Arthur Helps Quotes & Sayings

The world will tolerate many vices, but not their diminutives. — Arthur Helps

We should lay up in our minds a store of goodly thoughts which will be a living treasure of knowledge always with us, and from which, at various times, and amidst all the shiftings of circumstances, we might be sure of drawing some comfort, guidance and sympathy. — Arthur Helps

Be cheerful [and grateful for the good that you have]: do not brood over fond hopes unrealized until a chain is fastened on each thought and wound around the heart. Nature intended you to be the fountain-spring of cheerfulness and social life, and not the mountain of despair and melancholy. — Arthur Helps

The thing which makes one man greater than another, the quality by which we ought to measure greatness, is a man's capacity for loving. — Arthur Helps

To hear always, to think always, to learn always, it is thus that we live truly. He who aspires to nothing, who learns nothing, is not worthy of living. — Arthur Helps

Those who are successfully to lead their fellow-men, should have once possessed the nobler feelings. We have all known individuals whose magnanimity was not likely to be troublesome on any occasion; but then they betrayed their own interests by unwisely omitting the consideration, that such feelings might exist in the breasts of those whom they had to guide and govern: for they themselves cannot even remember the time when in their eyes justice appeared preferable to expediency, the happiness of others to self-interest, or the welfare of a State to the advancement of a party. — Arthur Helps

No man has ever praised to persons equally-and pleased them both. — Arthur Helps

Thoughts there are, not to be translated into any language, and spirits alone can read them. — Arthur Helps

When we consider the incidents of former days, and perceive, while reviewing the long line of causes, how the most important events of our lives originated in the most trifling circumstances; how the beginning of our greatest happiness or greatest misery is to be attributed to a delay, to an accident, to a mistake; we learn a lesson of profound humility. — Arthur Helps

Extremely foolish advice is likely to be uttered by those who are looking at the laboring vessel from the land. — Arthur Helps

Always say a kind word if you can, if only that it may come in, perhaps, with singular opportuneness, entering some mournful man's darkened room, like a beautiful firefly, whose happy circumvolutions he cannot but watch, forgetting his many troubles. — Arthur Helps

We are frequently understood the least by those who have known us the longest. — Arthur Helps

Wise sayings often fall on barren ground, but a kind word is never thrown away. — Arthur Helps

I do not know of any sure way of making others happy as being so one's self. — Arthur Helps

There is an honesty which is but decided selfishness in disguise. The person who will not refrain from expressing his or her sentiments and manifesting his or her feelings, however unfit the time, however inappropriate the place, however painful this expression may be, lays claim, forsooth, to our approbation as an honest person, and sneers at those of finer sensibilities as hypocrites. — Arthur Helps

If you would understand your own age, read the works of fiction produced in it. People in disguise speak freely. — Arthur Helps

Almost all human affairs are tedious. Everything is too long. Visits, dinners, concerts, plays, speeches, pleadings, essays, sermons, are too long. Pleasure and business labor equally under this defect, or, as I should rather say, this fatal super-abundance. — Arthur Helps

It requires a strong mind to bear up against several languages. Some persons have learnt so many, that they have ceased to think in any one. — Arthur Helps

The world will find out that part of your character which concerns it: that which especially concerns yourself, it will leave for you to discover. — Arthur Helps

The measure of civilization in a people is to be found in its just appreciation of the wrongfulness of war. — Arthur Helps

The man of the house can destroy the pleasure of the household, but he cannot make it. That rests with the woman, and it is her greatest privilege. — Arthur Helps

Pride, if not the origin, is the medium of all wickedness-the atmosphere without which it would instantly die away. — Arthur Helps

They tell us that "Pity is akin to Love;" if so, Pity must be a poor relation. — Arthur Helps

No doubt hard work is a great police agent. If everybody were worked from morning till night, and then carefully locked up, the register of crime might be greatly diminished. But what would become of human nature? Where would be the room for growth in such a system of things? It is through sorrow and mirth, plenty and need, a variety of passions, circumstances, and temptations, even through sin and misery, that men's natures are developed. — Arthur Helps

The greatest luxury of riches is that they enable you to escape so much good advice. — Arthur Helps

We all admire the wisdom of people who come to us for advice. — Arthur Helps

Choose an author as you choose a friend. — Arthur Helps

Man ceased to be an ape, vanquished the ape, on the day the first book was written. — Arthur Helps

