, the 
 gift of God, man's exertion, and the events 
 of life. 
 
 The three indispensables of Genius, are 
 understanding, feeling and perseverance. 
 
 The three things that enrich Genius, 
 are contentment of mind, the cherishing of 
 good thoughts, and exercising the memory. 
 
 SoUTHET. 
 
 TRUE COURAGE. 
 True courage is the result of reasoning. 
 A brave mind is always impregnable. Reso- 
 lution lies more in the head than in the 
 veins, and a just sense of honor and of in- 
 famy, of duty and of religion, will carry 
 us further than all the force of mechanism. 
 — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 TRUE RICHES. 
 The man that would be truly rich, must 
 not increase his fortune, but retrench his 
 desires. — Seneca. 
 
 TRUE MORALITY. 
 In morality there are books enough writ 
 both by ancient and modern philosophers ; 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 227 
 
 but the morality of the Gospel doth so ex- 
 ceed them all, that to give a man a full 
 knowledge of true morality, I shall send 
 him to no other book than the New Testa- 
 ment. — Locke. 
 
 TRUTH. 
 
 1. Truth is the offspring of unbroken 
 meditations, and of thoughts often revised 
 and corrected. — Wollaston. 
 
 2. Truth is the band of union and the 
 basis of human happiness. Without this 
 virtue there is no reliance upon language, 
 no confidence in friendship, no security in 
 promises and oaths. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. Truth is the joining or separating of 
 signs, as the things signified agree or disa- 
 gree. — Locke. 
 
 4. The precipitancy of disputation, and 
 the stir and noise of passions that usually 
 attend it, must needs be prejudicial to 
 Truth ; for its calm insinuations can no 
 more be heard in such a bustle, than a 
 whistle among a crowd of sailors in a storm. 
 — Glanville. 
 
228 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 TUITION. 
 
 1. When so much of true life is put into 
 them, freely talk with them about what 
 most delights them ; that they may perceive 
 that those under whose tuition they are, are 
 not enemies to their satisfaction. — Locke. 
 
 2. No science is speedily learned by 
 the noblest genius without tuition. — Dr. 
 Watts. 
 
 TULLY AND TILLOTSON, ON THE IMMORTAL- 
 ITY OF THE SOUL. 
 TitllYj the chief Philosopher among the 
 Romans, expresseth himself with a good 
 degree of confidence, on the Immortality of 
 the soul. He argues for it in several parts 
 of his works, but particularly in his book 
 de Senectute, he declares his own opinion 
 of it, where, speaking to Scipio andLselius, 
 he says, u I do not see why I may not ad- 
 venture to declare free to you, what my 
 thoughts are concerning Death ; and per- 
 haps I may discern better than others, 
 what it is, because I am now, by reason of 
 my age, not far from it. I believe," says 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 229 
 
 he, " that the Fathers, those eminent per- 
 sons and my particular friends, are still 
 alive, and that they live the life which only 
 deserves the name of life." And after- 
 ward, " Nee me solum ratio ac dispntatio 
 impulit ut ita crederem, sed nobilitas etiam 
 summorum philosophorum et authoritas /" 
 " nor has reason only and disputation 
 brought me to this belief, but the famous 
 judgment and authority of the chief Phi- 
 losophers." And having mentioned Pytha- 
 goras, Socrates and Plato, he breaks out 
 into this rapture, " Oh prceclarum diem 
 quum in Mud animorum concilium ccetum- 
 que proficiscar et cam ex hdc turba et collu- 
 vione discedam!" " Oh glorious day, 
 when I shall go unto the great council and 
 assembly of spirits, when I shall go out of 
 this tumult and confusion, and quit the sink 
 of this world, when I shall be gathered to 
 all those brave spirits, who have left this 
 world, and meet with Cato, the greatest 
 and best of mankind ! " What could a 
 Christian almost say with more estasy ? 
 And he concludes, " Quod si in hoc erro, 
 quod animos hominum immortales esse 
 
230 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 credam, libent e?To, nee mihi hnnc errorem 
 quo deleclor, dum vivo, extorqueri volo : sin 
 mortuus, ut quidam ruinuti philosophi cen- 
 sent, nihil sentiam non vereor ne hunc er- 
 rorem meum mortui philosophi irrideant" 
 " But if after all I am mistaken herein, I 
 am well pleased with my error, which I 
 would not willingly part with whilst I live : 
 and if, after my death, as some little phi- 
 losophers suppose, I shall be deprived of all 
 sense, I have no fear of being exposed and 
 laughed at by them, for this, my mistake, 
 in the other world." 
 
 Thus you see what assurance the hea- 
 thens had of this principle, and that there 
 was a general inclination and propension 
 in them to the belief of it ; and as it was 
 not firmly and upon good grounds believed 
 among the common people, so neither was 
 it doubted of or called in question among 
 them. Among the philosophers it was a 
 matter of great uncertainty, being stiffly 
 denied by some, doubted of by others ; and 
 those who were most inclinable to the 
 entertainment of it, do rather express their 
 desires and hopes of it, than their full as- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 231 
 
 surance concerning it. — Archbishop Til- 
 lotson. 
 
 TYRANNY. 
 
 1. Power, unless managed with gentle- 
 ness and discretion, does but make a man 
 the more hated. No intervals of good hu- 
 mor, no starts of bounty will atone for ty- 
 ranny and oppression. — Jeremy Collier. 
 
 2. It is strange to see the unmanlike 
 cruelty of mankind, who, not content with 
 their tyrannous ambition to have brought 
 the others' virtuous patience under them, 
 think their masterhood nothing without 
 doing injury to them. — Sir Philip Sid- 
 ney. 
 
 VANITY. 
 1. Our great ethic fabler, Gay, in his ad- 
 mirable exposition in "the man and the 
 flea" that " every thing alive is vain," 
 asks, 
 
 i ' Does not the hawk all fowls survey 
 As destined only for his prey ? 
 And do not tyrants, prouder things, 
 Think men were born as slaves to kings ? " 
 
232 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 And in a manner worthy of the best pe- 
 riods of ancient or modern literature, our 
 British Jotham admonishes senators, and 
 instructs all ; and illustrates a class, by the 
 backsliding crab, who, from his hide-bound 
 shell exclaims, 
 
 " Nature is too profuse," says he, 
 
 " Who gave all these to pleasure me ! " 
 
 and another, like the slimy all-defiling snail, 
 
 " When bord'ring pinks and roses bloom 
 And every garden breathes perfume, 
 When peaches glow with sunny dyes, 
 Like Laura's cheek, when blushes rise," etc. 
 
