William Shenstone Quotes

An English poet.
(1714 - 1763)

A fool and his words are soon parted.

A liar begins with making falsehood appear like truth, and ends with making truth itself appear like falsehood. [Falsehood]

A man has generally the good or ill qualities, which he attributes to mankind. [Judgment]

A miser grows rich by seeming poor; an extravagant man grows poor by seeming rich. [Miser]

A person that would secure to himself great deference will, perhaps, gain his point by silence as effectually as by anything he can say. [Silence]

A reserved man is in continual conflict with the social part of his nature, and even grudges himself the laugh into which he is sometimes betrayed.

A rich dress adds but little to the beauty of a person; it may possibly create a deference, but that is rather an enemy to love.

Anger is a great force. If you control it, it can be transmuted into a power which can move the whole world. [Anger]

Bashfulness is more frequently connected with good sense than with over assurance; and impudence, on the other hand, is often the effect of downright stupidity.

Consider, when you are enraged at anyone, what you would probably think if he should die during the dispute. [Anger]

Critics must excuse me if I compare them to certain animals called asses, who, by gnawing vines, originally taught the great advantage of pruning them. [Critics]

Deference before company is the genteelest kind of flattery. The flattery of epistles affects one less, as they cannot be shown without an appearance of vanity. Flattery of the verbal kind is gross. In short, applause is of too coarse a nature to be swallowed in the gross, though the extract of tincture be ever so agreeable. [Flattery]

Deference is the most delicate, the most indirect, and the most elegant of all compliments, and before company is the genteelest kind of flattery.

Deference often shrinks and withers as much upon the approach of intimacy, as the sensitive plant does upon the touch of one's finger.

Every good poet includes a critic, but the reverse is not true.

Every single instance of a friend's insincerity increases our dependence on the efficacy of money.

Extreme volatile and sprightly tempers seem inconsistent with any great enjoyment. There is too much time wasted in the mere transition from one object to another. No room for those deep impressions which are made only by the duration of an idea, and are quite requisite to any strong sensation, either of pleasure or of pain. The bee to collect honey, or the spider to gather poison, must abide some time upon the weed or flower. They whose fluids are mere sal volatile seem rather cheerful than happy men.

Fools are often united in the strictest intimacies, as the lighter kinds of woods are the most closely glued together. [Fools]

For seldom shall she hear a tale So sad, so tender, yet so true.

Grandeur and beauty are so very opposite, that you often diminish the one as you increase the other. Variety is most akin to the latter, simplicity to the former.