Famous Joseph Addison Quotations

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"He who would pass his declining years with honor and comfort, should, when young, consider that he may one day become old, and remember when he is old, that he has once been young."
by Joseph Addison
"What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to an human soul."
by Joseph Addison
"If you wish to succeed in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother, and hope your guardian genius."
by Joseph Addison
"Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind, which are delivered down from generation to generation as presents to the posterity of those who are yet unborn."
by Joseph Addison
"A man must be both stupid and uncharitable who believes there is no virtue or truth but on his own side."
by Joseph Addison
"A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world."
by Joseph Addison
"A cloudy day or a little sunshine have as great an influence on many constitutions as the most recent blessings or misfortunes."
by Joseph Addison
"The important question is not, what will yield to man a few scattered pleasures, but what will render his life happy on the whole amount."
by Joseph Addison
"The greatest sweetener of human life is Friendship. To raise this to the highest pitch of enjoyment, is a secret which but few discover."
by Joseph Addison
"The friendships of the world are oft confederacies in vice, or leagues of pleasures."
by Joseph Addison
"The most violent appetites in all creatures are lust and hunger; the first is a perpetual call upon them to propagate their kind, the latter to preserve themselves."
by Joseph Addison
"The unjustifiable severity of a parent is loaded with this aggravation, that those whom he injures are always in his sight."
by Joseph Addison
"Their is no defense against criticism except obscurity."
by Joseph Addison
"There is nothing that makes its way more directly to the soul than beauty."
by Joseph Addison
"There is not so variable a thing in nature as a lady's head-dress."
by Joseph Addison
"There is not a more unhappy being than a superannuated idol."
by Joseph Addison
"To a man of pleasure every moment appears to be lost, which partakes not of the vivacity of amusement."
by Joseph Addison
"To be exempt from the passions with which others are tormented, is the only pleasing solitude."
by Joseph Addison
"Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for."
by Joseph Addison
"Those Marriages generally abound most with Love and Constancy, that are preceded by a long Courtship."
by Joseph Addison
"What pity is it That we can die, but once to serve our country."
by Joseph Addison
"With regard to donations always expect the most from prudent people, who keep their own accounts."
by Joseph Addison
"Young men soon give, and soon forget, affronts; old age is slow in both."
by Joseph Addison
"As vivacity is the gift of women, gravity is that of men."
by Joseph Addison
"Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable."
by Joseph Addison
"Animals, in their generation, are wiser than the sons of men; but their wisdom is confined to a few particulars, and lies in a very narrow compass."
by Joseph Addison
"Cheerfulness is the best promoter of health and is as friendly to the mind as to the body."
by Joseph Addison
"Everything that is new or uncommon raises a pleasure in the imagination, because it fills the soul with an agreeable surprise, gratifies its curiosity, and gives it an idea of which it was not before possessed."
by Joseph Addison
"Education is a companion which no misfortune can depress, no crime can destroy, no enemy can alienate,no despotism can enslave. At home, a friend, abroad, an introduction, in solitude a solace and in society an ornament.It chastens vice, it guides virtue, it gives at once grace and government to genius. Without it, what is man? A splendid slave, a reasoning savage."
by Joseph Addison
"Friendship improves happiness, and abates misery, by doubling our joys, and dividing our grief."
by Joseph Addison
"If we may believe our logicians, man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter. He has a heart capable of mirth, and naturally disposed to it."
by Joseph Addison
"If we hope for what we are not likely to possess, we act and think in vain, and make life a greater dream and shadow than it really is."
by Joseph Addison
"If men would consider not so much wherein they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling."
by Joseph Addison
"Mirth is like a flash of lightning, that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity."
by Joseph Addison
"Nothing is capable of being well set to music that is not nonsense."
by Joseph Addison
"Our real blessings often appear to us in the shape of pains, losses and disappointments; but let us have patience and we soon shall see them in their proper figures."
by Joseph Addison
"Some virtues are only seen in affliction and others only in prosperity."
by Joseph Addison
"Suspicion is not less an enemy to virtue than to happiness; he that is already corrupt is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes suspicious will quickly be corrupt."
