Oftener Quotes & Sayings

No men are oftener wrong than those that can least bear to be so. — Francois De La Rochefoucauld

Things unhoped for happen oftener than things we desire. — Plautus

The tears into his eyes were brought, And thanks and praises seemed to run So fast out of his heart, I thought They never would have done. -I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds With coldness still returning; Alas! the gratitude of men Hath oftener left me mourning. — William Wordsworth

In all matters of opinion and science ... the difference between men is ... oftener found to lie in generals than in particulars; and to be less in reality than in appearance. An explication of the terms commonly ends the controversy, and the disputants are surprised to find that they had been quarrelling, while at bottom they agreed in their judgement. — David Hume

Tyranny has perhaps oftener grown out of the assumptions of power, called for, on pressing exigencies, by a defective constitution, than out of the full exercise of the largest constitutional authorities. — Alexander Hamilton

...stop pacing the aisles and counting the miles. Instead, climb more mountains, eat more ice cream, go barefoot oftener, swim more rivers, watch more sunsets, laugh more and cry less. Life must be lived as we go along. — Robert J. Hastings

Men fail much oftener from want of perseverance than from want of talent. — William Cobbett

Had we less to say to those we love, perhaps we should say it oftener. — Emily Dickinson

First impressions are often signals from the deep that we should credit oftener than we do ... — Katherine Anne Porter

Chastity is oftener owing to diffidence and shame, than to fortitude of reason or virtue. — Norm MacDonald

Men are much oftener thrown on their knees by the melancholy than by the agreeable passions. — David Hume

We fancy that our afflictions are sent us directly from above; sometimes we think it in piety and contrition, but oftener in moroseness and discontent. — Walter Savage Landor

The sensitive person's hostility to the machine is in one sense unrealistic, because of the obvious fact that the machine has come to stay. But as an attitude of mind there is a great deal to be said for it. The machine has got to be accepted, but it is probably better to accept it rather as one accepts a drug - that is, grudgingly and suspiciously. Like a drug, the machine is useful, dangerous and habit-forming. The oftener one surrenders to it the tighter its grip becomes. — George Orwell

According to Solomon, life and death are in the power of the tongue; and as Euripides truly affirmeth, every unbridled tongue in the end shall find itself unfortunate; for in all that ever I observed in the course of worldly things, I ever found that men's fortunes are oftener made by their tongues than by their virtues, and more men's fortunes overthrown thereby, also, than by their vices. — Walter Raleigh

She was afraid to suggest to him that to most people, nothing "happens." That most people merely live from day to day until they die. That, after he had been dead a year, doubtless fewer than five people would think of him oftener than once a year. That there might even come a year when no one on earth would think of him at all. — Gwendolyn Brooks

We oftener say things because we can say them well, than because they are sound and reasonable. — Walter Savage Landor

The wealthy seldom possess wealth: oftener they are possessed by it. — Ivan Panin

Even in ordinary conversation, the ideas connected with the word Logic include at least precision of language, and accuracy of classification: and we perhaps oftener hear persons speak of a logical arrangement, or of expressions logically defined, than of conclusions logically deduced from premises. — John Stuart Mill

And oh, what a mercy it is that these women do not exercise their powers oftener! We can't resist them, if they do. Let them show ever so little inclination, and men go down on their knees at once-old or ugly, it is all the same. And this I set down as a positive truth. A woman with fair opportunities, and without an absolute hump, may marry WHOM SHE LIKES. Only let us be thankful that the darlings are like the beasts of the field, and don't know their own power. They would overcome us entirely if they did. — Frank Yerby

One of the most widespread superstitions is that every man has his own special, definite qualities; that a man is kind, cruel, wise, stupid, energetic, apathetic, etc. Men are not like that. We may say of a man that he is more often kind than cruel, oftener wise than stupid, oftener energetic than apathetic, or the reverse; but it would be false to say of one man that he is kind and wise, of another that he is wicked and foolish. And yet we always classify mankind in this way. And this is untrue. Men are like rivers: the water is the same in each, and alike in all; but every river is narrow here, is more rapid there, here slower, there broader, now clear, now cold, now dull, now warm. It is the same with men. Every man carries in himself the germs of every human quality, and sometimes one manifests itself, sometimes another, and the man often becomes unlike himself, while still remaining the same man, In some people these changes are very rapid, and Nekhludoff was such a man. — Leo Tolstoy

A street in Constantinople is a picture which one ought to see once - not oftener. — Mark Twain

Men and women make sad mistakes about their own symptoms, taking their vague, uneasy longings sometimes for genius, sometimes for religion, and oftener still for a mighty love. — George Eliot

I will not say, as the beggars at our door used to do, 'I'll never ask anything of Him again;' but, on the contrary, 'He shall hear oftener from me than ever,' and I will love God the better, and love prayer the better, as long as I live. — Philip Henry

If we understood what happens when we use the Word of God, we would use it oftener. — Oswald Chambers

The innocence that feels no risk and is taught no caution, is more vulnerable than guilt, and oftener assailed. — Nathaniel Parker Willis

The action of the soul is oftener in that which is felt and left unsaid than in that which is said in any conversation. It broods over every society, and men unconsciously seek for it in each other. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

The progress of science has been amazingly rapid in the last decade; but consider the savants, those exhausted hens. They are certainly not "harmonious" natures: they can merely cackle more than before, because they lay eggs oftener: but the eggs are always smaller, [Pg 64] though their books are bigger. The natural result of it all is the favourite "popularising" of science (or rather its feminising and infantising), the villainous habit of cutting the cloth of science to fit the figure of the "general public. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Towns oftener swamp one than carry one out onto the big ocean of life. — D.H. Lawrence

