Aphorisms Galore!

Vice and Virtue

161 aphorisms  ·  5 comments

Aphorisms in This Category

tiny.ag/d6tftb8q  ·  submitted 1997

If everyone would sweep in front of their own door, the whole world would be clean.

Unknown, (Middle Eastern proverb), in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/rh0iiyqp  ·  submitted 1997

If only I could be respected without having to be respectable.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/0xhdtnul  ·  submitted 1997

If people talk negatively about you, live so that no one will believe them.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/zl0ikbnv  ·  submitted 1997

Coward: one who, in a perilous emergency, thinks with his legs.

Ambrose Bierce, in Vice and Virtue and War and Peace

tiny.ag/ca72ttqk  ·  submitted 1997

It has been observed that one's nose is never so happy as when it is thrust into the affairs of another, from which some physiologists have drawn the inference that the nose is devoid of the sense of smell.

Ambrose Bierce, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/9te2rxr1  ·  submitted 1997

A truth that's told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent

William Blake, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/9uv5rp2p  ·  submitted 1997

He whose face gives no light shall never become a star.

William Blake, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/e2igybvl  ·  submitted 1999 by Erwin van Moll

In adultery, there is usually tenderness and self-sacrifice; in murder, courage; in profanation and blasphemy, a certain satanic splendour. Judas elected those offences unvisited by any virtues: abuse of confidence and informing.

Jorge Luis Borges, "Three Versions of Judas", in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/ubsgpw2q  ·  submitted 1997

There is not any memory with less satisfaction than the memory of some temptation we resisted.

James Branch Cabell, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/l4pyn7j8  ·  submitted 1997

I will answer anything I can with honor, but not about others.

John Brown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/fpmrxth3  ·  submitted 1997

A mountain wears down a horse, anger wears down a man.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/xuteqz61  ·  submitted 1997

Always do right -- this will gratify some and astonish the rest.

Mark Twain, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/mltkwzme  ·  submitted 1997

Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest.

Mark Twain, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/2p8s4z0u  ·  submitted 1997

Always tell the truth. That way, you don't have to remember what you said.

Mark Twain, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/krxruwjx  ·  submitted 1999

Following the Equator (paperback)

Be good and you will be lonesome.

Mark Twain, Following the Equator, in Happiness and Misery and Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/17uoj5hx  ·  submitted 1997

Forget and forgive. This is not difficult when properly understood. It means forget inconvenient duties, then forgive yourself for forgetting. By rigid practice and stern determination, it comes easy.

Mark Twain, in Vice and Virtue and Work and Recreation

tiny.ag/qnvx9otp  ·  submitted 1997

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.

Mark Twain, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/mbwozhf6  ·  submitted 1997

If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything.

Mark Twain, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/q2py4esl  ·  submitted 1997

Let us so live that when we come to die, even the undertaker will be sorry.

Mark Twain, in Life and Death and Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/j8lj2pgz  ·  submitted 1997

Virtue is its own reward. There's a pleasure in doing good which sufficiently pays itself.

Sir John Vanbrugh, in Vice and Virtue