by Joseph Addison
"That he delights in the misery of others no man will confess, and yet what other motive can make a father cruel?"
by Joseph Addison
"No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority."
by Joseph Addison
"Is there not some chosen curse, some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven, red with uncommon wrath, to blast the man who owes his greatness to his country's ruin!"
by Joseph Addison
"Mere bashfulness without merit is awkwardness."
by Joseph Addison
"Men may change their climate, but they cannot change their nature. A man that goes out a fool cannot ride or sail himself into common sense."
by Joseph Addison
"Irregularity and want of method are only supportable in men of great learning or genius, who are often too full to be exact, and therefore they choose to throw down their pearls in heaps before the reader, rather than be at the pains of stringing them."
by Joseph Addison
"One should take good care not to grow too wise for so great a pleasure of life as laughter."
by Joseph Addison
"Modesty is not only an ornament, but also a guard to virtue."
by Joseph Addison
"Mutability of temper and inconsistency with ourselves is the greatest weakness of human nature."
by Joseph Addison
"It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are the more gentle and quiet we become towards the defects of others."
by Joseph Addison
"I value my garden more for being full of blackbirds than of cherries, and very frankly give them fruit for their songs."
by Joseph Addison
"Friendships, in general, are suddenly contracted; and therefore it is no wonder they are easily dissolved."
by Joseph Addison
"Better to die ten thousand deaths than wound my honor."
by Joseph Addison
"The union of the Word and the Mind produces that mystery which is called Life... Learn deeply of the Mind and its mystery, for therein lies the secret of immortality."
by Joseph Addison
"Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body."
by Joseph Addison
"Jesters do often prove prophets."
by Joseph Addison
"To say that authority, whether secular or religious, supplies no ground for morality is not to deny the obvious fact that it supplies a sanction."
by Joseph Addison
"Reading is a basic tool in the living of a good life."
by Joseph Addison
"'We are always doing', says he, 'something for Posterity, but I would fain see Posterity do something for us."
by Joseph Addison
"A good conscience is to the soul what health is to the body; it preserves constant ease and serenity within us; and more than countervails all the calamities and afflictions which can befall us from without."
by Joseph Addison
"A just and reasonable modesty does not only recommend eloquence, but sets off every great talent which a man can be possessed of."
by Joseph Addison
"A man should always consider how much more unhappy he might be than he is"
by Joseph Addison
"A man should always consider how much he has more than he wants."
by Joseph Addison
"A misery is not to be measured from the nature of the evil, but from the temper of the sufferer."
by Joseph Addison
"A misery is not to be measure from the nature of the evil, but from the temper of the sufferer."
by Joseph Addison
"A true critic ought to dwell upon excellencies rather than imperfections, to discover the concealed beauties of a writer, and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observation."
by Joseph Addison
"A woman seldom asks advice before she has bought her wedding clothes."
by Joseph Addison
"Admiration is a very short-lived passion, that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object."
by Joseph Addison
"Admiration is a very short-lived passion that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object, unless it be still fed with fresh discoveries, and kept alive by a perpetual succession of miracles rising into view."
by Joseph Addison
"Among all kinds of Writing, there is none in which Authors are more apt to miscarry than in Works of Humour, as there is none in which they are more ambitious to excel."
by Joseph Addison
"Animals, in their generation, are wiser than the sons of men but their wisdom is confined to a few particulars, and lies in a very narrow compass."
by Joseph Addison
"Cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity."
by Joseph Addison
"Content thyself to be obscurely good. When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, the post of honor is a private station."
by Joseph Addison
"Courage that grows from constitution often forsakes a man when he has occasion for it; courage which arises from a sense of duty acts; in a uniform manner."
by Joseph Addison
"Courage is the thing. All goes if courage goes."
by Joseph Addison
"Education is a companion which no misfortune can depress, no crime can destroy, no enemy can alienate,no despotism can enslave. At home, a friend, abroad, an introduction, in solitude a solace and in society an ornament.It chastens vice, it guides virtue, it gives at once grace and government to genius. Without it, what is man A splendid slave, a reasoning savage."
