Joseph Addison Quotes

The Female World are likewise indispensably necessary in the best Causes to manage the Controversial Part of them, in which no Man of tolerable Breeding is ever able to refute them. Arguments out of a pretty Mouth are unanswerable.

It is with great Satisfaction I observe, that the Women of our Island, who are the most eminent for Virtue and good Sense, are in the Interest of the present Government. As the fair Sex very much recommend the Cause they are engaged in, it would be no small Misfortune to a Sovereign, tho' he had all the Male Part of the Nation on his Side, if he did not find himself King of the most beautiful Half of his Subjects. Ladies are always of great use to the Party they espouse, and never fail to win over Numbers to it.

I have lived in one Reign, when the Prince, instead of invigorating the Laws of our Country, or giving them their proper Course, assumed a Power of dispensing with them: And in another, when the Sovereign was flattered by a Set of Men into a Persuasion, that the Regal Authority was unlimited and uncircumscribed. In either of these Cases, good Laws are at best but a dead Letter; and by shewing the People how happy they ought to be, only serve to aggravate the Sense of their Oppressions.

How can we sufficiently extol the Goodness of His present Majesty, who is not willing to have a single Slave in his Dominions! Or enough rejoice in the Exercise of that Loyalty, which, instead of betraying a Man into the most ignominious Servitude, (as it does in some of our neighboring Kingdoms) entitles him to the highest Privileges of Freedom and Property!

The House of Commons is the Representative of Men in my Condition. I consider my self as one who give my Consent to every Law which passes: A Free-Holder in our Government being of the Nature of a Citizen of Rome in that famous Commonwealth; who, by the Election of a Tribune, had a kind of remote Voice in every Law that was enacted. So that a Freeholder is but one Remove from a Legislator, and for that Reason ought to stand up in the Defense of those Laws, which are in some degree of his own making. For such is the Nature of our happy Constitution, that the Bulk of the People virtually give their Approbation to every thing they are bound to obey, and prescribe to themselves those Rules by which they are to walk.

I have rather chosen this Title than any other, because it is what I most glory in, and what most effectually calls to my Mind the Happiness of that Government under which I live. As a British Free-Holder, I should not scruple taking place of a French Marquis; and when I see one of my Countrymen amusing himself in his little Cabbage-Garden, I naturally look upon him as a greater Person than the Owner of the richest Vineyard in Champagne.

I have only one Request to make to my Readers, that they will peruse these Papers with the same Candor and Impartiality in which they are written; and shall hope for no other Prepossession in favor of them, than what one would think should be natural to every Man, a Desire to be happy, and a good Will towards those, who are the Instruments of making them so.

The cast of mind which is natural to a discreet man, make him look forward into futurity, and consider what will be his condition millions of ages hence, as well as what it is at present. He knows that the misery or happiness which are reserved for him in another world, lose nothing of their reality by being placed at so great a distance from him. The objects do not appear little to him because they are remote. He considers that those pleasures and pains which lie hid in eternity, approach nearer to him every moment, and will be present with him in their full weight and measure, as much as those pains and pleasures which he feels at this very instant. For this reason he is careful to secure to himself that which is the proper happiness of his nature, and the ultimate design of his being. He carries his thoughts to the end of every action, and considers the most distant as well as the most immediate effects of it. He supersedes every little prospect of gain and advantage which offers itself here, if he does not find it consistent with his views of an hereafter. In a word, his hopes are full of immortality, his schemes are large and glorious, and his conduct suitable to one who knows his true interest, and how to pursue it by proper methods.

Cunning is only the mimic of discretion, and may pass upon weak men in the same manner as vivacity is often mistaken for wit, and gravity for wisdom.

At the same time that I think discretion the most useful talent a man can be master of, I look upon cunning to be the accomplishment of little, mean, ungenerous minds. Discretion points out the noblest ends to us, and pursues the most proper and laudable methods of attaining them: cunning has only private selfish aims, and sticks at nothing which may make them succeed. Discretion has large and extended views, and, like a well-formed eye, commands a whole horizon: cunning is a kind of short-sightedness, that discovers the minutest objects which are near at hand, but is not able to discern things at a distance. Discretion the more it is discovered, gives a greater authority to the person who possesses it: cunning, when it is once detected, loses its force, and makes a man incapable of bringing about even those events which he might have done had he passed only for a plain man. Discretion is the perfection of reason, and a guide to us in all the duties of life: cunning is a kind of instinct, that only looks out after our immediate interest and welfare. Discretion is only found in men of strong sense and good understandings, cunning is often to be met with in brutes themselves, and in persons who are but the fewest removes from them.

Though a man has all other perfections, and wants discretion, he will be of no great consequence in the world; but if he has this single talent in perfection, and but a common share of others, he may do what he pleases in his station of life.

The discreet man finds out the talents of those he converses with, and knows how to apply them to proper uses. Accordingly, if we look into particular communities and divisions of men, we may observe that it is the discreet man, not the witty, nor the learned, nor the brave, who guides the conversation, and gives measures to the society.

There are many more shining qualities in the mind of man, but there is none so useful as discretion; it is this, indeed, which gives a value to all the rest, which sets them at work in their proper times and places, and turns them to the advantage of the person who is possessed of them. Without it, learning is pedantry, and wit impertinence; virtue itself looks like weakness; the best parts only qualify a man to be more sprightly in errors, and active to his own prejudice.

I Have often thought if the minds of men were laid open, we should see but little difference between that of the wise man and that of the fool. There are infinite reveries, numberless extravagances, and a perpetual train of vanities which pass through both. The great difference is, that the first knows how to pick and cull his thoughts for conversation, by suppressing some, and communicating others; whereas the other lets them all indifferently fly out in words.

The great art in writing advertisements is the finding out a proper method to catch the reader's eye; without which a good thing may pass over unobserved, or be lost among commissions of bankrupt.