It is a weak thing to tell half your story, and then ask your friend's advice-a still weaker thing to take it. — Arthur Helps

The worst use that can be made of success is to boast of it. — Arthur Helps

Many a man has a kind of a kaleidoscope, where the bits of broken glass are his own merits and fortunes; and they fall into harmonious arrangements, and delight him, often most mischievously and to his ultimate detriment; but they are a present pleasure. — Arthur Helps

Tolerance is the only real test of civilization. — Arthur Helps

The heroic example of other days is in great part the source of the courage of each generation; and men walk up composedly to the most perilous enterprises, beckoned onward by the shades of the brave that were. — Arthur Helps

The sense of danger is never, perhaps, so fully apprehended as when the danger has been overcome. — Arthur Helps

The most common-place people become highly imaginative when they are in a passion. Whole dramas of insult, injury, and wrong pass before their minds,
efforts of creative genius, for there is sometimes not a fact to go upon. — Arthur Helps

It is in length of patience, endurance and forbearance that so much of what is good in mankind and womankind is shown. — Arthur Helps

We are not so easily guided by our most prominent weaknesses as by those of which we are least aware. — Arthur Helps

The man who could withstand, with his fellow-men in single line, a charge of cavalry may lose all command of himself on the occurrence of a fire in his own house, because of some homely reminiscence unknown to the observing bystander. — Arthur Helps

Wisdom is seldom gained without suffering. — Arthur Helps

Everywhere I have sought rest and not found it, except sitting in a corner by myself with a little book. — Arthur Helps

Few have wished for memory so much as they have longed for forgetfulness. — Arthur Helps

If you are often deceived by those around you, you may be sure that you deserve to be deceived; and that instead of railing at the general falseness of mankind, you have first to pronounce judgment on your own jealous tyranny, or on your own weak credulity. — Arthur Helps

What a blessing this smoking is! Perhaps the greatest that we owe to the discovery of America. — Arthur Helps

There is one statesman of the present day, of whom I always say that he would have escaped making the blunders that he has made if he had only ridden more in buses. — Arthur Helps

A mixture of admiration and pity is one of the surest recipes for affection. — Arthur Helps

Always win fools first. They talk much, and what they have once uttered they will stick to; whereas there is always time, up to the last moment, to bring before a wise man arguments that may entirely change his opinion. — Arthur Helps

Simple ignorance has in its time been complimented by the names of most of the vices, and of all the virtues. — Arthur Helps

It has always appeared to me, that there is so much to be done in this world, that all self-inflicted suffering which cannot be turned to good account for others, is a loss - a loss, if you may so express it, to the spiritual world. — Arthur Helps

Selfishness, when it is punished by the world, is mostly punished because it is connected with egotism. — Arthur Helps

Infinite toil would not enable you to sweep away a mist; but by ascending a little you may often look over it altogether. — Arthur Helps

War may be the game of kings, but, like the games at ancient Rome, it is generally exhibited to please and pacify the people. — Arthur Helps

Those who never philosophized until they met with disappointments, have mostly become disappointed philosophers — Arthur Helps

There are no better cosmetics than a severe temperance and purity, modesty and humility, a gracious temper and calmness of spirit; and there is no true beauty without the signatures of these graces in the very countenance. — Arthur Helps

Men of much depth of mind can bear a great deal of counsel; for it does not easily deface their own character, nor render their purposes indistinct. — Arthur Helps

No man who has not sat in the assemblies of men can know the light, odd and uncertain ways in which decisions are often arrived at. — Arthur Helps

It takes a great man to make a great listener — Arthur Helps

An official man is always an official man, and he has a wild belief in the value of reports. — Arthur Helps

Many know how to please, but know not when they have ceased to give pleasure. — Arthur Helps

Remember that in giving any reason at all for refusing, you lay some foundation for a future request. — Arthur Helps

Most terrors are but spectral illusions. Only have the courage of the man who could walk up to his spectre seated in the chair before him, and sit down upon it; the horrid thing will not partake the chair with you. — Arthur Helps

People resemble still more the time in which they live, than they resemble their fathers. — Arthur Helps

Experience is the extract of suffering. — Arthur Helps

You cannot ensure the gratitude of others for a favour conferred upon them in the way which is most agreeable to yourself. — Arthur Helps

