Book of Wise Sayings | Page 7

no limit causes terror, and unseasonable kindness does
away with respect. Be not so severe as to cause disgust, nor so lenient
as to make people presume.
Sa'dí.
118.
Be patient, if thou wouldst thy ends accomplish; for like patience is
there no appliance effective of success, producing certainly abundant
fruit of actions, never damped by failure, conquering all impediments.
Bháravi.
119.
As rain breaks through an ill-thatched house, passion breaks through an
unreflecting mind.
Dhammapada.
120.
Most men, even the most accomplished, are of limited faculties; every

one sets a value on certain qualities in himself and others: these alone
he is willing to favour, these alone will he have cultivated.
Goethe.
121.
Poverty, we may say, surrounds a man with ready-made barriers, which
if they do mournfully gall and hamper, do at least prescribe for him,
and force on him, a sort of course and goal; a safe and beaten, though a
circuitous, course. A great part of his guidance is secure against fatal
error, is withdrawn from his control. The rich, again, has his whole life
to guide, without goal or barrier, save of his own choosing, and,
tempted, is too likely to guide it ill.
Carlyle.
122.
By Fate full many a heart has been undone, And many a sprightly rose
made woe-begone; Plume thee not on thy lusty youth and strength: Full
many a bud is blasted ere its bloom.
Omar Khayyám.
123.
The best thing is to be respected, the next, is to be loved; it is bad to be
hated, but still worse to be despised.
Chinese.
124.
To be envied is a nobler fate than to be pitied.
Pindar.
125.

He only does not live in vain Who all the means within his reach
Employs--his wealth, his thought, his speech-- T'advance the weal of
other men.
Sanskrit.
126.
If you injure a harmless person, the evil will fall back upon you, like
light dust thrown up against the wind.
Buddhist.
127.
In the life of every man there are sudden transitions of feeling, which
seem almost miraculous. At once, as if some magician had touched the
heavens and the earth, the dark clouds melt into the air, the wind falls,
and serenity succeeds the storm. The causes which produce these
changes may have been long at work within us, but the changes
themselves are instantaneous, and apparently without sufficient cause.
Longfellow.
128.
Man is an intellectual animal, therefore an everlasting contradiction to
himself. His senses centre in himself, his ideas reach to the ends of the
universe; so that he is torn in pieces between the two without the
possibility of its ever being otherwise. A mere physical being or a pure
spirit can alone be satisfied with itself.
Hazlitt.
129.
The pure in heart, who fear to sin, The good, kindly in word and deed--
These are the beings in the world Whose nature should be called divine.

Buddhist.
130.
If thou desirest that the pure in heart should praise thee, lay aside anger;
be not a man of many words; and parade not thy virtues in the face of
others.
Firdausí.
131.
A wise man takes a step at a time; he establishes one foot before he
takes up the other: an old place should not be forsaken recklessly.
Sanskrit.
132.
The fish dwell in the depths of the waters, and the eagles in the sides of
heaven; the one, though high, may be reached with the arrow, and the
other, though deep, with the hook; but the heart of man at a foot's
distance cannot be known.[9]
Burmese.
[9] Cf. Proverbs, XXV, 3.
133.
The life of man is the incessant walk of nature, wherein every moment
is a step towards death. Even our growing to perfection is a progress to
decay. Every thought we have is a sand running out of the glass of life.
Feltham.
134.
I have observed that as long as a man lives and exerts himself he can

always find food and raiment, though, it may be, not of the choicest
description.
Goethe.
135.
There are no riches like the sweetness of content, nor poverty
comparable to the want of patience.
R. Chamberlain.
136.
'Tis not for gain, for fame, from fear That righteous men injustice shun,
And virtuous men hold virtue dear: An inward voice they seem to hear,
Which tells them duty must be done.
Mahábhárata.
137.
As far and wide the vernal breeze Sweet odours waft from blooming
trees, So, too, the grateful savour spreads To distant lands of virtuous
deeds.
Sanskrit.
138.
In this world, however little happiness may have been our portion, yet
have we no desire to die. Whether he can speak of life as cheerful and
delicate, or as full of pain, anxiety, and sorrow, never yet have I seen
one