Samuel Richardson Quotes

Women love to be called cruel, even when they are kindest.

Those who have least to do are generally the most busy people in the world.

But let not those worthy young women, who may think themselves destined to a single life, repine over-much at their lot; since, possibly, if they have had no lovers, or having had one, two, or three, have not found a husband, they have had rather a miss than a loss, as men go.

In all Works of This, and of the Dramatic Kind, STORY, or AMUSEMENT, should be considered as little more than the Vehicle to the more necessary INSTRUCTION.

Over-niceness may be under-niceness.

A Stander-by is often a better judge of the game than those that play.

Why Do We Procrastinate? P - postponing life R - resisting change O - overly cautious C - contemplating course of action R - reasoning and justifying A - afraid of success S - summoning up some courage T - trouble moving forward I - inability to see the outcome N - not able to trust in your abilities to make decisions A - attempting to control the situation T - time to reflect on your motives E - erodes progress

The mind can be but full. It will be as much filled with a small disagreeable occurrence, having no other, as with a large one.

For tutors, although they may make youth learned, do not always make them virtuous.

Men generally are afraid of a wife who has more understanding than themselves.

Though a censure lies against those who are poor and proud, yet is Pride sooner to be forgiven in a poor person than in a rich one; since in the latter it is insult and arrogance; in the former, it may be a defense against temptations to dishonesty; and, if manifested on proper occasions, may indicate a natural bravery of mind, which the frowns of fortune cannot depress.

The wisest among us is a fool in some things.

Men and women are brothers and sisters; they are not of different species; and what need be obtained to know both, but to allow for different modes of education, for situation and constitution, or perhaps I should rather say, for habits, whether good or bad.

Chastity, like piety, is a uniform grace.

The plays and sports of children are as salutary to them as labor and work are to grown persons.

Youth is rather to be pitied than envied by people in years since it is doomed to toil through the rugged road of life which the others have passed through, in search of happiness that is not to be met with in it and that, at the highest, can be compounded for only by the blessing of a contented mind.

If women would make themselves appear as elegant to an Husband, as they were desirous to appear to him while a Lover, the Rake, which all women love, would last longer in the Husband than it generally does.

Tired of myself longing for what I have not

Some children act as if they thought their parents had nothing to do, but to see them established in the world and then quit it.

Love before marriage is absolutely necessary.

All women, from the countess to the cook-maid, are put into high good humor with themselves when a man is taken with them at firstsight. And be they ever so plain, they will find twenty good reasons to defend the judgment of such a man.

The World, thinking itself affronted by superior merit, takes delight to bring it down to its own level.

Nothing can be more wounding to a spirit not ungenerous, than a generous forgiveness.

Who would not rather be the sufferer than the defrauder?

The person who will bear much shall have much to bear, all the world through.

'Passion' a word which involves so many feelings. I feel it when we touch; I feel it when we kiss; I feel it when I look at you. For you are my passion; my one true love.

A feeling heart is a blessing that no one, who has it, would be without; and it is a moral security of innocence; since the heart that is able to partake of the distress of another, cannot wilfully give it.

Love will draw an elephant through a key-hole.

We can all be good when we have no temptation or provocation to the contrary.

Marriage is the highest state of friendship. If happy, it lessens our cares by dividing them, at the same time that it doubles our pleasures by mutual participation.

A good man will extend his munificence to the industrious poor of all persuasions reduced by age, infirmity, or accident; to thosewho labour under incurable maladies; and to the youth of either sex, who are capable of beginning the world with advantage, but have not the means.

It is but shaping the bribe to the taste, and every one has his price.

That dangerous but too commonly received notion, that a reformed rake makes the best husband.

Old men, imagining themselves under obligation to young paramours, seldom keep any thing from their knowledge.

Parents sometimes make not those allowances for youth, which, when young, they wished to be made for themselves.

Women are so much in love with compliments that rather than want them, they will compliment one another, yet mean no more by it than the men do.

Marry first, and love will come after is a shocking assertion; since a thousand things may happen to make the state but barely tolerable, when it is entered into with mutual affection.

When we reflect upon the cruelties daily practised upon such of the animal creation as are given us for food, or which we ensnarefor our diversion, we shall be obliged to own that there is more of the savage in human nature than we are aware of.

Superstitious notions propagated in infancy are hardly ever totally eradicate, not even in minds grown strong enough to despise the like credulous folly in others.

Those who can least bear a jest upon themselves, will be most diverted with one passed on others.

A man who insults the modesty of a woman, as good as tells her that he has seen something in her conduct that warranted his presumption.

Of what violences, murders, depredations, have not the epic poets, from all antiquity, been the occasion, by propagating false honor, false glory, and false religion?

From sixteen to twenty, all women, kept in humor by their hopes and by their attractions, appear to be good-natured.

All that hoops are good for is to clean dirty shoes and keep fellows at a distance.

Women's eyes are wanderers, and too often bring home guests that are very troublesome to them, and whom, once introduced, they cannot get out of the house.

I have my choice: who can wish for more? Free will enables us to do everything well while imposition makes a light burden heavy.

Air and manners are more expressive than words.

The uselessness and expensiveness of modern women multiply bachelors.