 " The snail looks round on flower and tree, 
 And cries, All these were made for me." 
 
 As one of those human snails, that crawl 
 in and beslime the fairest fruits whilst yet 
 unripe, and poison the fairest blossoms, 
 even in the bud, whispered in the ear of a 
 " Royal imp of fame," at a Drawing room, 
 whereat the proud and virtuous matrons of 
 the British Court, were presenting their 
 young and beauteous daughters, on their 
 entering the world of distinction, to their 
 Sovereign's dueen ; an observation not un- 
 like that of the reptile in the fable, but not 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 233 
 
 quite so selfish, for the human reptile used 
 the personal pronoun, dualiter. 
 
 The British fabler then, soaring above 
 animal nature, reproves e'en 
 
 " Man, the most conceited creature, 
 As from a cliff he cast his eyes 
 And viewed the seas and arched skies ; 
 The sun was sunk beneath the main ; 
 The moon and all the -starry train 
 Hang the vast vault of Heav'n. The man 
 His contemplation thus began. 
 When I behold this glorious show, 
 And the wide watery world below, 
 The scaly people of the main, 
 The beasts that range the wood or plain, 
 The wing'd inhabitants of air, 
 The day, the night, the various year, 
 And know all these, by Heav'n designed 
 As gifts to pleasure human kind, 
 I cannot raise my worth too high, 
 Of what vast consequence am I? 
 
 Not of th' importance you suppose, 
 Exclaims a Flea upon his nose : 
 Be humble, learn thyself to scan, 
 Know, pride was never made for man, 
 'Tis vanity that swells thy mind. 
 What f Heaven and earth for thee design'd? 
 For thee! made only for our need 
 That more important Fleas might feed.** 
 
 Editor. 
 
234 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 2. Vanity is rather a mark of humility 
 than pride. Vain men delight in telling 
 what honors have been done them, what 
 great company they have kept, and the 
 like ; by which they plainly confess, that 
 these honors were more than their due, and 
 such as their friends would not believe, if 
 they had not been told : whereas, a man 
 truly proud, thinks the honors below his 
 merit, and scorns to boast. — Swift. 
 
 3. Were it not strange if God should 
 have made such a store of glorious creatures 
 on earth, and leave them all to be consumed 
 in secular vanity, allowing none but the 
 baser sort to be employed in his own ser- 
 vice. — Hooker. 
 
 4. There is no folly like vain glory, nor 
 any thing more ridiculous than for a vain 
 man to be always boasting of himself. — 
 L'Estrange. 
 
 5. ? Tis an old maxim in the schools, 
 That vanity's the food of fools ; 
 Yet now and then you men of wit 
 Will condescend to take a bit. 
 
 Swift. 
 
 6. Vanity is a strong temptation to lying ; 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 235 
 
 it makes people magnify their merit, over- 
 flourish their family, and tell strange stories 
 of their interest and acquaintance. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 7. Whether it were out of the same 
 vanity which possessed all those learned 
 philosophers and poets, that Plato also pub- 
 lished, not under the right author's names, 
 those things which he had read in the 
 Scriptures ; or fearing the severity of the 
 Areopagites, and the example of his master 
 Socrates, I cannot judge. — Sir Walter 
 Raleigh. 
 
 VANITY IN DRESS. 
 
 1. The vanity of loving fine clothes and 
 new fashions, and valuing ourselves by 
 them, is one of the most childish pieces of 
 folly that can be. — Sir Matthew Hale. 
 
 2. No man is esteemed for gay garments, 
 but by fools and women. — Sir Walter 
 Raleigh. 
 
 3. Some of the manly sex amongst us are 
 so effeminate, that they would rather have 
 the commonwealth out of order, than their 
 hair ; they are more solicitous about trim- 
 
236 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 ming and sprucing up their heads, than 
 they are of their health, or the safety of 
 the public ; and are more anxious to be fine 
 than virtuous. — Seneca. 
 
 4. For a man to be fantastic and effemi- 
 nate in attire, is unpardonable. It is next 
 to Sardanapalus's spinning among women. 
 To such I would say, Art thou not ashamed, 
 when Nature hath made thee a Man, to 
 make thyself a woman. — Stob^us. 
 
 5. This is a childish and foolish vice, 
 especially in a man, and argues great weak- 
 ness and shallowness of judgment. For it 
 is here, as in Heraldry, those scutcheons 
 and coats of armory that have the most 
 colors, are generally the less honorable. 
 According to the true and impartial esti- 
 mate of things, a great variety and profuse- 
 ness of ornaments, are badges of disgrace 
 and dishonor, and they proclaim the empti- 
 ness and vanity of those that wear them 
 and delight in them. Such persons, for 
 the most part, are commonly men of no 
 worth : herein resembling Tulips, which 
 are useless and unprofitable vegetables for 
 the life of man. — Dr. John Edwards, 
 1698. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 237 
 
 6. Ornaments become vicious, though 
 not so in themselves, by being spotted with 
 Pride and Vanity, and a Haughty Mind. — 
 Ibid. 
 
 VEILED TRUTHS. 
 The Jews, by adhering to the letter of 
 the Law, Ave re misled into unbelief. And. 
 even so, the infidel, resting in the mere 
 contemplation of natural' effects, fails to re- 
 cognize the great Creative Cause of all. 
 The Jews, likewise, thus saw in Christ, a 
 mere man, without recognizing the higher 
 nature in Him. All are in a veil which 
 conceal God — the Christian must recog- 
 nize him in all. — Pascal. 
 
 VIRTUE. 
 
 1. Religion, or Virtue, in a large sense, 
 includes duty to God and to our neighbor; 
 but in a proper sense, Yirtue signifies duty 
 towards men, and Religion duty to God. — 
 Dr. Isaac Watts. 
 
 2. Virtue is the solid good, which tutors 
 should not only read lectures and talk of, 
 but the labor and art of education should 
 
238 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 furnish the mind with and fasten there. — 
 Locke. 
 
 VIXEN. 
 Vixen, or Fixen, is the name of a she- 
 fox : otherwise applied to a woman whose 
 nature and condition is thereby compared 
 to a she-fox. — Verstegan. 
 
