“Adroit observers will find that some who affect to dislike flattery, may yet be flattered indirectly, by a well seasoned abuse and ridicule of their rivals.”
Source: Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think
“Fortune has been considered the guardian divinity of fools; and, on this score, she has been accused of blindness; but it should rather be adduced as a proof of her sagacity, when she helps those who cannot help themselves.”
Source: Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan
“Genius, when employed in works whose tendency it is to demoralize and to degrade us, should be contemplated with abhorrence rather than with admiration; such a monument of its power, may indeed be stamped with immortality, but like the Coliseum at Rome, we deplore its magnificence because we detest the purposes for which it was designed.”
Source: Lacon: or, Many things in few words
“If kings would only determine not to extend their dominions until they had filled them with happiness, they would find the smallest territories too large, but the longest life too short for the full accomplishment of so grand and so noble an ambition.”
Source: Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan
“Much too oft we make life gloomy-- When happy we might be, If we gathered more of sunshine, And not dark shadows see.”
“Hope is a prodigal young heir, and Experience is his banker; but his drafts are seldom honoured, since there is often a heavy balance against him, because he draws largely on a small capital, is not yet in possession, and if he were, would die.”
Source: Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think
“Hypocrites act by virtue.... They frame many counterfeits of her, with which they make an ostentatious parade, in all public assemblies, and processions; but the original of what they counterfeit, and which may indeed be said to have fallen from heaven, they produce so seldom, that it is cankered by the rust of sloth, and useless from non-application.”
Source: Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think
“Were the life of man prolonged, he would become such a proficient in villainy, that it would become necessary again to drown or to burn the world. Earth would become an hell; for future rewards when put off to a great distance, would cease to encourage, and future punishments to alarm.”
Source: Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think
“The integrity that lives only on opinion would starve without it.”
Source: Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think
“Ironically, the first thing that appealed to me about Islam was its pluralism. The fact that the Koran praises all the great prophets of the past.”
