Sydney Smith Quotes

Every rock in the ocean where a cormorant can perch is occupied by our troops — has a governor, deputy-governor, storekeeper, and deputy-storekeeper — and will soon have an archdeacon and a bishop. Military colleges, with thirty-four professors, educating seventeen ensigns per annum, being half an ensign for each professor, with every species of nonsense, athletic, sartorial, and plumigerous.

Never give way to melancholy; resist it steadily, for the habit will encroach.

It is the greatest of all mistakes, to do nothing because you can only do little...

In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every other word you have written; you have no idea what vigour it will give your style.

Great men hallow a whole people and lift up all who live in their time.

It is true that every increase of knowledge may possibly render depravity more depraved, as well as it may increase the strength of virtue. It is in itself only power; and its value depends on its application.

It is a very wise rule in the conduct of the understanding, to acquire early a correct notion of your own peculiar constitution of mind, and to become well acquainted, as a physician would say, with your idiosyncrasy. Are you an acute man, and see sharply for small distances? or are you a comprehensive man, and able to take in, wide and extensive views into your mind? Does your mind turn its ideas into wit? or are you apt to take a common-sense view of the objects presented to you? Have you an exuberant imagination, or a correct judgment? Are you quick, or slow? accurate, or hasty? a great reader, or a great thinker? It is a prodigious point gained if any man can find out where his powers lie, and what are his deficiencies, — if he can contrive to ascertain what Nature intended him for: and such are the changes and chances of the world, and so difficult is it to ascertain our own understandings, or those of others, that most things are done by persons who could have done something else better. If you choose to represent the various parts in life by holes upon a table, of different shapes, — some circular, some triangular, some square, some oblong, — and the persons acting these parts by bits of wood of similar shapes, we shall generally find that the triangular person has got into the square hole, the oblong into the triangular, and a square person has squeezed himself into the round hole. The officer and the office, the doer and the thing done, seldom fit so exactly, that we can say they were almost made for each other.

We can inform Jonathan what are the inevitable consequences of being too fond of glory;—<small>TAXES</small> upon every article which enters into the mouth, or covers the back, or is placed under the foot—taxes upon every thing which it is pleasant to see, hear, feel, smell, or taste—taxes upon warmth, light, and locomotion—taxes on every thing on earth, and the waters under the earth—on every thing that comes from abroad, or is grown at home—taxes on the raw material—taxes on every fresh value that is added to it by the industry of man—taxes on the sauce which pampers man's appetite, and the drug that restores him to health—on the ermine which decorates the judge, and the rope which hangs the criminal—on the poor man's salt, and the rich man's spice—on the brass nails of the coffin, and the ribands of the bride—at bed or board, couchant or levant, we must pay:—The schoolboy whips his taxed top—the beardless youth manages his taxed horse, with a taxed bridle on a taxed road:—and the dying Englishman pouring his medicine, which has paid 7 per cent., into a spoon that has paid 15 per cent.—flings himself back upon his chintz-bed which has paid 22 per cent.—makes his will on an eight pound stamp, and expires in the arms of an apothecary who has paid a license of an hundred pounds for the privilege of putting him to death. His whole property is then immediately taxed from 2 to 10 per cent. Besides the probate, large fees are demanded for burying him in the chancel; his virtues are handed down to posterity on taxed marble; and he is then gathered to his fathers,—to be taxed no more.

The fact is that in order to do any thing in this world worth doing, we must not stand shivering on the bank thinking of the cold and the danger, but jump in and scramble through as well as we can.

You remember Thurlow's answer to some one complaining of the injustice of a company. "Why, you never expected justice from a company, did you? they have neither a soul to lose, nor a body to kick."

We have taxes upon every article that enters into the mouth, or covers the back, or is placed under the foot; taxes upon everything which it is pleasant to feel, smell, or taste; taxes on everything in the earth, or in the waters under the earth; on everything that comes from abroad or that is grown at home ; taxes on the raw material; taxes on every value that is added to it by the industry of man ; taxes on the sauce which pampers man's appetite, and on the drug which restores him to health ; on the ermine which covers the judge, and the rope that hangs the criminal; on the poor man's salt, and the rich man's spice; on the brass nails of the coffin, and the ribbons of the bride; — on bed and board — couchant or levant — we must pay.

The schoolboy whips his taxed top; the beardless youth manages a taxed horse, with a taxed bridle, on a taxed road; and the dying Englishman, pouring his medicine, which has paid seven per cent, into a spoon which has paid fifteen per cent, flings himself back upon his chintz bed, which has paid twenty-two per cent, and expires in the arms of an apothecary who has paid a license of one hundred pounds for the privilege of presiding at his death-bed. His whole property is then taxed from two to twenty per cent. Besides the probate, large fees are demanded for burying him in the chancel ; his virtues are handed down to posterity on taxed marble, and he is gathered to his fathers to be taxed no more.

Praise is the best diet for us, after all.

Serenely full, the epicure would say,
Fate cannot harm me, I have dined today.

We cultivate literature on a little oatmeal.

All musical people seem to be happy.
It is the engrossing pursuit, — almost the only innocent and
unpunished passion.