 VOLTAIRE'S LAST WORDS. 
 Voltaire was fertile and elegant, his 
 observations are very acute, yet he often 
 betrays great ignorance, when he treats 
 on subjects of ancient learning. Madame 
 de Talmond once said to him, " I think, 
 Sir, that a philosopher should never write, 
 but with the endeavor to render mankind 
 less wicked and unhappy than they are. 
 Now you do quite the contrary ; you are 
 always writing against that Religion which 
 alone is able to restrain wickedness, and to 
 afford us consolation under misfortunes." 
 Voltaire was much struck, and excused 
 himself by saying, that he only wrote for 
 those who were of the same opinion as 
 himself. Tronchin * assured his friends 
 
 # M. Tronchin was one of the most celebrated phy 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 239 
 
 that Yoltaire died in great agonies of mind. 
 '•I die forsaken by gods and men,'' ex- 
 claimed he, in those awful moments, when 
 Truth will force its way. 'I wish," add- 
 ed Tronchin, "that those who had been 
 perverted by his writings, had been present 
 at his death ; it was a sight too horrid to 
 support." — William Seward. 
 
 UNNECESSARY CHAINS. 
 1. When # Meletius, Bishop of Anti- 
 och, visited the dioceses of Syria, and the 
 several religious persons famous for severe 
 undertakings ; espying that Simeon Stylites 
 dwelt upon a pillar, and had bound his leg 
 
 sicians of the eighteenth century. He was born at 
 Geneva, maternally related to Lord Bolingbroke, edu- 
 cated in England, and patronized by his noble relative. 
 He studied at Cambridge, became pupil to Boerhave, 
 at Leyden, practised there and in Amsterdam. After 
 much travel and practice, he settled in Paris, under the 
 patronage of the Duke of Orleans, and became inti- 
 mately acquainted with Yoltaire, J. J. Rousseau, Dide- 
 rot, Thomas, and other philosophers and men of letters, 
 who have amply celebrated in their writings his talents 
 and virtues. — Ed. 
 
 * Theod. Hist. Eccles. Lib. i. Ch. 4. 
 
240 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 thereto, with a strong chain of iron, sent 
 for a smith, caused it to be knocked off, 
 and said, " to a man that loves God, his 
 mind is a sufficient chain." For the loads 
 of voluntary austerities rashly undertaken, 
 makes religion a burden, when their first 
 heats expire ; and their vows which are in- 
 tended to secure the practice, and perpetu- 
 ate the piety, are but the occasions of an 
 aggravated crime ; and the vow does not 
 secure the piety, but the weariness and 
 satiety of the duty tempts to the breakings 
 of the vow, or, at least, makes the man 
 impatient when he cannot persist with con- 
 tent, nor with safety. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 2. We read of a virtuous lady that de- 
 sired of St. Athanasius to procure for her, 
 out of the number of widows fed from the 
 ecclesiastical corban, an old woman, morose, 
 peevish and impatient, that she might, by 
 the society of so ungentle a person, have 
 often occasion to exercise her patience, her 
 forgiveness, and her charity. I know not 
 how well the counsel succeeded with her; 
 I am sure it was not very safe. For to in- 
 vite the trouble but to triumph over it, is 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 241 
 
 to wage a war of an uncertain issue, for no 
 end but to get the pleasures of the victory, 
 which oftentimes do not pay for the trou- 
 ble, never for the danger. — Ibid. 
 
 3. An Egyptian, who acknowledged Fire 
 for his god, one day doing his devotions 
 kissed his god, after the manner of wor- 
 shippers, and burnt his lips. It was not in 
 the power of that false and imaginary deity 
 to care the real hurt done to his devoutest 
 worshipper. Just such a fool is he that 
 kisses a danger, though with a design of 
 virtue, and hugs an opportunity of sin, for 
 an advantage of piety. He burns himself 
 in the neighborhood of the flame, and 
 twenty to one but he may perish in its em- 
 braces : and he that looks out a danger, that 
 he may overcome it, does as did the Per- 
 sian who worshipped the sun, looked upon 
 him when he prayed him to cure his weak 
 eyes. The sun may as well cure a bad 
 eye, or a great burden knit a broken arm, 
 as a danger can do him advantage that 
 seeks such a combat, which may ruin him ; 
 and after which, he rarely may have this 
 rewardj that it may be said of him, he had 
 
 16 
 
242 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 the good fortune not to perish in his folly. 
 It is easier to prevent a mischief than to 
 cure it, and besides the pain of the wound, 
 it is far more full of difficulty to cure a 
 broken leg, which a little care and obser- 
 vation would have preserved whole. To 
 recover from a sin, is none of the easiest 
 labors that concern the sons of men ; and 
 therefore it concerns them rather not to 
 enter into such a narrow strait, from which 
 they can never draw back their head, with- 
 out leaving their hair and skin and ears 
 behind. — Ibid. 
 
 4. If God please to try us, he means us 
 no hurt, and he means it with great reason 
 and great mercy ; but if we go to try our- 
 selves, we may mean well, but not wisely. 
 For as it is simply unlawful for weak per- 
 sons to seek a temptation, so for the more 
 perfect it is dangerous. We have enemies 
 enough without, and one of our own with- 
 in ; but we become our own tempter, when 
 we run out to meet the world, or to invite 
 the Devil home, that we may throw holy 
 water upon his flames, and call the danger 
 nearer, that we may run from it. And cer- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 243 
 
 tainly men are more guilty of many of 
 their temptations than the Devil ; through 
 their incuriousness or rashness, doing as 
 much mischief to themselves as he can. 
 For he can but offer, and so much we do, 
 when we run into danger. Such were 
 those stories of Saint Anthony provoking 
 the Devil to battle. If the stories had been 
 as true as the actions were rash and ridicu- 
 lous, the story had fastened a note of indis- 
 cretion on that good man ; though I think 
 there is nothing but a mark of fiction and 
 falsehood on the writer. — Ibid. 
 
 5. The chain worn by Simeon Stylites, 
 the pillar-saint, and his followers, might be 
 equally injurious as salutary. The iron in 
 itself was neither salutary nor injurious, 
 but was one or the other, according to the 
 disposition of the wearer. Such ascetics 
 should beware of sham holiness, as the 
 main point is to draw nigh unto God with 
 a sincere humility, that he may draw nigh 
 unto thee. They must be on their guard 
 against condemning others, should avoid 
 arrogance and haughty language, and wear 
 the cross, not merely on the surface, but in 
 
244 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 his inmost soul ; and labor for the benefit 
 of others. People of both sexes, learned 
 and unlearned, high and low, assemble 
 around him. Towards these he must act 
 in a right manner, or, in one word, apos- 
 tolically. for he must be all things to all 
 men, that he may gain all, for the glory of 
 God. He must not flatter, lest he injure 
 the cause of Truth ; nor be rude to any 
 one, that he be not accused of unbecoming 
 freedom of speech, but consider himself a 
 channel of nothing but of good. — Arch- 
 bishop ElJSTATHIUS. 
 
