Isaac Barrow Quotes

Nothing of worth or weight can be achieved with half a mind, with a faint heart, and with a lame endeavor.

The reading of books, what is it but conversing with the wisest men of all ages and all countries.

Upright simplicity is the deepest wisdom, and perverse craft the merest shallowness.

He who loveth a book will never want a faithful friend, a wholesome counsellor, a cheerful companion, or an effectual comforter.

Mathematics - the unshaken Foundation of Sciences, and the plentiful Fountain of Advantage to human affairs.

It is commonly said that revenge is sweet, but to a calm and considerate mind, patience and forgiveness are sweeter.

He that loveth a book will never want a faithful friend, a wholesome counsellor, a cheerful companion, an effectual comforter. By study, by reading, by thinking, one may innocently divert and pleasantly entertain himself, as in all weathers, so in all fortunes.

It is safe to make a choice of your thoughts, scarcely ever safe to express them all.

The proper work of man, the grand drift of human life, is to follow reason, that noble spark kindled in us from heaven.

We should allow others' excellences, to preserve a modest opinion of our own.

Virtue is not a mushroom, that springeth up of itself in one night when we are asleep, or regard it not; but a delicate plant, that groweth slowly and tenderly, needing much pains to cultivate it, much care to guard it, much time to mature it, in our untoward soil, in this world's unkindly weather.

We may be as good as we please, if we please to be good.

Chance never writ a legible book; chance never built a fair house; chance never drew a neat picture; it never did any of these things, nor ever will; nor can it be without absurdity supposed able to do them; which yet are works very gross and rude, very easy and feasible, as it were, in comparison to the production of a flower or a tree.

Sin is never at a stay; if we do not retreat from it, we shall advance in it; and the farther on we go, the more we have to come back.

That men should live honestly, quietly, and comfortably together, it is needful that they should live under a sense of God's will, and in awe of the divine power, hoping to please God, and fearing to offend Him, by their behaviour respectively.

It is a fair adornment of a man and a great convenience both to himself and to all those with whom he converses and deals, to act uprightly, uniformly, and consistently. The practice of piety frees a man from interior distraction and from irresolution in his mind, from duplicity or inconstancy in his character, and from confusion in his proceedings, and consequently securing for others freedom from deception and disappointment in their transactions with him.

Nothing hath wrought more prejudice to religion, or brought more disparagement upon truth, than boisterous and unseasonable zeal.

Smiling always with a never fading serenity of countenance, and flourishing in an immortal youth.

Incredulity is not wisdom, but the worst kind of folly. It is folly, because it causes ignorance and mistake, with all the consequents of these; and it is very bad, as being accompanied with disingenuity, obstinacy, rudeness, uncharitableness, and the like bad dispositions; from which credulity itself, the other extreme sort of folly, is exempt.

If we desire to live securely, comfortably, and quietly, that by all honest means we should endeavor to purchase the good will of all men, and provoke no man's enmity needlessly; since any man's love may be useful, and every man's hatred is dangerous.

Every ear is tickled with the sweet music of applause.

The fruits of the earth do not more obviously require labor and cultivation to prepare them for our use and subsistence, than our faculties demand instruction and regulation in order to qualify us to become upright and valuable members of society, useful to others, or happy ourselves.

Even private persons in due season, with discretion and temper, may reprove others, whom they observe to commit sin, or follow bad courses, out of charitable design, and with hope to reclaim them.

Poetry is a kind of ingenious nonsense (Spence, Anecdotes

Mr Newton, a fellow of our College, and very young, being but the second year master of arts; but of an extraordinary genius and proficiency.