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We gain nothing by being with such as ourselves. We encourage one another in mediocrity. I am always longing to be with men more excellent than myself.

Charles Lamb

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Charles Lamb
Age: 59 †
Born: 1775
Born: February 10
Died: 1834
Died: December 27
Literary Critic
Playwright
Poet
Writer
London
England
Longing
Excellent
Gain
Gains
Another
Nothing
Mediocrity
Always
Association
Men
Encourage

More quotes by Charles Lamb

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Sassafras wood boiled down to a kind of tea, and tempered with an infusion of milk and sugar hath to some a delicacy beyond the China luxury.
Charles Lamb
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I have passed all my days in London, until I have formed as many and intense local attachments as any of you mountaineers can have done with dead nature.
Charles Lamb
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You look wise, pray correct that error.
Charles Lamb
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Ceremony is an invention to take off the uneasy feeling which we derive from knowing ourselves to be less the object of love and esteem with a fellow-creature than some other person is. It endeavours to make up, by superior attentions in little points, for that invidious preference which it is forced to deny in the greater.
Charles Lamb
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If dirt were trumps, what hands you would hold!
Charles Lamb
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Who has not felt how sadly sweet The dream of home, the dream of home, Steals o'er the heart, too soon to fleet, When far o'er sea or land we roam?
Charles Lamb
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Tis unpleasant to meet a beggar. It is painful to deny him and, if you relieve him, it is so much out of your pocket.
Charles Lamb
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A sweet child is the sweetest thing in nature.
Charles Lamb
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A man can never have too much Time to himself, nor too little to do. Had I a little son, I would christen him Nothing-To-Do he should do nothing. Man, I verily believe, is out of his element as long as he is operative. I am altogether for the life contemplative.
Charles Lamb
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A presentation copy...is a copy of a book whoch does not sell, sent you by the author, with his foolish autograph at the beginning of it for which, if a stranger, he only demands your friendship if a brother author, he expects from you a book of yours, which does not sell, in return.
Charles Lamb
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Do not fold, spindle or mutilate.
Charles Lamb
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Rags, which are the reproach of poverty, are the beggar's robes, and graceful insignia of his profession, his tenure, his full dress, the suit in which he is expected to show himself in public.
Charles Lamb
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The teller of a mirthful tale has latitude allowed him. We are content with less than absolute truth.
Charles Lamb
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Opinions is a species of property - I am always desirous of sharing.
Charles Lamb
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Dream not ... of having tasted all the grandeur and wildness of fancy till you have gone mad!
Charles Lamb
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I can scarce bring myself to believe, that I am admitted to a familiar correspondence, and all the license of friendship, with a man who writes blank verse like Milton.
Charles Lamb
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May be the truth is, that one pipe is wholesome, two pipes toothsome, three pipes noisome, four pipes fulsome, five pipes quarrelsome and that's the some on't.
Charles Lamb
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For with G. D., to be absent from the body is sometimes (not to speak profanely) to be present with the Lord.
Charles Lamb
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The cheerful Sabbath bells, wherever heard, Strike pleasant on the sense, most like the voice Of one, who from the far-off hills proclaims Tidings of good to Zion.
Charles Lamb
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Not if I know myself at all.
Charles Lamb