 UNPROFITABLE OCCUPATIONS. 
 1. I cannot but think as Aristotle (lib. 
 vi.) did of Thales and Anaxagoras, that 
 they may be learned, but not wise ; or 
 wise, but not prudent, when they are igno- 
 rant of such things as are profitable to 
 them. For suppose they know the won- 
 ders of nature, and the subtleties of meta- 
 physics, and operations mathematical, yet 
 they cannot be prudent, who spend them- 
 selves wholly upon unprofitable and inef- 
 fective contemplations. — Jeremy Taylor. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 245 
 
 2. On the celebrated dispute between 
 Dr. Bentley, then master of Trinity Col- 
 lege, Cambridge, and Dr. Hare, Bishop of 
 Chichester, concerning the metres of Te- 
 rence, Sir Isaac Newton observed that 
 "two dignified Clergymen, instead of mind- 
 ing their duty, had fallen out about a play- 
 book." — Cumberland. 
 
 USEFUL KNOWLEDGE. 
 Contemplate three things, and thou wilt 
 avoid sin. Know whence thou comest, 
 whither thou goest, and before whom thou 
 art hereafter to render a responsible account. 
 Whence comest thou ? Prom a perishable 
 atom. Whither goest thou ? To a place 
 of ashes, worms and maggots. Before 
 whom art thou hereafter to render a respon- 
 sible account? Before the Sovereign of 
 the King of kings, the Holy One. Blessed 
 be his name. — Rabbi Akabiah. 
 
 USELESS KNOWLEDGE. 
 Some there are that know the resorts and 
 falls of business, that cannot sail into the 
 main of it ; like a house that hath conve- 
 
248 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 nient stairs, but never a fair room. — Lord 
 Bacon. 
 
 USURY. 
 
 1. Usury bringeth the treasury of a realm 
 into few hands ; for the usurer being at 
 certainties, and others at uncertainties, 
 at the end, most of the money will be in 
 the box. — Ibid. 
 
 2. The Usurer lives upon the labor of 
 the industrious ; he eats his bread in the 
 sweat of another man's brow. — Jeremy 
 Collier. 
 
 UTTERANCE. 
 Many a man thinks admirably well, who 
 has a poor utterance ; while others have a 
 charming manner of speech, but their 
 thoughts are trifling. — Isaac Watts. 
 
 WIT. 
 1. Wit, as it implies a certain uncommon 
 reach, and vivacity of thought, is an excel- 
 lent talent, very fit to be employed in the 
 search of Truth, and very capable of as- 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 247 
 
 sisting to discern and embrace it. — Bishop 
 Burnet. 
 
 2. Wit, lying most in the assemblage of 
 ideas, and putting those together with quick- 
 ness and variety, whereto can be found any 
 resemblance or congruity, thereby to make 
 up pleasant pictures in the fancy. Judg- 
 ment, on the contrary, lies in separating 
 carefully one from another, ideas where 
 can be found the least difference, thereby 
 to avoid being misled by similitude. — 
 Locke. 
 
 3. The definition of Wit is only this, 
 that it is a propriety of thoughts and words : 
 or, in other terms, thoughts and words ele- 
 gantly adapted to the subject. — Dryden. 
 
 4. Where there is a real stock of Wit, 
 the wittiest sayings will yet be found, in a 
 great measure the issues of chance. — Dr. 
 South. 
 
 5. Wit is like the engraver's burine, or 
 the corrodings of aquafortis, which engrave 
 and indent the characters so that they can 
 never be effaced. — Essay on the Govern- 
 ment or the Tongue. 
 
248 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 WITTY MEN. 
 Without the subordinate good qualities 
 of natural good sense, good nature and dis- 
 cretion, a man of wit and learning would 
 be painful to the generality of mankind, 
 instead of being pleasing. Witty men are 
 apt to imagine they are agreeable as such, 
 and by that means grow the worst com-, 
 panions imaginable. They deride the ab- 
 sent, or rally the present, in a wrong manner; 
 not knowing that if you pinch or tickle a 
 man till he is uneasy in his seat, or ungrace- 
 fully distinguished from the rest of the 
 company, you equally hurt him. — Addi- 
 son. 
 
 WOMEN. 
 
 1. The corruption of the world indulges 
 women in great vanity ; and mankind seem 
 to consider them in no other view than as 
 painted idols, that are to allure and gratify 
 their passions. — Bishop Law. 
 
 2. Women are soft, mild, pitiful and 
 
 flexible. — Shakspeare. 
 
 3. Women in their nature are much more 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 249 
 
 gay and joyous than men ; whether it be 
 that their blood is more refined, their fibres 
 more delicate, and their animal spirits more 
 light ; vivacity is the gift of women, gravity 
 of men. — Addison. 
 
 4. Men have knowledge and strength to 
 fit them for action : Women affection, for 
 their better compliance ; and herewith 
 beauty to compensate for their subjection, 
 by giving them an equivalent regency over 
 men. — Grew. 
 
 WORDS. 
 As conceptions are the images of things 
 to the mind within itself, so are words or 
 names the marks of those conceptions, to 
 the minds of them we converse with. — 
 Dr. South. 
 
 WORDS v. THINGS. 
 Though a linguist should pride himself 
 to have all the tongues that Babel cleft the 
 world into ; yet, if he had not studied the 
 solid things in them as well as the words 
 and lexicons, he were nothing so much to 
 be esteemed a learned man, as any yeoman 
 
250 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 completely wise in his mother dialect only. 
 — Milton. 
 
 WORDS UTTERED IN AFFLICTION. 
 Do not accuse a man for what he utters 
 in affliction. — Maimonides. 
 
 WORK. 
 All the world is perpetually at work, 
 only that our poor mortal lives should pass 
 the happier for that little time we possess 
 them, or else end the better when we lose 
 them. Upon this occasion riches came to 
 be coveted, honors esteemed, friendship 
 pursued, and virtues admired. — - Sir Wil- 
 liam Temple. 
 
 WORSHIP. 
 
 1. First worship God ; he that forgets 
 
 to pray, 
 Bids not himself good-morrow, nor 
 good-day. — Thomas Randolph. 
 
 2. The law of nature teacheth that the 
 true and living God ought to be worshipped, 
 and that a sufficient and convenient time is 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 251 
 
 to be set apart for the same. — Thomas 
 White. 
 
