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The man of pleasure, by a vain attempt to be more happy than any man can be, is often more miserable than most men are.

Charles Caleb Colton

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Charles Caleb Colton
Died: 1832
Died: January 1
Priest
Writer
Charles Colton
Men
Attempt
Vain
Miserable
Pleasure
Happy
Often

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He who knows himself knows others.
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From the preponderance of talent, we may always infer the soundness and vigour of the commonwealth but from the preponderance of riches, its dotage and degeneration.
Charles Caleb Colton
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I have somewhere seen it observed that we should make the same use of a book that the bee does of a flower: she steals sweets from it, but does not injure it.
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The press is the foe of rhetoric, but the friend of reason.
Charles Caleb Colton
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A fool is often as dangerous to deal with as a knave, and always more incorrigible.
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Fashions smile has given wit to dullness and grace to deformity, and has brought everything into vogue, by turns, but virtue.
Charles Caleb Colton
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Mystery magnifies danger, as a fog the sun, the hand that warned Belshazzar derived its horrifying effect from the want of a body.
Charles Caleb Colton
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As the gout seems privileged to attack the bodies of the wealthy, so ennui seems to exert a similar prerogative over their minds.
Charles Caleb Colton
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As a man of pleasure, by a vain attempt to be more happy than any man can be, is often more miserable than most men are, so the sceptic, in a vain attempt to be wise beyond what is permitted to man, plunges into a darkness more deplorable, and a blindness more incurable than that of the common herd, whom he despises, and would fain instruct.
Charles Caleb Colton
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It is adverse to talent to be consorted and trained up with inferior minds and inferior companions, however high they may rank. The foal of the racer neither finds out his speed nor calls out his powers if pastured out with the common herd, that are destined for the collar and the yoke.
Charles Caleb Colton
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Much may be done in those little shreds and patches of time which every day produces, and which most men throw away.
Charles Caleb Colton
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There are male as well as female gossips.
Charles Caleb Colton
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Nothing is more durable than the dynasty of Doubt for he reigns in the hearts of all his people, but gives satisfaction to none of them, and yet he is the only despot who can never die, while any of his subjects live.
Charles Caleb Colton
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Nobility of birth does not always insure a corresponding unity of mind if it did, it would always act as a stimulus to noble actions but it sometimes acts as a clog rather than a spur.
Charles Caleb Colton
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There is this difference between the two temporal blessings - health and money money is the most envied, but the least enjoyed health is the most enjoyed, but the least envied and this superiority of the latter is still more obvious when we reflec.
Charles Caleb Colton
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When a man has displayed talent in some particular path, and left all competitors behind him in it, the world are too apt to give him credit for universality of genius, and to anticipate for him success in all that he undertakes.
Charles Caleb Colton
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Heroism, self-denial, and magnanimity, in all instances where they do not spring from a principle of religion, are but splendid altars on which we sacrifice one kind of self-love to another.
Charles Caleb Colton
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There are many who say more than the truth on some occasions, and balance the account with their consciences by saying less than the truth on others. But the fact is that they are in both instances as fraudulant as he would be that exacted more than his due from his debtors, and paid less than their due to his creditors.
Charles Caleb Colton
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Times of great calamity and confusion have been productive for the greatest minds. The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace. The brightest thunder-bolt is elicited from the darkest storm.
Charles Caleb Colton
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It is a common observation that any fool can get money but they are not wise that think so.
Charles Caleb Colton