Page:Three Thousand Selected Quotations from Brilliant Writers.djvu/250

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
242
FAME.

Dishonor waits on perfidy. A man should blush to think a falsehood; it is the crime of cowards.


Lie not, neither to thyself nor men nor God. Let mouth and heart be one—beat and speak together, and make both felt in action. It is for cowards to lie.


I have seldom known any one who deserted truth in trifles that could be trusted in matters of importance.

Paley.

Dissimulation in youth is the forerunner of perfidy in old age; its first appearance is the fatal omen of growing depravity and future shame.

Blair.

FAME.

No true and permanent fame can be founded, except in labors which promote the happiness of mankind.


The highest greatness, surviving time and stone, is that which proceeds from the soul of man. Monarchs and cabinets, generals and admirals, with the pomp of court and the circumstance of war, in the lapse of time disappear from sight; but the pioneers of truth, though poor and lowly, especially those whose example elevates human nature, and teaches the rights of man, so that "a government of the people, by the people, for the people, may not perish from the earth;" such a harbinger can never be forgotten, and their renown spreads co-extensive with the cause they served so well.