 WORSHIPFUL SINNERS. 
 When old age comes upon a good and 
 temperate man, it comes alone, bringing no 
 other evil with it ; but when it comes to 
 wait upon a great and worshipful sinner, 
 who, for many years, has eaten well, and 
 done ill, it is attended by a long train of 
 rheums. — Dr. South. 
 
 YOUTH. 
 
 1. Youth is the vernal season of life, 
 and the blossoms it then puts forth, are in- 
 dications of those future fruits which are 
 to be gathered in the succeeding periods. — 
 Cicero. 
 
 2. This stage of life, unless under the 
 direction of good principles, is very danger- 
 ous to pass through. The passions of 
 young people ride them at full speed ; they 
 want both experience to guide, and temper 
 to hold them in. So that neither bogs nor 
 precipices can stop them; for when they 
 move fastest they see least. Like a ship 
 
252 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 without a pilot, they are apt to be overset 
 by the violence of desire. They play their 
 appetite at large, and chop at every thing 
 that comes in their way. They are as 
 prodigal of their person and their pocket, 
 as if their senses could not wear out, nor 
 the fund of life and futurity ever decay. — 
 Jeremy Collier. 
 
 3. As it is fit to read the best authors to 
 youth first, so let them be of the openest 
 and clearest ; as Livy before Sallust, Sid- 
 ney before Donne. — Ben Jonson. 
 
 4. If this were seen, 
 The happiest youth viewing his pro- 
 gress through, 
 
 What perils past, what crosses do en- 
 sue, 
 
 Would shut the book, and sit him down 
 and die ? — Shakspeare. 
 
 5. Here be all the pleasures 
 That fancy can beget on youthful 
 
 thoughts, 
 When the fresh blood grows lively 
 
 and returns, 
 Brisk as the April buds in primrose 
 
 season. — Milton. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 253 
 
 THE YOUTH OF GENIUS. 
 1. In reading the memoirs of a man of 
 genius, we often reprobate the domestic 
 persecutions of those who opposed his in- 
 clinations. No poet but is moved with 
 indignation at the recollection of the tutor 
 of the Port-Royal thrice burning the ro- 
 mance which Racine at length got by 
 heart ; no geometrician but bitterly inveighs 
 against the father of Pascal, for not suffer- 
 ing him to study Euclid, which he at 
 length understood without studying. The 
 father of Pertarch cast to the flames the 
 poetical library of his son, amidst the 
 shrieks, the groans and the tears of the 
 youth. Yet this burnt-offering neither 
 converted Petrarch into a sober lawyer, nor 
 deprived him of the Roman laurel. The 
 uncle of Alfieri, for more than twenty 
 years, suppressed the poetical character of 
 the noble bard ; he was a poet without 
 knowing how to write a verse, and Nature, 
 like a hard creditor, exacted, with redoubled 
 interest, all the genius which the uncle had 
 so long kept from her. These are the men 
 
254 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 whose inherent impulse no human opposi- 
 tion, and even no adverse education, can 
 deter from proving them to be great men. — 
 
 D'lSRAELI. 
 
 2. Many brave young minds have often- 
 times, through hearing the praises and fa- 
 mous eulogies of worthy men, been stirred 
 up to effect the like commendations. — 
 Spenser. 
 
 YOUTH, EDUCATION OF. 
 Men glory in raising great and magnifi- 
 cent structures, and find a secret pleasure 
 to see sets of their own planting grow up 
 and flourish : but surely it is a greater and 
 more glorious work, to build up a man, to 
 see a youth of our own planting, from the 
 small beginnings and advantages we have 
 given him, to grow up into a considerable 
 fortune, to take root in the world, and to 
 shoot up to such a height, and spread his 
 branches so wide, that we who first 
 planted him, may ourselves find comfort 
 and shelter under his shadow. — Arch- 
 bishop Tillotson. 
 
A THOUGHT-BOOK. 255 
 
 ZUINGLIUS'S HEART. 
 
 In the beginning of the Reformation, 
 when Zuinglius was slain in a battle by 
 the Papists, and his body burnt, his heart 
 was found entire in the ashes ; from whence, 
 saith the historian, his enemies concluded 
 the obdurateness of his heart ; but his 
 friends, the firmness and sincerity of it in 
 the true religion. Both these censures 
 seem to be built upon the same ground of 
 fancy and imagination : but it is a wise and 
 well grounded observation, which Thuanus 
 the historian, who was himself of the Ro- 
 man Communion, makes upon it, adeo tur- 
 batis odio ant amove animis, ut Jit in 
 religionis disse?itionibas, pro se quisque 
 omnia superstitione interpretatar ; " thus," 
 saith he, " men's minds being prejudiced 
 beforehand, by love or hatred, as it com- 
 monly falls out in differences of religion, 
 each party superstitiously interprets the 
 little circumstances of every event in favor 
 of itself." 
 
 Every thing hath two handles ; a good 
 wit and a strong imagination may find 
 
256 A THOUGHT-BOOK. 
 
 something in every judgment, whereby he 
 may, with some appearance of reason, turn 
 the cause of the judgment upon his adver- 
 sary. Fancy is an endless thing, and if 
 we will go this way to work, then he that 
 hath the best wit, is like to be the best 
 interpreter of God's Judgments. — Arch- 
 bishop TlLLOTSON. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 AT 102 AOANATOZ. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 \ 
 
 Addison's Style .... Johnson 
 Addison on Aristotle, Polybius, and Cicero Addison 
 Admiration . TUlotson, Glanville, Addison, Watts 
 The Affections .... Hooker 
 
 Almighty Power South, Hakappar, Raleigh, Taylor, 
 
 The Mishna Tor ah 
 
 Ambition 
 
 The Amusements of a People 
 
 Anagrammatism 
 
 Our Ancestors . 
 
 Ancients and Moderns 
 
 Ancient Knighthood 
 
 Anger . . . 
 
 Anglicisms and Gallicisms 
 
 Aristotle's Morality . 
 
 Arithmetic 
 
 Arrogance 
 
 Art 
 
 Artifice of Faction . 
 
 Assaults of the Devil . 
 
 Assurance . 
 
 Atheism 
 
 Athenian Juries . 
 
