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Half the vices which the world condemns most loudly have seeds of good in them and require moderate use rather than total abstinence.

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
Use
Moderates
Good
Require
World
Seeds
Vices
Total
Condemns
Virtue
Loudly
Rather
Abstinence
Half
Moderate

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It seems to be the fate of man to seek all his consolations in futurity. The time present is seldom able to fill desire or imagination with immediate enjoyment, and we are forced to supply its deficiencies by recollection or anticipation.
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Let man be true and every god a liar.
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Genius might be described as a supreme capacity for getting its possessors into trouble of all kinds
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To know God better is only to realize how impossible it is that we should ever know him at all. I know not which is more childish to deny him, or define him.
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A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg.
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The function of vice is to keep virtue within reasonable bounds.
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Our minds want clothes as much as our bodies.
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We are not won by arguments that we can analyse but by tone and temper, by the manner which is the man himself.
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Since God himself cannot change the past, He is obliged to tolerate the existence of historians.
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Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.
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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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Adversity, if a man is set down to it by degrees, is more supportable with equanimity by most people than any great prosperity arrived at in a single lifetime.
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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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The best liar is he who makes the smallest amount of lying go the longest way.
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Nature. As the word is now commonly used it excludes nature's most interesting productions-the works of man. Nature is usually taken to mean mountains, rivers, clouds and undomesticated animals and plants. I am not indifferent to this half of nature, but it interests me much less than the other half.
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Life is one long process of getting tired.
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Prayers are to men as dolls are to children. They are not without use and comfort, but it is not easy to take them very seriously.
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History is a bucket of ashes.
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The advantage of doing one's praising for oneself is that one can lay it on so thick and exactly in the right places.
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Belief like any other moving body follows the path of least resistance.
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