Joseph Addison Quotes

A misery is not to be measured from the nature of the evil, but from the temper of the sufferer.

An ostentatious man will rather relate a blunder or an absurdity he has committed, than be debarred from talking of his own dear person.

If men would consider not so much wherein they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling.

If you wish success in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother and hope your guardian genius.

It is folly for an eminent person to think of escaping censure, and a weakness to be affected by it. All the illustrious persons of antiquity, and indeed of every age, have passed through this fiery persecution. There is no defense against reproach but obscurity; it is a kind of concomitant to greatness, as satires and invectives were an essential part of a Roman triumph.

Self discipline is that which, next to virtue, truly and essentially raises one man above another.

True happiness... arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's self.

What an absurd thing it is to pass over all the valuable parts of a man, and fix our attention on his infirmities.

How beautiful is death, when earn'd by virtue! Who would not be that youth? What pity is it That we can die but once to serve our country!

Content thyself to be obscurely good. When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, the post of honor is a private station.

I value my garden more for being full of blackbirds than of cherries, and very frankly give them fruit for their songs.

Exercise ferments the humors, casts them into their proper channels, throws off redundancies, and helps nature in those secret distributions, without which the body cannot subsist in its vigor, nor the soul act with cheerfulness.

True happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noise; it arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's self, and in the next from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions.

Man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter.

Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable.