Daniel Defoe
All our discontents about what we want appeared to spring from the want of thankfulness for what we have.Collection: Thankful
The soul is placed in the body like a rough diamond, and must be polished, or the luster of it will never appear.Collection: Brainy
I have often thought of it as one of the most barbarous customs in the world, considering us as a civilized and a Christian country, that we deny the advantages of learning to women.Collection: Learning
It is better to have a lion at the head of an army of sheep, than a sheep at the head of an army of lions.Collection: Leadership
Fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself.Collection: Fear
The height of human wisdom is to bring our tempers down to our circumstances, and to make a calm within, under the weight of the greatest storm without.Collection: Wisdom
Expect nothing and you'll always be surprisedCollection: Expect Nothing
It is never too late to be wise.Collection: Wise
Though I don't like the crew, I won't sink the ship. In fact, in time of storm I'll do my best to save it. You see, we are all in this craft and must sink or swim together.Collection: Swim
In trouble to be troubled, Is to have your trouble doubled.Collection: Stay Calm
Today we love what tomorrow we hate, today we seek what tomorrow we shun, today we desire what tomorrow we fear, nay, even tremble at the apprehensions of.Collection: Hate
Self-destruction is the effect of cowardice in the highest extreme.Collection: Death
All men would be tyrants if they could.Collection: Men
Necessity makes an honest man a knave.Collection: Honesty
Justice is always Violence to the Party offending, for every Man is Innocent in his own Eyes.Collection: Party
I hear much of people's calling out to punish the guilty, but very few are concerned to clear the innocent.Collection: Inspirational
I saw the Cloud, though I did not foresee the Storm.Collection: Clouds
The best of men cannot suspend their fate; The good die early, and the bad die late.Collection: Fate
Thus fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself when apparent to the eyes ; and we find the burden of anxiety greater, by much, than the evil which we are anxious about.Collection: Eye
Pleasure is a thief to business.Collection: Thieves
I learned to look more upon the bright side of my condition, and less upon the dark side, and to consider what I enjoyed, rather than what I wanted : and this gave me sometimes such secret comforts, that I cannot express them ; and which I take notice of here, to put those discontented people in mind of it, who cannot enjoy comfortably what God has given them, because they see and covet something that he has not given them. All our discontents about what we want appeared to me to spring from the want of thankfulness for what we have.Collection: Spring
For I cannot think that GOD Almighty ever made them [women] so delicate, so glorious creatures; and furnished them with such charms, so agreeable and so delightful to mankind; with souls capable of the same accomplishments with men: and all, to be only Stewards of our Houses, Cooks, and Slaves.Collection: Men
Friends are good,--good, if well chosen.Collection: Wells
As covetousness is the root of all evil, so poverty is the worst of all snares.Collection: Roots
He that is rich is wise, And all men learned poverty despise.Collection: Wise
She is always married too soon, who gets a bad husband, and she is never married too late, who gets a good one.Collection: Marriage
Thus we never see the true state of our condition till it is illustrated to us by its contraries, nor know how to value what we enjoy, but by the want of it.Collection: Want
Never, ladies, marry a fool. Any husband rather than a fool. With some other husband you may be unhappy, but with a fool you will be miserable.Collection: Husband
And of all plagues with which mankind are curst, Ecclesiastic tyranny's the worst.Collection: Doubt
Things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believed.Collection: Certain
'Tis no sin to cheat the devil.Collection: Cheating
Pride, the first peer and president of Hell.Collection: Pride
Why then should women be denied the benefits of instruction? If knowledge and understanding had been useless additions to the sex, God almighty would never have given them capacities.Collection: Sex
Vice came in always at the door of necessity, not at the door of inclination.Collection: Doors
I am giving an account of what was, not of what ought or ought not to be.Collection: Giving
For sudden Joys, like Griefs, confound at first.Collection: Grief
Business neglected is business lost.Collection: Lost
He that Opposes his own Judgment against the Current of the Times, ought to be back'd with unanswerable Truths; and he that has that Truth on his Side, is a Fool, as well as a Coward, if he is afraid to own it, because of the Currency or Multitude of other Mens Opinions.Collection: Coward
It put me upon reflecting how little repining there would be among mankind at any condition of life, if people would rather compare their condition with those that were worse, in order to be thankful, than be always comparing them with those which are better, to assist their murmurings and complaining.Collection: Order
I had been tricked once by that Cheat called love, but the Game was over.Collection: Games
A rich man is an honest man--no thanks to him; for he would be a double knave, to cheat mankind when he had no need of it: he has no occasion to press upon his integrity, nor so much as to touch upon the borders of dishonesty.Collection: Integrity
So possible is it for us to roll ourselves up in wickedness, till we grow invulnerable by conscience; and that sentinel, once dozed, sleeps fast, not to be awakened while the tide of pleasure continues to flow or till something dark and dreadful brings us to ourselves again.Collection: Sleep
Law is but a heathen word for power.Collection: Power
Nature has left this tincture in the blood, That all men would be tyrants if they could.Collection: Men
No man of common sense will value a woman the less, for not giving herself up at the first attack, or for not accepting his proposal without enquiring into his person or character; on the contrary, he must think her the weakest of all creatures in the world, as the rate of men now goes; in short, he must have a very contemptible opinion of her capacities, nay, even of her understanding, that having but one cast for her life, shall cast that life away at once, and make matrimony like death, be a leap in the dark.Collection: Character
A woman well bred and well taught, furnished with the additional accomplishments of knowledge and behaviour, is a creature without comparison. Her society is the emblem of sublimer enjoyments, her person is angelic, and her conversation heavenly. She is all softness and sweetness, peace, love, wit, and delight. She is every way suitable to the sublimest wish, and the man that has such a one to his portion, has nothing to do but to rejoice in her, and be thankful.Collection: Women
Tis very strange men should be so fond of being wickeder than they are.Collection: Men
Wit, like the Belly, if it be not fed, Will starve the Members, and distract the Head.Collection: Feds