Do not shun this maxim because it is common-place. On the contrary, take the closest heed of what observant men, who would probably like to show originality, are yet constrained to repeat. Therein lies the marrow of the wisdom of the world. — Arthur Helps

Any one who is much talked of be much maligned. This seems to be a harsh conclusion; but when you consider how much more given men are to depreciate than to appreciate, you will acknowledge that there is some truth in the saying. — Arthur Helps

Alas! it is not the child but the boy that generally survives in the man. — Arthur Helps

Some persons, instead of making a religion for their God, are content to make a god of their religion. — Arthur Helps

He who is continually changing his point of view sees more, and more clearly, than one who, statue-like, forever stands upon the same pedestal; however lofty and well-placed that pedestal may be. — Arthur Helps

The most enthusiastic man in a cause is rarely chosen as the leader. — Arthur Helps

It has been said with some meaning that if men would but rest in silence, they might always hear the music of the spheres. — Arthur Helps

A great many wise sayings have been uttered about the effects of solitary retirement; but the motives which impel men to seek it are not more various than the effects which it produces on different individuals. One thing is certain, that those who can with truth affirm that they are "never less alone than when alone," might generally add that they never feel more lonely than when not alone. — Arthur Helps

Routine is not organization, any more than paralysis is order. — Arthur Helps

More than half the difficulties of the world would be allayed or removed by the exhibition of good temper. — Arthur Helps

There are few who would need advisers, if they were only accustomed to appeal to themselves in their calmest, holiest moments. If, when embarrassed with doubt as to any course of action, they would turn aside from the immediate tumult of the world, and from the vain speaking of those who "darken counsel by words without knowledge;" and would then commune with their hearts alone, at night, the heavens their silent counsellors, they would act not always in accordance with the wise men of this world, but with that wisdom which bringeth peace. — Arthur Helps

Entrust a secret to one whose importance will not be much increased by divulging it. — Arthur Helps

In a balanced organization, working towards a common objective, there is success. — Arthur Helps

No man, or woman, was ever cured of love by discovering the falseness of his or her lover. The living together for three long, rainy days in the country has done more to dispel love than all the perfidies in love that have ever been committed. — Arthur Helps

Keep your feet on the ground, but let your heart soar as high as it will. Refuse to be average or to surrender to the chill of your spiritual environment. — Arthur Helps

The apparent foolishness of others is but too frequently our own ignorance. — Arthur Helps

A man's action is only a picture book of his creed. — Arthur Helps

Love, like the opening of the heavens to the saints, shows for a moment, even to the dullest person, the possibilities of the human race. One has faith, hope, and charity for another being, perhaps but the creation of the imagination; still it is a great advance for a person to be profoundly loving, even in his or her imagination. — Arthur Helps

The reasons which any man offers to you for his own conduct betray his opinion of your character. — Arthur Helps

Offended vanity is the great separator in social life. — Arthur Helps

Do not be deceived into thinking that how a man acts is the full picture. — Arthur Helps

Every happiness is a hostage to fortune. — Arthur Helps

We are pleased with one who instantly assents to our opinions, but we love a proselyte. — Arthur Helps

Rare almost as great poets, rarer, perhaps, than veritable saints and martyrs; are consummate men of business. A man, to be excellent in this way, requires a great knowledge of character, with that exquisite tact which feels unerringly the right moment when to act. A discreet rapidity must pervade all the movements of his thought and action. He must be singularly free from vanity, and is generally found to be an enthusiast who has the art to conceal his enthusiasm. — Arthur Helps

A sceptical young man one day conversing with the celebrated Dr. Parr, observed that he would believe nothing which he could not understand. "Then, young man, your creed will be the shortest of any man's I know." — Arthur Helps

There is hardly a more common error than that of taking the man who has one talent, for a genius. — Arthur Helps

It is better in some respects to be admired by those with whom you live than to be loved by them; and this not on account of any gratification of vanity, but because admiration is so much more tolerant than love. — Arthur Helps

The very best financial presentation is one that's well thought out and anticipates any questions ... answering them in advance. — Arthur Helps

A great and frequent error in our judgment of human nature is to suppose that those sentiments and feelings have no existence, which may be only for a time concealed. The precious metals are not found at the surface of the earth, except in sandy places. — Arthur Helps

Men rattle their chains-to manifest their freedom. — Arthur Helps