The Good Book (77 page)

  3. In everything there is a measure.

  4. Enough is enough for the wise.

Chapter 106: Money

  1. One handful of money is stronger than two handfuls of truth.

  2. A person without money is a bow without an arrow.

  3. Help me to money and I will help myself to friends.

  4. Everyone bastes the fat hog while the lean one burns.

  5. For lack of money one cannot speed.

  6. If money goes before, all ways lie open.

  7. Money begets money.

  8. Money is ace of trumps.

  9. Money is often lost for want of money.

10. When fishing for man, money is the best bait.

11. Money is welcome though it come in dirty clothes.

12. Money makes us laugh.

13. Money makes mastery.

14. Money makes the pot boil.

15. Money makes, and money mars.

16. Ready money is a ready remedy.

17. The love of money and the love of learning seldom meet.

18. Liberty is the price paid for money.

19. Money is perfumed, wherever found.

20. There is no companion like money.

21. To have money is a fear, to lack it is a grief.

22. They need honey on their tongues who have no money in their purses.

23. Money has wings.

24. Money is never out of season.

25. Mention money, and the world is silent.

26. The person with both mind and money employs the latter well.

27. Money is the sinew of affairs.

28. The love of money grows with the amount of money.

29. You must spend money if you wish to make it.

30. When money speaks, truth is silent.

Chapter 107: Mothers

  1. Better the child cry than the mother sigh.

  2. A child may have too much of a mother’s blessing.

  3. Light-heeled mothers make leaden-heeled daughters.

  4. Men are what their mothers make them.

  5. Mothers’ darlings make milksop heroes.

  6. The kick of the dam does not hurt the colt.

  7. Mother love is always in its spring.

  8. Who takes the child by the hand takes the mother by the heart.

  9. Children are the anchors that hold their mothers to life.

10. A bustling mother makes a slothful child.

11. The mother’s breath is always sweet.

12. No mother has a homely child.

13. A mother’s wrath does not survive the night.

14. A mother will understand what her dumb child says.

15. When the child falls the mother weeps; when the mother falls the child laughs.

16. More than one mother can make a tasty soup.

17. Judge someone not by the words of his mother but by the comments of his neighbours.

Chapter 108: Nature

  1. To know nature, consult nature.

  2. It cannot be nature, if it is not sense.

  3. Nature is the true law.

  4. Nature obeys necessity.

  5. Nature pardons no mistakes.

  6. To command nature one must obey it.

  7. The volume of nature is the book of knowledge.

  8. Wisdom and nature never say different things.

  9. Nature always returns.

10. Nature does nothing in vain.

Chapter 109: Necessity

  1. Necessity breaks iron.

  2. Necessity is the argument of tyrants and the creed of slaves.

  3. Necessity makes an honest man a knave.

  4. Necessity never makes a good bargain.

  5. We do what we must, and call it by good names.

  6. Necessity is a strict teacher.

  7. Every act of necessity is disagreeable.

  8. The wise never oppose necessity.

  9. Necessity knows no shame.

Chapter 110: Opinion

  1. Only little minds are alienated by differences of opinion.

  2. Erroneous opinions can be tolerated where reason is free to combat them.

  3. Opinion in good people is know­ledge in the making.

  4. So many heads, so many opinions.

  5. A man who never alters his opinion is like standing water, which breeds reptiles.

  6. Opinion is the queen of the world.

  7. Those who never retract an opinion love themselves more than truth.

Chapter 111: Opportunity

  1. Every opportunity grasped is two new opportunities made.

  2. Hoist sail in a fair wind.

  3. Opportunity seldom comes labelled.

  4. Who seizes the right moment is the right person for the moment.

  5. Know your opportunity.

Chapter 112: Pain

  1. Where we feel pain we lay a hand.

  2. An hour of pain is as long as a day of pleasure.

  3. Great pain for little gain makes a man weary.

  4. If pains be a pleasure, profit will follow.

  5. Pain is forgotten when gain comes.

  6. Those who do not feel pain seldom think others feel it.

  7. There is a pleasure akin to pain.

  8. No matter which finger you bite, it will hurt.

  9. Nothing comes without pains except dirt and long nails.

Chapter 113: Patience

  1. Grain by grain the hen fills her belly.

  2. They who can have patience can have what they will.

  3. How poor are those without patience.

  4. Patience achieves more than force.

  5. Patience is a plaster for all sores.

  6. Patience opens every door.

  7. Every misfortune is subdued by patience.

  8. Patience provoked often turns to fury.

