Quotes from William Shenstone

Men are sometimes accused of pride, merely because their accusers would be proud themselves were they in their places.

Some men are called sagacious, merely on account of their avarice; whereas a child can clench its fist the moment it is born.

A miser grows rich by seeming poor. An extravagant man grows poor by seeming rich.

Every single instance of a friend's insincerity increases our dependence on the efficacy of money.

It happens a little unluckily that the persons who have the most infinite contempt of money are the same that have the strongest appetite for the pleasures it procures.

What leads to unhappiness is making pleasure the chief aim.

Reserve is no more essentially connected with understanding than a church organ with devotion, or wine with good-nature.

Patience is the panacea; but where does it grow, or who can swallow it?

Poetry and consumption are the most flattering of diseases.

There is a certain flimsiness of poetry which seems expedient in a song.

The lines of poetry, the period of prose, and even the texts of Scripture most frequently recollected and quoted, are those which are felt to be preeminently musical.

Avarice is the most oppose of all characters to that of God Almighty, whose alone it is to give and not receive.

Taste and good-nature are universally connected.

Every good poet includes a critic, but the reverse is not true.

Bashfulness is more frequently connected with good sense than we find assurance; and impudence, on the other hand, is often the mere effect of downright stupidity.

Anger is a great force. If you control it, it can be transmuted into a power which can move the whole world.

When self-interest inclines a man to print, he should consider that the purchaser expects a pennyworth for his penny, and has reason to asperse his honesty if he finds himself deceived.

The eye must be easy, before it can be pleased.

The weak and insipid white wine makes at length excellent vinegar.

Anger is a great force. If you control it, it can be transmuted into a power which can move the whole world.

A liar begins with making falsehood appear like truth, and ends with making truth itself appear like falsehood.

Jealousy is the fear or apprehension of superiority: envy our uneasiness under it.

So sweetly she bade me adieu, I thought that she bade me return.

Grandeur and beauty are so very opposite, that you often diminish the one as you increase the other. Variety is most akin to the latter, simplicity to the former.