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A man should be just cultured enough to be able to look with suspicion upon culture at first, not second hand.

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
Men
Culture
Hands
Able
Look
Cultured
Firsts
Suspicion
Looks
Second
First
Hand
Enough
Upon

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Belief like any other moving body follows the path of least resistance.
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It is death, and not what comes after death, that men are generally afraid of.
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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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He was born stupid, and greatly increased his birthright.
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I believe that he was really sorry that people would not believe he was sorry that he was not more sorry.
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If God wants us to do a thing, he should make his wishes sufficiently clear. Sensible people will wait till he has done this before paying much attention to him.
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It is a wise tune that knows its own father, and I like my music to be the legitimate offspring of respectable parents.
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Some men love truth so much that they seem to be in continual fear lest she should catch a cold on overexposure.
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Justice is my being allowed to do whatever I like. Injustice is whatever prevents my doing so.
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God cannot alter the past, though historians can.
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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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Every man's work, whether it be literature, or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself.
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Don't learn to do, but learn in doing.
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Most people have never learned that one of the main aims in life is to enjoy it.
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The seven deadly sins: Want of money, bad health, bad temper, chastity, family ties, knowing that you know things, and believing in the Christian religion.
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The extremes of vice and virtue are alike detestable, and absolute virtue is as sure to kill a man as absolute vice is.
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If I die prematurely at any rate I shall be saved from being bored to death by my own success.
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God as now generally conceived of is only the last witch.
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Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.
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