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Never tell your resolution beforehand, or it's twice as onerous a duty.

John Selden

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John Selden
Age: 69 †
Born: 1584
Born: December 16
Died: 1654
Died: November 30
Jurist
Politician
Writer
Beforehand
Resolution
Twice
Duty
Tell
Never
Onerous

More quotes by John Selden

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Humility is a virtue all preach, none practice and yet everybody is content to hear.
John Selden
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Prayer should be short, without giving God Almighty reasons why He should grant this or that He knows best wheat is good for us. If your boy should ask you for a suit of clothes and give you reasons, would you endure it? You know his needs better than he let him ask for a suit of clothes.
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The clergy would have us believe them against our own reason, as the woman would have her husband against his own eyes.
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The law against witches does not prove there be any but it punishes the malice of those people that use such means to take away men's lives.
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Pleasure is nothing else but the intermission of pain.
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In a troubled state we must do as in foul weather upon a river, not think to cut directly through, for the boat may be filled with water but rise and fall as the waves do, and give way as much as we conveniently can.
John Selden
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Wit and wisdom are born with a man.
John Selden
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While you are upon earth, enjoy the good things that are here (to that end were they given), and be not melancholy, and wish yourself in heaven.
John Selden
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The House of Commons is called the Lower House, in twenty Acts of Parliament but what are twenty Acts of Parliament amongst Friends?
John Selden
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Nothing is text but what is spoken of in the Bible and meant there for person and place the rest is application which a discreet man may do well but it is his scripture, not the Holy Ghost's. First, in your sermons use your logic, and then your rhetoric rhetoric without logic is like a tree with leaves and blossoms, but no root.
John Selden
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Men say they are of the same religion, for quietness' sake but if the matter were well examined, you would scarce find three anywhere of the same religion on all points.
John Selden
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The Parish makes the constable, and when the constable is made, he governs the Parish.
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Scrutamini scripturas (Let us look at the scriptures). These two words have undone the world.
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Idolatry is in a man's own thought, not in the opinion of another.
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No man is the wiser for his learning it may administer matter to work in, or objects to work upon but wit and wisdom are born with a man.
John Selden
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There was never a merry world since the fairies left off dancing.
John Selden
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There is no book on which we can rest in a dying moment but the Bible.
John Selden
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Few men make themselves masters of the things they write or speak.
John Selden
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Tis not seasonable to call a man traitor, that has an army at his heels.
John Selden
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Philosophy is nothing but discretion.
John Selden