Robert Aris Willmott Quotes
An English author.
(1809 - 1863)
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A discursive student is almost certain to fall into bad company. Homes of entertainment, scientific and romantic, are always open to a man who is trying to escape from his thoughts. But a shelter from the tempest is dearly bought in the house of the plague. Ten minutes with a French novel or a German rationalist have sent a reader away with a fever for life.
[Reading]
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A little knowledge leads the mind from God. Unripe thinkers use their learning to authenticate their doubts. While unbelief has its own dogma, more peremptory than the inquisitor's, patient meditation brings the scholar back to humbleness. He learns that the grandest truths appear slowly.
[Knowledge]
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Amusement is the waking sleep of labor. When it absorbs thought, patience, and strength that might have been seriously employed, it loses its distinctive character and becomes the taskmaster of idleness.
[Amusements]
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Attention makes the genius; all learning, fancy, science, and skill depend upon it. - Newton traced his great discoveries to it. - It builds bridges, opens new worlds, heals diseases, carries on the business of the world. - Without it taste is useless, and the beauties of literature unobserved.
[Attention]
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Biography is the personal and home aspect of history.
[Biography]
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Education is the apprenticeship of life.
[Education]
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Even the most refined and polished of men seldom conceal any of the sacrifices they make, or what it costs to make them. This is reserved for women, and is one of the many proofs they give of their superiority in all matters of affection and delicacy.
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Fiction allures to the severe task by a gayer preface. - Embellished truths are the illuminated alphabet of larger children.
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Genius finds its own road, and carries its own lamp.
[Genius]
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History presents the pleasantest features of poetry and fiction - the majesty of the epic, the moving accidents of the drama, and the surprises and moral of the romance.
[History]
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How deep is the magic of sound may be learned by breaking some sweet verses into prose. The operation has been compared to gathering dew-drops, which shine like jewels upon the flower, but run into water in the hand. The elements remain, but the sparkle is gone.
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It is supposable that in the eyes of angels, a struggle down a dark lane and a battle of Leipsic differ in nothing but in degree of wickedness.
[Crime]
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Joy and grief are never far apart. - In the same street the shutters of one house are closed, while the curtains of the next are brushed by the shadows of the dance. - A wedding party returns from the church; and a funeral winds to its door. - The smiles and sadness of life are the tragi-comedy of Shakespeare. - Gladness and sighs brighten and dim the mirror he beholds.
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Mere learning is only a compiler, and manages the pen as the compositor picks out the types - each sets up a book with the hand. - Stone masons collected the dome of St. Paul's, but Wren hung it in the air.
[Learning]
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Occasionally a single anecdote opens a character; biography has its comparative anatomy, and a saying or a sentiment enables the skillful hand to construct the skeleton.
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Of many large volumes the index is the best portion and the most useful. - A glance through the casement gives whatever knowledge of the interior is needful. - An epitome is only a book shortened; and as a general rule, the worth increases as the size lessens.
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Only the astrologer and the empyric never fail.
[Failure]
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Philosophical studies are beset by one peril, that a person easily brings himself to think that he thinks; and a smattering of science encourages conceit. Moreover, the vain man is generally a doubter. It is Newton who sees himself in a child on the seashore, and his discoveries in the colored shells.
[Philosophy]
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Talents, to strike the eye of posterity, should be concentrated. Rays, powerless while they are scattered, burn in a point.
[Talent]
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Taste is not stationary. It grows every day, and is improved by cultivation, as a good temper is refined by religion.
[Taste]
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