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It is not he who gains the exact point in dispute who scores most in controversy - but he who has shown the better temper.

Samuel Butler

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Samuel Butler
Age: 66 †
Born: 1835
Born: December 4
Died: 1902
Died: June 18
Farmer
Novelist
Painter
Photographer
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
Translator
Writer
Notts
Cellarius
Shown
Temper
Score
Debate
Dispute
Gains
Scores
Anger
Disputes
Point
Controversy
Better
Exact

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If a man knows not life which he hath seen, how shall he know death, which he hath not seen?
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Youth is like spring, an over praised season more remarkable for biting winds than genial breezes. Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits.
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If people would dare to speak to one another unreservedly, there would be a good deal less sorrow in the world a hundred years hence.
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He is greatest who is most often in men's good thoughts.
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God cannot alter the past, though historians can.
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He dons are too busy educating the young men to be able to teach them anything.
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They say the test of [literary power] is whether a man can write an inscription. I say, Can he name a kitten? And by this test I am condemned, for I cannot.
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Let us eat and drink neither forgetting death unduly nor remembering it. The Lord hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, etc., and the less we think about it the better.
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An apology for the devil: it must be remembered that we have heard one side of the case. God has written all the books.
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[P]oetry resembles metaphysics: one does not mind one's own, but one does not like anyone else's.
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The great pleasure of a dog is that you may make a fool of yourself with him and not only will he not scold you, but he will make a fool of himself too.
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There should be asylums for habitual teetotalers, but they would probably relapse into teetotalism as soon as they got out.
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Be virtuous and you will be vicious.
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Nobody shoots at Santa Claus.
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How often do we not see children ruined through the virtues, real or supposed, of their parents?
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Men should not try to overstrain their goodness more than any other faculty, bodily or mental.
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The three most important things a man has are, briefly, his private parts, his money, and his religious opinions.
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The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore.
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If the headache would only precede the intoxication, alcoholism would be a virtue.
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Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.
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