the mind.--_Diodorus._

Let every man, if possible, gather some good books under his
roof.--_Channing._

Wise books for half the truths they hold are honored tombs.--_George
Eliot._

~Bores.~--I am constitutionally susceptible of noises. A carpenter's
hammer, in a warm summer's noon, will fret me into more than midsummer
madness. But those unconnected, unset sounds are nothing to the measured
malice of music.--_Lamb._

These, wanting wit, affect gravity, and go by the name of solid
men.--_Dryden._

If we engage into a large acquaintance and various familiarities, we set
open our gates to the invaders of most of our time; we expose our life
to a quotidian ague of frigid impertinences which would make a wise man
tremble to think of.--_Cowley._

The symptoms of compassion and benevolence, in some people, are like
those minute guns which warn you that you are in deadly peril!--_Madame
Swetchine._

~Borrowing.~--You should only attempt to borrow from those who have but
few of this world's goods, as their chests are not of iron, and they
are, besides, anxious to appear wealthier than they really
are.--_Heinrich Heine._

According to the security you offer to her, Fortune makes her loans easy
or ruinous.--_Bulwer-Lytton._

~Bravery.~--True bravery is shown by performing without witnesses what one
might be capable of doing before all the world.--_Rochefoucauld._

'Tis late before the brave despair.--_Thompson._

The bravest men are subject most to chance.--_Dryden._

The truly brave are soft of heart and eyes.--_Byron._

People glorify all sorts of bravery except the bravery they might show
on behalf of their nearest neighbors.--_George Eliot._

~Brevity.~--To make pleasures pleasant shorten them.--_Charles Buxton._

Was there ever anything written by mere man that was wished longer by
its readers, excepting Don Quixote, Robinson Crusoe, and the Pilgrim's
Progress?--_Johnson._

A sentence well couched takes both the sense and understanding. I love
not those cart-rope speeches that are longer than the memory of man can
fathom.--_Feltham._

I saw one excellency was within my reach--it was brevity, and I
determined to obtain it.--_Jay._

Be brief; for it is with words as with sunbeams--the more they are
condensed, the deeper they burn.--_Southey._

Concentration alone conquers.--_Charles Buxton._

The more an idea is developed, the more concise becomes its expression:
the more a tree is pruned, the bett