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If the egotist is weak, his egotism is worthless. If the egotist is strong, acute, full of distinctive character, his egotism is precious, and remains a possession of the race.

Alexander Smith

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Alexander Smith
Age: 36 †
Born: 1830
Born: December 31
Died: 1867
Died: January 5
Poet
Cille Mheàrnaig
Character
Worthless
Precious
Possession
Remains
Egotist
Weak
Acute
Full
Glitter
Race
Distinctive
Strong
Egotism

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Thoughts must come naturally, like wild-flowers they cannot be forced in a hot-bed, even although aided by the leaf-mould of your past.
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If we were to live here always, with no other care than how to feed, clothe, and house ourselves, life would be a very sorry business. It is immeasurably heightened by the solemnity of death.
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My heart like moon-charmed waters, all unrest.
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Everything is sweetened by risk.
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There is a certain even-handed justice in Time and for what he takes away he gives us something in return. He robs us of elasticity of limb and spirit, and in its place he brings tranquility and repose—the mild autumnal weather of the soul.
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Each time we love,We turn a nearer and a broader markTo that keen archer, Sorrow, and he strikes.
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Death, which we are accustomed to consider an evil, really acts for us the friendliest part, and takes away the commonplace of existence.
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The only thing a man knows is himself.
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In life there is nothing more unexpected and surprising than the arrivals and departures of pleasure. If we find it in one place today, it is vain to seek it there tomorrow. You can not lay a trap for it.
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A bottomless pit of violence, a Tower of Babel where all are speakers and no hearers.
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Not on the stage alone, in the world also, a man's real character comes out best in his asides.
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Some books are drenchèd sandsOn which a great soul's wealth lies all in heaps,Like a wrecked argosy.
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We are never happy we can only remember that we were so once.
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Books are a finer world within the world. (1863)
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My garden, with its silence and pulses of fragrance that come and go on the airy undulations, affects me like sweet music. Care stops at the gates, and gazes at me wistfully through the bars.
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It is a characteristic of pleasure that we can never recognize it to be pleasure till after it is gone.
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Men praise poverty, as the African worships Mumbo Jumbo--from terror of the malign power, and a desire to propitiate at.
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Fame is but an inscription on a grave, and glory the melancholy blazon on a coffin lid.
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