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Better that we should err in action than wholly refuse to perform. The storm is so much better than the calm, as it declares the presence of a living principle. Stagnation is something worse than death. It is corruption also.
William Gilmore Simms
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William Gilmore Simms
Age: 64 †
Born: 1806
Born: April 17
Died: 1870
Died: June 11
Historian
Lawyer
Novelist
Poet
Charleston
South Carolina
Principles
Perform
Living
Corruption
Death
Storm
Action
Principle
Also
Presence
Better
Calm
Declares
Much
Refuse
Stagnation
Something
Worse
Wholly
More quotes by William Gilmore Simms
Have I done anything for society? I have then done more for myself. Let that question and truth be always present to thy mind, and work without cessation.
William Gilmore Simms
The dread of criticism is the death of genius.
William Gilmore Simms
He who would acquire fame must not show himself afraid of censure. The dread of censure is the death of genius.
William Gilmore Simms
There is no doubt such a thing as chance, but I see no reason why Providence should not make use of it.
William Gilmore Simms
The amiable is a duty most certainly, but must not be exercised at the expense of any of the virtues. He who seeks to do the amiable always, can only be successful at the frequent expense of his manhood.
William Gilmore Simms
To feel oppressed by obligation is only to prove that we are incapable of a proper sentiment of gratitude. To receive favors from the unworthy is simply to admit that our selfishness is superior to our pride. Most men remember obligations, but not often to be grateful for them. The proud are made sour by the remembrance and the vain silent.
William Gilmore Simms
There is a native baseness in the ambition which seeks beyond its desert, that never shows more conspicuously than when, no matter how, it temporarily gains its object.
William Gilmore Simms
Our true acquisitions lie only in our charities - we gain only as we give.
William Gilmore Simms
But for that blindness which is inseparable from malice, what terrible powers of evil would it possess! Fortunately for the world, its venom, like that of the rattlesnake, when most poisonous, clouds the eye of the reptile, and defeats its aim.
William Gilmore Simms
We must calculate not on the weather, nor on fortune, but upon God and ourselves. He may fail us in the gratification of our wishes, but never in the encounter with our exigencies.
William Gilmore Simms
To make punishments efficacious, two things are necessary. They must never be disproportioned to the offence, and they must be certain.
William Gilmore Simms
The only true source of politeness is consideration.
William Gilmore Simms
The fool is willing to pay for anything but wisdom. No man buys that of which he supposes himself to have an abundance already.
William Gilmore Simms
What we call vice in our neighbor may be nothing less than a crude virtue. To him who knows nothing more of precious stones than he can learn from a daily contemplation of his breastpin, a diamond in the mine must be a very uncompromising sort of stone.
William Gilmore Simms
The wonder is not that the world is so easily governed, but that so small a number of persons will suffice for the purpose. There are dead weights in political and legislative bodies as in clocks, and hundreds answer as pulleys who would never do for politicians.
William Gilmore Simms
Solitude bears the same relation to the mind that sleep does to the body. It affords it the necessary opportunities for repose and recovery.
William Gilmore Simms
The proverb answers where the sermon fails.
William Gilmore Simms
The birth of a child is the imprisonment of a soul. The soul must work its way out of prison, and, in doing so, provide itself with wings for a future journey. It is for each of us to determine whether our wings shall be those of an angel or a grub!
William Gilmore Simms
Philosophy has its bugbears, as well as superstition.
William Gilmore Simms
The true law of the race is progress and development. Whenever civilization pauses in the march of conquest, it is overthrown by the barbarian.
William Gilmore Simms