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Humility is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet every body is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.

John Selden

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John Selden
Age: 69 †
Born: 1584
Born: December 16
Died: 1654
Died: November 30
Jurist
Politician
Writer
Hear
Doctrine
Practice
Content
Body
Master
Every
Thinks
Laity
Good
Humility
Practise
Men
None
Clergy
Thinking
Masters
Preach
Virtue
Servant

More quotes by 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.
John Selden
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Of all the actions of a man's life, his marriage does least concern other people, yet of all the actions of our lives, 'tis the most meddled with by other people.
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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Pride may be allowed to this or that degree, else a man cannot keep up dignity. In gluttony there must be eating, in drunkenness there must be drinking 'tis not the eating, and 'tis not the drinking that must be blamed, but the excess. So in pride.
John Selden
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Preachers say, Do as I say, not as I do. But if a physician had the same disease upon him that I have, and he should bid me do one thing and he do quite another, could I believe him?
John Selden
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Abundance consists not alone in material possession, but in an uncovetous spirit.
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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We pick out a text here and there to make it serve our turn whereas , if we take it all together, and considered what went before and what followed after, we should find it meant no such thing.
John Selden
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Take a straw and throw it up into the air, you may see by that which way the wind is.
John Selden
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Never tell your resolution beforehand, or it's twice as onerous a duty.
John Selden
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Pleasure is nothing else but the intermission of pain.
John Selden
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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.
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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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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The Parish makes the constable, and when the constable is made, he governs the Parish.
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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Those that govern most make least noise.
John Selden
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In quoting of books, quote such authors as are usually read others you may read for your own satisfaction, but not name them.
John Selden
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Commonly we say a judgment falls upon a man for something in him we cannot abide.
John Selden
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We measure the excellency of other men by some excellency we conceive to be in ourselves.
John Selden