 Avarice 
 
 Taylor 
 
 Robertson 
 
 Camden 
 
 Taylor, Addison 
 
 Collier 
 
 . King Arthur 
 
 Leontius, Locke, South 
 
 Le Maitre 
 
 Rett 
 
 Johnson 
 
 jfflian, Collier 
 
 . Jonson 
 
 Collier 
 
 . Taylor 
 
 . South, Hammond 
 
 Bacon, Collier, Bentley 
 
 . Jones 
 
 V Estrange, Collier 
 
 PAGE 
 1 
 1 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 
 S 
 
 9 
 
 10 
 
 10 
 
 11 
 
 12 
 
 12 
 
 13 
 
 14 
 
 14 
 
 14 
 
 15 
 
 16 
 
 17 
 
 17 
 
XIV 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 
 Lord Bacon on Science 
 
 and Literature . . Bacon 
 
 IS 
 
 Bad Company 
 
 . Augustine 
 
 19 
 
 Bad Soil . 
 
 Arbuthnot 
 
 20 
 
 Biblical Writers 
 
 Duchal 
 
 20 
 
 Biography 
 
 . Burgh, Mackintosh, Addison 
 
 20 
 
 Blank Verse 
 
 . Rett 
 
 21 
 
 Bluntness 
 
 Boyle 
 
 22 
 
 Blustering . 
 
 Dryden, L'Estrange 
 
 23 
 
 Body and Mind 
 
 Collier 
 
 23 
 
 Bolingbroke ! s Ignorance . . . Newton 
 
 23 
 
 Books . 
 
 Bacon, Collier 
 
 .26 
 
 Books v. Travellers 
 
 . Kuittner, Ferguson 
 
 27 
 
 Bravery 
 
 Aristotle, Addison 
 
 29 
 
 The British Monarchy 
 
 . Burke 
 
 29 
 
 Brotherhood . 
 
 Locke 
 
 31 
 
 The Business of a Scholar . . Johnson 
 
 31 
 
 Calumny 
 
 Meander 
 
 32 
 
 Castles in the Air 
 
 Sioift 
 
 32 
 
 Cause and Effect . 
 
 Taylor 
 
 33 
 
 Chance . 
 
 . Bentley 
 
 33 
 
 Charity, (Riches of) 
 
 Broxcne 
 
 34 
 
 Charity Sermons 
 
 , Broxcne, Hooker 
 
 34 
 
 Chatham's Eloquence 
 
 . Chesterfield 
 
 34 
 
 Cheerfulness v. Mirth 
 
 . Addison 
 
 35 
 
 Choice of Counsellors 
 
 Sirach 
 
 36 
 
 Christian Fortitude . 
 
 Dry den 
 
 37 
 
 The Church 
 
 Pearson, Hooker 
 
 37 
 
 Church Music 
 
 Collier 
 
 37 
 
 Church and State 
 
 Bolingbroke 
 
 39 
 
 Church Union 
 
 . . Hooker 
 
 40 
 
 Classic Ground 
 
 . Kett, Johnson 
 
 41 
 
 Classic Writers 
 
 . Blackstone 
 
 43 
 
 The Clergy . 
 
 Milton, Clarendon 
 
 44 
 
 Clerical Flattery . 
 
 Collier 
 
 45 
 
 Clerical Pollutions 
 
 . Taylor 
 
 45 
 
 Clerical Studies . 
 
 Naplcton 
 
 46 
 
 Clerical Writings 
 
 West 
 
 47 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 XV 
 
 Commerce . Brown, Campbell, Locke, Rett 
 
 Conscience . . . Swift, South, Addison 
 
 Cosmopolity of Literature . . D ) Israeli 
 
 Covetousness . Locke, Taylor, Tillotson, Collier 
 Critics . . . . Collier, Watts 
 
 Criticism . . Johnson, Locke, Swift, D' Israeli 
 
 Death 
 
 The Death of Socrates . 
 
 Democracy . 
 
 Dependence 
 
 Description v. Definition 
 
 Desire . 
 
 Despair 
 
 Despise Nothing 
 
 Despondency 
 
 Detraction 
 
 Devisers 
 
 Dialectics 
 
 Discretion . 
 
 Discussion 
 
 Disputation 
 
 Dissimulation . 
 
 The Drama 
 
 Dryden on Homer and Chaucer 
 
 Duelling . 
 
 Education 
 
 Emulation 
 
 Ends of Language . 
 
 Ends of Man 
 
 The End of Pleasure 
 
 Swift, Collier, Taylor 
 
 . Plato 
 
 Plutarch 
 
 . Boyle, Collier 
 
 Watts 
 
 Locke 
 
 Locke, Collier 
 
 . Azai, Talmud 
 
 Collier, L'Estrange, Locke 
 
 Epictetus, Browne, De Balzac 
 
 Greta 
 
 Boyle 
 
 Swift, Collier 
 
 South 
 
 Locke 
 
 Bacon 
 
 . Eastathius, Jonson 
 
 Dryden 
 
 Taylor, Collier 
 
 Hooker 
 
 Collier, Spratt 
 
 Locke 
 
 Barrow 
 
 Collier 
 
 Frederic the Great 
 
 English History 
 
 The English People De Montesquieu, Brissot, Vattel 
 
 Envy ...... Collier 
 
 Esteem ..... Collier 
 
 Evangelic Religion .... Milton 
 
 Every Man has his Price . , . Taylor 
 
 Evidence ..... Bentley 
 
 47 
 49 
 51 
 51 
 53 
 54 
 57 
 59 
 66 
 66 
 67 
 67 
 67 
 68 
 69 
 70 
 71 
 71 
 71 
 72 
 72 
 72 
 73 
 74 
 74 
 75 
 75 
 76 
 77 
 
 79 
 80 
 80 
 81 
 81 
 -81 
 
XVI 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 
 Evidence of Christianity . Jenyns, Templet Tillotson 
 
 81 
 
 Examples 
 
 . Seneca , Rogers, Du Fresnoy 
 
 83 
 
 Excellence . 
 
 Reynolds 
 
 84 
 
 Excess . 
 
 . Bacon, Donne 
 
 84 
 
 Eye of a Painter . 
 
 . Richardson 
 
 85 
 
 Faith . 
 
 Swift, Milton, Pascal 
 
 85 
 
 False Conclusions 
 
 Browne 
 
 86 
 
 Farce . 
 
 . Dryden 
 
 86 
 
 Fate 
 
 Justin Martyr 
 
 86 
 
 Felicity of Man 
 
 Boyle 
 
 87 
 
 Fellowship 
 
 Locke 
 
 87 
 
 Female Rhymes 
 
 . Cowley, Dryden 
 
 87 
 
 Fickleness 
 
 Addison 
 
 88 
 
 Fiction 
 
 • . Dryden 
 
 S3 
 
 The Firmament . 
 
 Raleigh, Derham, Stackhouse 
 
 8S 
 
 Flatterers 
 
 Bacon 
 
 92 
 
 Flattery . 
 
