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Charles Caleb Colton Quotes - Page 14

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The pride of ancestry is a superstructure of the most imposing height, but resting on the most flimsy foundation. It is ridiculous enough to observe the hauteur with which the old nobility look down on the new. The

The pride of ancestry is a superstructure of the most imposing height, but resting on the most flimsy foundation. It is ridiculous enough to observe the hauteur with which the old nobility look down on the new. The reason of this puzzled me a little, until I began to reflect that most titles are respectable only because they are old; if new, they would be despised, because all those who now admire the grandeur of the stream would see nothing but the impurity of the source.

Charles Caleb Colton
Pride, Foundation, Titles
Charles Caleb Colton (1823). “Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan”

He that has never known adversity is but half acquainted with others, or with himself.

Charles Caleb Colton
Adversity, Half, Known
Charles Caleb Colton (1836). “Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.238

We shall at all times chance upon men of recondite acquirements, but whose qualifications, from the incommunicative and inactive habits of their owners, are as utterly useless to others as though the possessors had them not.

Charles Caleb Colton
Men, Useless, Chance
Charles Caleb Colton (1836). “Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.313

Make the most of the day, by determining to spend it on two sorts of acquaintances only--those by whom something may be got, and those from whom something may be learned.

Charles Caleb Colton
Two, May, Acquaintance

It has been shrewdly said, that when, men abuse us we should suspect ourselves, and when they praise us, them. It is a rare instance of virtue to despise which censure which we do not deserve; and still more rare to despise praise which we do.

Charles Caleb Colton
Men, Abuse, Praise
Charles Caleb Colton (1824). “Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think”, p.125

That an author's work is the mirror of his mind is a position that has led to very false conclusions. If Satan himself were to write a book it would be in praise of virtue, because the good would purchase it for use, and the bad for ostentation.

Charles Caleb Colton
Book, Writing, Mirrors
Charles Caleb Colton (1832). “Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.141

As there are none so weak that we may venture to injure them with impunity, so there are none so low that they may not at some time be able to repay an obligation. Therefore, what benevolence would dictate, prudence would confirm.

Charles Caleb Colton
May, Venture, Able
Charles Caleb Colton (1824). “Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think”, p.37

There is one passage in the Scriptures to which all the potentates of Europe seem to have given their unanimous assent and approbation...."There went out a decree in the days of Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed."

Charles Caleb Colton
Europe, Atheism, World

If our eloquence be directed above the heads of our hearers, we shall do no execution. By pointing our arguments low, we stand a chance of hitting their hearts as well as their heads. In addressing angels, we could hardly raise our eloquence too high; but we must remember that men are not angels.

Charles Caleb Colton
Heart, Angel, Men
Charles Caleb Colton (1832). “Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.147

Novels may teach us as wholesome a moral as the pulpit. There are "sermons in stones," in healthy books, and "good in everything.

Charles Caleb Colton
Book, Healthy, May

We injure mysteries, which are matters of faith, by any attempt at explanation in order to make them matters of reason. Could they be explained, they would cease to be mysteries; and it has been well said that a thing is not necessarily against reason because it happens to be above it.

Charles Caleb Colton
Order, Matter, Mystery
Charles Caleb Colton (1832). “Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”

As the grand discordant harmony of the celestial bodies may be explained by the simple principles of gravity and impulse, so also in that more wonderful and complicated microcosm, the heart of man, all the phenomena of morals are perhaps resolvable into one single principle, the pursuit of apparent good; for although customs universally vary, yet man in all climates and countries is essentially the same.

Charles Caleb Colton
Country, Heart, Simple
Charles Caleb Colton (1824). “Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think”, p.102

There are circumstances of peculiar difficulty and danger, where a mediocrity of talent is the most fatal quantum that a man can possibly possess. Had Charles the First and Louis the Sixteenth been more wise or more weak, more firm or more yielding, in either case they had both of them saved their heads.

Charles Caleb Colton
Wise, Men, Peculiar
Charles Caleb Colton (1823). “Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan”, p.96

Logic and metaphysics make use of more tools than all the rest of the sciences put together, and do the least work.

Charles Caleb Colton
Together, Tools, Use
Charles Caleb Colton (1823). “Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan”, p.231

Literature has her quacks no less than medicine, and they are divided into two classes; those who have erudition without genius, and those who have volubility without depth; we shall get second-hand sense from the one, and original nonsense from the other.

Charles Caleb Colton
Hands, Class, Two
Charles Caleb Colton (1821). “Lacon: or, Many things in few words”, p.232

Light, whether it be material or moral, is the best reformer.

Charles Caleb Colton
Light, Moral, Materials
Charles Caleb Colton (1836). “Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.421

Alas! how has the social spirit of Christianity been perverted by fools at one time, and by knaves and bigots at another; by the self-tormentors of the cell, and the all-tormentors of the conclave!

Charles Caleb Colton
Self, Cells, Knaves

The consequences of things are not always proportionate to the apparent magnitude of those events that have produced them. Thus the American Revolution, from which little was expected, produced much; but the French Revolution, from which much was expected, produced little.

Charles Caleb Colton
Events, Littles, Revolution
Charles Caleb Colton (1836). “Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.115

The drafts which true genius draws upon posterity, although they may not always be honored so soon as they are due, are sure to be paid with compound interest in the end.

Charles Caleb Colton
Genius, Literature, May
Charles Caleb Colton (1866). “Lacon: or, Many things in few words”, p.123

He that abuses his own profession will not patiently bear with any one else who does so. And this is one of our most subtle operations of self-love. For when we abuse our own profession, we tacitly except ourselves; but when another abuses it, we are far from being certain that this is the case.

Charles Caleb Colton
Self, Abuse, Doe
Charles Caleb Colton (1821). “Lacon: or, Many things in few words”, p.39

Men spend their lives in anticipations,—in determining to be vastly happy at some period when they have time. But the present time has one advantage over every other—it is our own. Past opportunities are gone, future have not come. We may lay in a stock of pleasures, as we would lay in a stock of wine; but if we defer the tasting of them too long, we shall find that both are soured by age.

Charles Caleb Colton
Inspirational, Happiness, Happy

We make a goddess of Fortune ... and place her in the highest heaven. But it is not fortune that is exalted and powerful, but we ourselves that are abject and weak.

Charles Caleb Colton
Powerful, Heaven, Goddess
Charles Caleb Colton (1836). “Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.365

Time ... advances like the slowest tide, but retreats like the swiftest torrent.

Charles Caleb Colton
Time, Tides, Retreat
Philip Dormer Stanhope (4th earl of Chesterfield.), Charles Caleb Colton (1861). “Lord Chesterfield's advice to his son on men and manners. To which are added, selections from Colton's 'Lacon'.”, p.238

Courage is generosity of the highest order, for the brave are prodigal of the most precious things.

Charles Caleb Colton
Order, Generosity, Brave
Charles Caleb Colton (1832). “Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.157

Power. like the diamond, dazzles the beholder, and also the wearer; it dignifies meanness; it magnifies littleness; to what is contemptible, it gives authority; to what is low, exaltation. To acquire it, appears not more difficult than to be dispossessed of it when acquired, since it enables the holder to shift his own errors on dependents, and to take their merits to himself. But the miracle of losing it vanishes, when we reflect that we are as liable to fall as to rise, by the treachery of others; and that to say "I am" is language that has been appropriated exclusively to God!

Charles Caleb Colton
Fall, Errors, Giving
Charles Caleb Colton (1832). “Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think”, p.23

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