To err is human; to forgive, divine.
Alexander Pope
Be not the first by whom the new are tried, Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast: Man never is, but always to be blest.
Happy the man whose wish and care a few paternal acres bound, content to breathe his native air in his own ground.
For Forms of Government let fools contest; whatever is best administered is best.
Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
Honor and shame from no condition rise. Act well your part: there all the honor lies.
Nature and nature's laws lay hid in the night. God said, Let Newton be! and all was light!
Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed was the ninth beatitude.
A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring.
Men must be taught as if you taught them not, and things unknown proposed as things forgot.
Lo! The poor Indian, whose untutored mind sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind.
'Tis education forms the common mind; just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.
Act well your part, there all the honour lies.
Teach me to feel another's woe, to hide the fault I see, that mercy I to others show, that mercy show to me.
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
Some people will never learn anything, for this reason, because they understand everything too soon.
To be angry is to revenge the faults of others on ourselves.
The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read, With loads of learned lumber in his head.
An honest man's the noblest work of God.
The proper study of Mankind is Man.
The most positive men are the most credulous.
Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll; charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
On life's vast ocean diversely we sail. Reasons the card, but passion the gale.
No one should be ashamed to admit he is wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.
And, after all, what is a lie? 'Tis but the truth in a masquerade.
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, and wretches hang that jurymen may dine.
Trust not yourself, but your defects to know, make use of every friend and every foe.
The ruling passion, be it what it will. The ruling passion conquers reason still.
Party-spirit at best is but the madness of many for the gain of a few.
All nature is but art unknown to thee.
True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, as those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.
Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.
So vast is art, so narrow human wit.
Never find fault with the absent.
What some call health, if purchased by perpetual anxiety about diet, isn't much better than tedious disease.
All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body Nature is, and God the soul.
A work of art that contains theories is like an object on which the price tag has been left.
Praise undeserved, is satire in disguise.
Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man.
Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see, Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be.
Of Manners gentle, of Affections mild; In Wit a man; Simplicity, a child.
Who shall decide when doctors disagree, And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me?
Woman's at best a contradiction still.
They dream in courtship, but in wedlock wake.
At ev'ry word a reputation dies.
The greatest magnifying glasses in the world are a man's own eyes when they look upon his own person.
Order is heaven's first law.
The learned is happy, nature to explore; The fool is happy, that he knows no more.
On wrongs swift vengeance waits.