 Collier, Shakspeare 
 
 92 
 
 Fluency of Speech 
 
 Swift 
 
 92 
 
 Food for the Mind 
 
 Plutarch 
 
 93 
 
 Foresight 
 
 Rogers 
 
 93 
 
 Formalities 
 
 . Bacon 
 
 93 
 
 Fortitude 
 
 Locke, Collier 
 
 94 
 
 Free Trade 
 
 . Child 
 
 94 
 
 Free-will 
 
 Locke 
 
 95 
 
 Friends and Enemies 
 
 Lavater, Addison, Collier 
 
 95 
 
 Friendship Aristotle, 
 
 Cicero, Addison, Collier # Ennius, 
 
 
 
 Slrach 
 
 96 
 
 God's Creatures 
 
 Hooker, Cicero, Pascal 
 
 98 
 
 A Good Man . 
 
 Taylor 
 
 100 
 
 A Good Name 
 
 Talmud 
 
 100 
 
 Goodness 
 
 . Collier, Sidney 
 
 100 
 
 Good Intentions . 
 
 Taylor 
 
 101 
 
 Goodness of God 
 
 Search 
 
 102 
 
 Government 
 
 Temple, Collier, Swift 
 
 103 
 
 Gray's Opinion of Tacitus . . . Gray 
 
 104 
 
 Greatness 
 
 Locke, Sidney, Collier 
 
 105 
 
 Hereditary Fame 
 
 . Collier, Swift, Addison 
 
 106 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 XV11 
 
 Milton 
 
 Collier 
 
 Justin Martyr 
 
 Bacon 
 
 . South 
 
 Temple 
 
 Jortin, Justin Martyr 
 
 . Watts, Tillotson 
 
 Heresy- 
 Heroes 
 
 Hesiod's Theogony 
 Hollow Church-Papists 
 Hollowness 
 Home . 
 
 Homer's Religion 
 Homonyma v. Synonyma 
 Honor Swift, Taylor, Bacon, Collier, Wake, Addison 
 Hope . . . . ... Collier 
 
 Human Life ..... Plato 
 
 Human Nature Taylor, Justin Martyr, Burnet 
 
 Humility . Collier, Taylor, Coleridge, Eusiathius 
 Hypocrites . . . Eustathius, South 
 
 Ideas ..... Locke, Kelt 
 
 Idleness .... Locke, Collier 
 
 Idolatry . . . . . South 
 
 Ignorance .... South, Collier 
 
 Imagination . . Swift, Collier. Bacon 
 
 Immateriality of the Soul Tillotson, Watts, Collier, 
 
 Heylin 
 Independence .... Pope, Collier 
 
 Infancy of Science .... Collier 
 
 Innate Principles .... Locke 
 
 Instinct, Natural and Argumentative . Taylor 
 
 Intellectual Powers .... Milton 
 
 Intellectual Pleasures . . . Milton 
 
 Intemperance ..... Collier 
 
 Johnson's Dictionary . . . Nares 
 
 Johnson's Lives of the Poets . . Kelt 
 
 Knavery .... South, Collier 
 
 Knowledge 
 
 Knowledge not always Power 
 
 Law 
 
 Laziness 
 
 South 
 
 Locke, Collier 
 
 Collier, Addison, 
 
 Shakspeare 
 
 Hooker, Anacharsis 
 
 Locke, South, Bacon 
 
 107 
 108 
 109 
 110 
 110 
 111 
 111 
 112 
 113 
 116 
 116 
 117 
 118 
 120 
 122 
 123 
 123 
 123 
 124 
 
 124 
 126 
 126 
 127 
 127 
 129 
 131 
 131 
 131 
 132 
 133 
 133 
 
 134 
 135 
 135 
 
XV111 
 
 CONTEXTS. 
 
 Leaders 
 
 
 . Sicift 
 
 Learning . Milton 
 
 Collier, Bacon, Locke, Ascham, 
 
 
 
 Addison 
 
 Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity 
 
 Taylor, Locke, 
 
 
 Collier 
 
 Sicift, L'Estrange 
 
 Literary Reward 
 
 Milton, Malthus, Ethics of the 
 
 
 
 Fathers, Blackstone 
 
 The Lord's Prayer . 
 
 . 
 
 Taylor, Augustine 
 
 Love 
 
 . 
 
 . South 
 
 Love of Money 
 
 . 
 
 Taylor 
 
 Love of Truth . 
 
 . 
 
 . Bacon 
 
 Mammon 
 
 . 
 
 Spenser 
 
 Masters and Servants 
 
 . 
 
 Taylor 
 
 Mathematics .... Locke 
 
 Matter of Prayer Taylor, Dry den, Persius, Addison 
 Meditation ..... Taylor 
 Men of Knowledge and Men of Taste . D'lsraeli 
 Men v. Books ..... Collier 
 Men of Valor .... Bacon 
 
 Mental Pleasures .... Collier 
 
 Mental Prayer .... Taylor 
 
 Milton's Childhood .... Milton 
 Milton's Prayer for the Church . . Milton 
 
 Mind your own Business . . . Terence 
 
 Miracles . r • . Collier, Locke, Bentley 
 
 Moderation ..... Taylor 
 Monkish Hatred of Literature . . Chaniatcs 
 
 Moral Effects of Seasons of Mourning upon Nations 
 
 Taylor 
 Morality of the Gospel . . . . Locke 
 
 Natural Religion . . . Tay J or, Wilkins 
 
 Nature . . . Wordsworth, Boyle, Collier 
 
 Nature and Art .... Aristotle 
 Old Wise Spirits .... Taylor 
 
 Opiates .... Collier, Bentley 
 
 Opinion ...... Jonson 
 
 136 
 136 
 
 133 
 
 139 
 143 
 143 
 143 
 144 
 144 
 145 
 145 
 145 
 143 
 148 
 149 
 150 
 150 
 150 
 151 
 152 
 153 
 153 
 155 
 156 
 
 157 
 153 
 159 
 160 
 162 
 162 
 163 
 164 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 XIX 
 
 Origin of Mabometanism 
 
 Bacon 
 
 164 
 
 Origin of the Mind 
 
 Collier, Raleigh 
 
 164 
 
 Origin of Power 
 
 Davenant 
 
 166 
 
 Perfection 
 
 L'Estravge, Hooker, King 
 
 166 
 
 Post-Augustan Writers 
 
 . . . Kett 
 
 168 
 
 Posthumous Fame 
 
 Addison, Collier 
 
 169 
 
 Prayer 
 
 Talmud, Wtiite, Taylor 
 
 170 
 
 Pre-eminence . 
 