  9. Be patient, and shuffle the cards.

10. With patience and time the mulberry becomes a silk gown.

Chapter 114: Peace

  1. Peace breeds, strife consumes.

  2. Better a lean peace than a fat victory.

  3. By wisdom peace, by wisdom plenty.

  4. Peace begins where ambition ends.

  5. Peace has greater victories than war.

  6. When people find no peace within, they will find it nowhere else.

Chapter 115: People

  1. The mob has many heads but no brains.

  2. The people pay with ingratitude.

  3. The tyranny of a multitude is a multiplied tyranny.

  4. To worship the people is to be worshipped.

  5. Trust not the many-minded populace.

  6. Nothing is so uncertain as the judgements of the mob.

  7. It is easy to side with the crowd.

Chapter 116: Philanthropy

  1. Mankind will not be reasoned out of the feeling of humanity.

  2. We praise those who love their fellow human beings.

  3. What good thing you do, do not defer it.

  4. What is done for another is done for oneself.

  5. Only those live who do good.

Chapter 117: Philosophy

  1. Philosophy is the sweet milk of adversity.

  2. Clarity is the sincerity of philosophers.

  3. Philosophy is doubt.

  4. Let philosophers be wise for themselves.

  5. Philosophy does the going, and wisdom is the goal.

  6. Philosophy is the mother of the arts.

  7. The true medicine of the mind is philosophy.

  8. To enjoy freedom, be the slave of philosophy.

Chapter 118: Pleasure

  1. If you long for pleasure you must labour to get it.

  2. After pleasant scratching comes painful smarting.

  3. Fly the pleasure that bites tomorrow.

  4. Follow pleasure and it will flee, flee pleasure and it will follow.

  5. For one pleasure a thousand griefs are proved.

  6. Pleasure makes hours short.

  7. Pleasure is the greatest incentive to vice.

  8. Rarity gives zest to pleasure.

  9. There is no pleasure unalloyed.

Chapter 119: Politics

  1. All politicians die by swallowing their own lies.

  2. The honest politician is the one who, when bought, stays bought.

  3. Few politicians die, and none resign.

  4. Politicians neither love nor hate.

  5. Old politicians chew on past wisdom.

  6. Party is the madness of the many for the gain of the few.

  7. There is no gambling like politics.

  8. Vain hope, to make people happy by politics.

  9. When great questions end, little parties begin.

10. Office shows the person.

Chapter 120: Poverty

  1. Those guilty of poverty easily suspect themselves.

  2. Who licks his knife has little for others.

  3. Who has a low door must stoop.

  4. It is easier to praise poverty than to bear it.

  5. Poverty, not will, consents.

  6. Poverty is not a vice but an inconvenience.

  7. Poverty is the mother of health.

  8. Poverty is the worst guard of chastity.

  9. There is no virtue that poverty cannot destroy.

10. Poverty is the mother of crime.

11. Riches follow poverty better than poverty follows riches.

12. Light purse, heavy heart.

13. Poverty is a kind of leprosy.

14. The poor are never free.

15. Poverty is never believed, though speaking truth.

16. Contented poverty is an honourable estate.

17. Little goods, little cares.

18. It is natural for the poor to count their sheep.

19. Money moves slowly towards poverty.

20. There are many things the ragged dare not say.

21. To have nothing is not poverty.

22. Poverty is a shirt of fire.

Chapter 121: Power

  1. If you would have power, pretend to have power.

  2. Increase of power leads to increase of wealth.

  3. Power weakens the wicked.

  4. The greater the power, the more dangerous its abuse.

  5. Power corrupts.

  6. Partnership with power is never safe.

  7. Power acquired by guilt is never used for good.

Chapter 122: Praise

  1. A man’s praise stinks in his own mouth.

  2. All praise their own wares.

  3. Faint praise is abuse.

  4. Who loves praise loves temptation.

  5. Let all praise the bridge they go over.

  6. Praises are wages.

  7. Praise makes good men better and bad men worse.

  8. Undeserved praise is satire.

  9. In doing what we ought we deserve no praise.

10. Unless new praise arises, the old is lost.

11. One has only to die to be praised.

12. The refusal of praise is the desire to be twice praised.

Chapter 123: Prosperity

  1. Prosperity reveals vice, adversity virtue.

  2. Prosperity is a great teacher, adversity a greater.

  3. Prosperity lets go the bridle.

  4. Prosperity makes friends, adversity tries them.

  5. The rich are never sure that they are loved for themselves.

Chapter 124: Proverbs

  1. Proverbs are the daughters of experience.

  2. A proverb is a short sentence formed of long experience.

  3. There is no proverb which is untrue.

  4. A short saying often contains much wisdom.