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I hate a style, as I do a garden, that is wholly flat and regular that slides along like an eel, and never rises to what one can call an inequality.

William Shenstone

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William Shenstone
Age: 48 †
Born: 1714
Born: November 18
Died: 1763
Died: February 11
Gardener
Horticulturist
Poet
Writer
Hate
Flat
Writing
Flats
Never
Inequality
Like
Regular
Garden
Eels
Along
Slides
Style
Rises
Call
Wholly

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It seems with wit and good-nature, Utrum horum mavis accipe. Taste and good-nature are universally connected.
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A rich dress adds but little to the beauty of a person. It may possibly create a deference, but that is rather an enemy to love.
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The eye must be easy, before it can be pleased.
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Modesty makes large amends for the pain it gives those who labor under it, by the prejudice it affords every worthy person in their favor.
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Hope is a flatterer, but the most upright of all parasites for she frequents the poor man's hut, as well as the palace of his superior.
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When self-interest inclines a man to print, he should consider that the purchaser expects a pennyworth for his penny, and has reason to asperse his honesty if he finds himself deceived.
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The world may be divided into people that read, people that write, people that think, and fox-hunters.
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May I always have a heart superior, with economy suitable, to my fortune.
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Fashion is a great restraint upon your persons of taste and fancy who would otherwise in the most trifling instances be able to distinguish themselves from the vulgar.
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Virtues, like essences, lose their fragrance when exposed. They are sensitive plants, which will not bear too familiar approaches.
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It happens a little unluckily that the persons who have the most infinite contempt of money are the same that have the strongest appetite for the pleasures it procures.
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Immoderate assurance is perfect licentiousness.
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Grandeur and beauty are so very opposite, that you often diminish the one as you increase the other. Variety is most akin to the latter, simplicity to the former.
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Avarice is the most oppose of all characters to that of God Almighty, whose alone it is to give and not receive.
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Anger and the thirst of revenge are a kind of fever fighting and lawsuits, bleeding,--at least, an evacuation. The latter occasions a dissipation of money the former, of those fiery spirits which cause a preternatural fermentation.
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I have been formerly so silly as to hope that every servant I had might be made a friend I am now convinced that the nature of servitude generally bears a contrary tendency. People's characters are to be chiefly collected from their education and place in life birth itself does but little.
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Let the gulled fool the toil of war pursue, where bleed the many to enrich the few.
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Every good poet includes a critic, but the reverse is not true.
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To thee, fair Freedom! I retire From flattery, cards, and dice, and din: Nor art thou found in mansions higher Than the low cot, or humble inn.
William Shenstone
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A large retinue upon a small income, like a large cascade upon a small stream, tends to discover its tenuity.
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