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No doubt solitude is wholesome, but so is abstinence after a surfeit. The true life of man is in society.

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
Wholesome
Solitude
Doubt
Society
True
Men
Life
Surfeit
Abstinence

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Philosophy has its bugbears, as well as superstition.
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Vanity is so constantly solicitous of self, that even where its own claims are not interested, it indirectly seeks the aliment which it loves, by showing how little is deserved by others.
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Our possessions are wholly in our performances. He owns nothing to whom the world owes nothing.
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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.
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The only true source of politeness is consideration.
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To make punishments efficacious, two things are necessary. They must never be disproportioned to the offence, and they must be certain.
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The dread of criticism is the death of genius.
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It is a bird-flight of the soul, when the heart declares itself in song. The affections that clothe themselves with wings are passions that have been subdued to virtues.
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The only rational liberty is that which is born of subjection, reared in the fear of God and the love of man.
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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.
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I know not that there is anything in nature more soothing to the mind than the contemplation of the moon, sailing, like some planetary bark, amidst a sea of bright azure. The subject is certainly hackneyed the moon has been sung by poet and poetaster. Is there any marvel that it should be so?
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No errors of opinion can possibly be dangerous in a country where opinion is left free to grapple with them.
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Stagnation is something worse than death. It is corruption, also.
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The birth of a child is the imprisonment of a soul.
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The true law of the race is progress and development. Whenever civilization pauses in the march of conquest, it is overthrown by the barbarian.
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Revelation may not need the help of reason, but man does, even when in possession of revelation. Reason may be described as the candle in the man's hand, to which revelation brings the necessary flame.
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The only true source of politeness is consideration,--that vigilant moral sense which never loses sight of the rights, the claims, and the sensibilities of others. This is the one quality, over all others, necessary to make a gentleman.
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I believe that economists put decimal points in their forecasts to show they have a sense of humor.
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Tact is one of the first of mental virtues, the absence of which is frequently fatal to the best of talents. Without denying that it is a talent of itself, it will suffice if we admit that it supplies the place of many talents.
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I listen to them freely and with all the respect merited by their intelligence, their character, their knowledge, reserving always my incontestable right of criticism and censure.
William Gilmore Simms