by Joseph Addison
"Education is a companion which no misfortune can depress, no crime can destroy, no enemy can alienate, no despotism can enslave. At home, a friend, abroad, an introduction, in solitude a solace and in society an ornament. It chastens vice, it guides virtue, it gives at once grace and government to genius. Without it, what is man? A splendid slave, a reasoning savage."
by Joseph Addison
"Exercise ferments the humors, casts them into their proper channels, throws off redundancies, and helps nature in those secret distributions, without which the body cannot subsist in its vigor, nor the soul act with cheerfulness."
by Joseph Addison
"From social intercourse are derived some of the highest enjoyments of life; where there is a free interchange of sentiments the mind acquires new ideas, and by frequent exercise of its powers, the understanding gains fresh vigor."
by Joseph Addison
"Friendship improves hapiness and reduces misery, by doubting our joys and dividing our grief."
by Joseph Addison
"Great souls by instinct to each other turn, demand alliance, and in friendship burn."
by Joseph Addison
"How beautiful is death, when earn'd by virtue Who would not be that youth What pity is it That we can die but once to serve our country"
by Joseph Addison
"I consider time as an in immense ocean, in which many noble authors are entirely swallowed up"
by Joseph Addison
"I have somewhere met with the epitaph on a charitable man which has pleased me very much. I cannot recollect the words, but here is the sense of it: 'What I spent I lost; what I possessed is left to others; what I gave away remains with me.'"
by Joseph Addison
"I think I may define taste to be that faculty of the soul which discerns the beauties of an author with pleasure, and the imperfections with dislike."
by Joseph Addison
"If you wish success in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother and hope your guardian genius."
by Joseph Addison
"It is folly for an eminent person to think of escaping censure, and a weakness to be affected by it. All the illustrious persons of antiquity, and indeed of every age, have passed through this fiery persecution. There is no defense against reproach but obscurity; it is a kind of concomitant to greatness, as satires and invectives were an essential part of a Roman triumph."
by Joseph Addison
"It is folly for an eminent man to think of escaping censure, and a weakness to be affected with it. All the illustrious persons of antiquity, and indeed of every age in the world, have passed through this fiery persecution."
by Joseph Addison
"Justice is an unassailable fortress, built on the brow of a mountain which cannot be overthrown by the violence of torrents, nor demolished by the force of armies."
by Joseph Addison
"Laughter, while it lasts, slackens and unbraces the mind, weakens the faculties, and causes a kind of remissness and dissolution in all the powers of the soul."
by Joseph Addison
"Laughter, while it lasts, slackens and unbraces the mind, weakens the faculties and causes a kind of remissness and dissolution in all the powers of the soul; and thus it may be looked on as weakness in the composition of human nature. But if we consider the frequent reliefs we receive from it and how often it breaks the gloom which is apt to depress the mind and damp our spirits, with transient, unexpected gleams of joy, one would take care not to grow too wise for so great a pleasure of life."
by Joseph Addison
"Man is subject to innumerable pains and sorrows by the very condition of humanity, and yet, as if nature had not sown evils enough in life, we are continually adding grief to grief and aggravating the common calamity by our cruel treatment of one another."
by Joseph Addison
"Man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter."
by Joseph Addison
"Music, the greatest good that mortals know and all of heaven we have hear below."
by Joseph Addison
"Mysterious love, uncertain treasure, hast thou more of pain or pleasure! Endless torments dwell about thee: Yet who would live, and live without thee!"
by Joseph Addison
"Nothing is more gratifying to the mind of man than power or dominion."
by Joseph Addison
"One's religion is whatever he is most interested in, and yours is Success."
by Joseph Addison
"Plenty of people wish to become devout, but no one wishes to be humble."
by Joseph Addison
"Ridicule is generally made use of to laugh men out of virtue and good sense, by attacking everything praiseworthy in human life."
by Joseph Addison
"Ridicule is generally made use of to laugh men out of virtue and good sense, by attacking everything praiseworthy in human life"
by Joseph Addison
"Self discipline is that which, next to virtue, truly and essentially raises one man above another."
by Joseph Addison
"Sunday clears away the rust of the whole week."
by Joseph Addison


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