Joseph Addison

Charity is a virtue of the heart, and not of the hands.

The sense of honour is of so fine and delicate a nature, that it is only to be met with in minds which are naturally noble, or in such as have been cultivated by good examples, or a refined education.

A good conscience is to the soul what health is to the body; it preserves a constant ease and serenity within us, and more than countervails all the calamities and afflictions which can possibly befall us.

Blessings may appear under the shape of pains, losses and disappointments; but let him have patience, and he will see them in their proper figures.

Courage that grows from constitution very often forsakes a man when he has occasion for it, and when it is only a kind of instinct in the Soul breaks out on all occasions without judgment or discretion. That courage which proceeds from the …

When I read the rules of criticism, I immediately inquire after the works of the author who has written them, and by that means discover what it is he likes in a composition.

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

Justice discards party, friendship, kindred, and is therefore always represented as blind.

To be perfectly just is an attribute in the divine nature; to be so to the utmost of our abilities, is the glory of man.

There is no virtue so truly great and godlike as justice.

From hence, let fierce contending nations know, What dire effects from civil discord flow.

Sweet are the slumbers of the virtuous man.

What means this heaviness that hangs upon me? This lethargy that creeps through all my senses? Nature, oppress'd and harrass'd out with care, Sinks down to rest.

The soul, secured in her existence, smiles At the drawn dagger, and defies its point.

The ideal man bears the accidents of life With dignity and grace, the best of circumstances.

my death and life, My bane and antidote, are both before me

Eternity! thou pleasing dreadful thought! Through what variety of untried being, Through what new scenes and changes must we pass!

It must be so — Plato, thou reasonest well! Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, This longing after immortality? Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror, O falling into nought? Why shrinks the soul Back on herself, and …

If there's a power above us, (And that there is all nature cries aloud Through all her works) he must delight in virtue.

The stars shall fade away, the sun himself Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years, But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth, Unhurt amidst the wars of elements, The wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds.

The honors of this world, what are they But puff, and emptiness, and peril of falling?

Thanks to the gods! my boy has done his duty.

O ye powers that search The heart of man, and weigh his inmost thoughts, If I have done amiss, impute it not! The best may err, but you are good.

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