 . Juvenal 
 
 171 
 
 Prejudice . 
 
 . Hurd 
 
 172 
 
 Prerogative t , 
 
 Bacon, Hall 
 
 172 
 
 Pride 
 
 Collier 
 
 172 
 
 Prudence 
 
 Milton, Collier 
 
 173 
 
 Character of Queen Anne 
 
 . Swift 
 
 173 
 
 Reading 
 
 Watts, Bacon, Collier 
 
 173 
 
 Reality 
 
 Cheyne 
 
 175 
 
 Reason Milton, Watts, Collier, Hooker, Swift, Locke 
 
 175 
 
 The Preformation . 
 
 Robertson 
 
 177 
 
 Reformers 
 
 Phalaris, King Charles 
 
 178 
 
 Regality 
 
 King Charles 
 
 178 
 
 Religion 
 
 . Wilkins, Taylor 
 
 179 
 
 Remorse 
 
 Collier 
 
 180 
 
 Revelation Butler, Pi 
 
 iley, Sprat, De Montesquieu 
 
 180 
 
 Revenge . Taylor, 
 
 Collier, Euripides, Johnson 
 
 181 
 
 Reveries . 
 
 Addison 
 
 183 
 
 Riches 
 
 Locke, Pope 
 
 183 
 
 Rise and Fall of Rome . 
 
 Raleigh 
 
 184 
 
 Rivalry 
 
 Addison 
 
 184 
 
 Robbery 
 
 . South 
 
 184 
 
 Rudiments . 
 
 Locke 
 
 185 
 
 Sagacity 
 
 Locke 
 
 185 
 
 Sapience 
 
 Grew 
 
 1S5 
 
 Sarcasms 
 
 Watts 
 
 1S5 
 
 Satire . Bacon, Cleveland, Addison^ Tillotson, Swift, 
 
 
 
 Roscommon 
 
 1S6 
 
 Self-conceit 
 
 Collier 
 
 1S8 
 
 Self-denial 
 
 . Scldcn 
 
 188 
 
XX CONTENTS. 
 
 
 Self-knowledge Pascal, Collier 
 
 183 
 
 Self-praise ...... Xenophon 
 
 139 
 
 Self-teaching Jonson 
 
 189 
 
 The Senses . . . Linnams, Holder, Collier 
 
 190 
 
 Sensuality .... Taylor, & Estrange 
 
 191 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney's Last Words . . . Greville 
 
 193 
 
 Slander . Theophrastus, Epictetus, Milton, Nelson, 
 
 
 South 
 
 193 
 
 Sloth . . . L'Estrange, Collier, South 
 
 195 
 
 
 195 
 
 Sluggishness ..... Locke 
 
 196 
 
 
 196 
 
 Smiles ..... Milton, Collier 
 
 196 
 
 Solitude Aristotle, Sidney, D' Israeli, Taylor, Bacon, 
 
 
 Dryden 
 
 197 
 
 Soul and Body ..... Collier 
 
 193 
 
 Spiritual Learning . . . Taylor 
 
 199 
 
 Sublimity . . . Raleigh, Stackhouse 
 
 200 
 
 Success . . Johnson, Collier, Hammond 
 
 202 
 
 Sudden Death ..... Taylor 
 
 203 
 
 Superstition .... Bacon 
 
 207 
 
 Suspicion ..... Bacon 
 
 208 
 
 Swearing . . Browne, Earl of Pembroke 
 
 208 
 
 Talents Misplaced .... Johnson 
 
 208 
 
 Talk .... Ascham, Collier 
 
 209 
 
 Temperance . Socrates, Dodsley, Milton, Temple, 
 
 Collier 209 
 Temples to the Deity . Montesquieu, Epictetus, 
 
 St. Paid, Shakspeare 211 
 
 Temporal Ends .... Taylor 212 
 
 The number Ten .... Brown 212 
 
 Thought .... Dryden, Addison 213 
 
 Time . . Bacon, Grew, Locke, Malebranche 213 
 
 Timidity ..... Xenophanes 215 
 
 Titles .... Addison, Milton 215 
 
 Transmigration of Science . Peter the Great 216 
 
CONTENTS. XXI 
 
 Translation .... Maimonides 217 
 
 Transubstantiation . Locke, Hooker, Milton 218 
 
 Travel . Bacon, Milton, Mlddleton, DeVolney, Kett 219 
 
 Travelling Companions . Knox, Kett, Sidney 223 
 
 Triunity of Justice . . . Raleigh 224 
 
 Triunities of Poetry .... Southey 225 
 
 True Courage ..... Collier 226 
 
 True Riches .... Seneca 226 
 
 True Morality ..... Locke 226 
 
 Truth . Wolla-ston, Collier, Locke, Glanville 227 
 
 Tuition ..... Locke, Watts 223 
 Tully and Tillotson on the Immortality of the Soul 
 
 Tillotson 22S 
 
 Tyranny .... Collier, Sidney 231 
 Vanity . Editor, Swift, Hooker, UEstrange, Collier, 
 
 Raleigh 231 
 Vanity in Dress . Hale, Raleigh, Seneca, Stobceus, 
 
 Edwards 235 
 
 Veiled Truths ..... Pascal 237 
 
 Virtue .... Watts, Locke 237 
 
 Vixen . . . , . Verstegan 238 
 
 Voltaire's Last Words . . . Seward 233 
 
 Unnecessary Chains . . Taylor, Eustathius 239 
 
 Unprofitable Occupations Taylor, Cumberland 244 
 
 Useful Knowledge . . . Akabiah 245 
 
 Useless Knowledge .... Bacon 245 
 
 Usury ..... Bacon, Collier 246 
 
 Utterance ..... Watts 246 
 Wit . Burnet, Locke, Dryden, South, Essay on the 
 
 Government of the Tongue 246 
 
 Witty Men ..... Addison 248 
 
 Women . . Laic, Shakspeare, Addison, Grew 248 
 
 Words ..... South 249 
 
 Words v. Things .... Milton 249 
 
 Words Uttered in Affliction . Maimonides 250 
 
 Work ...... Temple 250 
 
 JL&&6 44 
 
XXI 1 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Worship .... Randolph^ While 
 Worshipful Sinners .... South 
 Youth . Cicero, Collier, Jonson, Shakspeare, Milton 
 The Youth of Genius . . D'Israeli, Spenser 
 
 Youth, Education of . . . . Tillotson 
 
 Zuinsrlius's Heart • . . Tillotson 
 
 250 
 
 251 
 251 
 
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