Foreseeing is not understanding, else surely the prophecy latent in man would come oftener to the surface! — George MacDonald

Thanksgiving Day, a function which originated in New England two or three centuries ago when those people recognized that they really had something to be thankful for
annually, not oftener
if they had succeeded in exterminating their neighbors, the Indians, during the previous twelve months instead of getting exterminated by their neighbors, the Indians. Thanksgiving Day became a habit, for the reason that in the course of time, as the years drifted on, it was perceived that the exterminating had ceased to be mutual and was all on the white man's side, consequently on the Lord's side; hence it was proper to thank the Lord for it and extend the usual annual compliments. — Mark Twain

The breath, the watchword, the comfort, the strength, the honor of a Christian. If thou be a child of God, thou wilt seek thy Father's face, and live in thy Father's love. Pray that this year thou mayst be holy, humble, zealous, and patient; have closer communion with Christ, and enter oftener into the banqueting-house of His love. Pray that thou mayst be an example and a blessing unto others, and that thou mayst live more to the glory of thy — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

The worst things always happen at night, and oftener than one would think on stormy nights. ("The Compensation House") — Charles Collins

Great books are written for Christianity much oftener than great deeds are done for it. City libraries tell us of the reign of Jesus Christ but city streets tell us of the reign of Satan. — Horace Mann

Love's blindness consists oftener in seeing what is not there than in seeing what is. — Peter De Vries

And they are like a drug, one needs them oftener and oftener and has to make them more and more exciting - until at last one's imagination won't work at all. — Dodie Smith

Yes," I said, "that is what I mean to say. I am not going to vote for him." The others began to find their voices. They sang the same note. They said that when a party's representatives choose a man, that ends it. If they choose unwisely it is a misfortune, but no loyal member of the party has any right to withhold his vote. He has a plain duty before him and he can't shirk it. He must vote for that nominee. I said that no party held the privilege of dictating to me how I should vote. That if party loyalty was a form of patriotism, I was no patriot, and that I didn't think I was much of a patriot anyway, for oftener than otherwise what the general body of Americans regarded as the patriotic course was not in accordance with my views; that if there was any valuable difference between being an American and a monarchist it lay in the theory that the American could decide for himself what is patriotic and what isn't; whereas — Mark Twain

All things that God would have us do are hard for us to do
remember that
and hence, he oftener commands us than endeavours to persuade. — Herman Melville

We seldom speak of the virtue which we have, but much oftener of that which we lack. — Oliver Goldsmith

If they who understand the utmost refinement of any art will enjoy the perfection of it in a manner superior to other men, will they not amply pay for that advantage in feeling more than other men the imperfection of it, which in the natural course of things must so much oftener fall in their way? — Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke

Does it not seem as if Mozart's works become fresher and fresher the oftener we hear them? — Robert Schumann

I have been sorry for married women oftener than for old maids. — Florence Converse

But all the things that God would have us do are hard for us to do
remember that
and hence, he oftener commands us than endeavors to persuade. And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists. — Herman Melville

Remain tranquil and prepare to bear still greater trials. All is not lost even though you be troubled oftener or tempted more grievously. You are a man, not God. You are flesh, not an angel. How can you possibly expect to remain always in the same state of virtue when the angels in heaven and the first man in paradise failed to do so? I am He Who rescues the afflicted and brings to My divinity those who know their own weakness. — Thomas A Kempis

Men marry for fortune, and sometimes to please their fancy; but, much oftener than is suspected, they consider what the world will say of it
how such a woman in their friends' eyes will look at the head of a table. Hence we see so many insipid beauties made wives of, that could not have struck the particular fancy of any man that had any fancy at all. — Charles Lamb

Such is the way of all superstition, whether in astrology, dreams, omens, divine judgments, or the like; wherein men, having a delight in such vanities, mark the events where they are fulfilled, but where they fail, though this happen much oftener. — Francis Bacon

Praise - actual personal praise - oftener frets and embarrasses than it encourages. It is too small when too near. — Letitia Elizabeth Landon

There is nothing so difficult to describe as happiness. Whether some feeling of envy enters into the mind upon hearing of it, or whether it is so calm, so unassuming, so little ostentatious in itself, that words give an imperfect idea of it, I know not. It is easier to enjoy it, than define it ... and is oftener found at home, when home has not been embittered by dissensions, suspicions and guilt, than any where else upon earth. Yes, it is in home and in those who watch there for us. — Lady Caroline Lamb

When a woman wants me to do anything (my daughter, or not, it doesn't matter), I always insist on knowing why. The oftener you make them rummage their own minds for a reason, the more manageable you will find them in all the relations of life. It isn't their fault (poor wretches!) that they act first and think afterwards; it's the fault of the fools who humour them. — Wilkie Collins

post-prandial hour. But oftener than not when these occasions occurred, — E.F. Benson

Great comforts do, indeed, bear witness to the truth of thy grace, but not to the degree of it; the weak child is oftener in the lap than the strong one. — William Gurnall

Most think that they are above being supported by the town; but it oftener happens that they are not above supporting themselves by dishonest means, which would be more disreputable. — Henry David Thoreau

Tradition, - which sometimes brings down truth that history has let slip, but is oftener the wild babble of the time, such as was formerly spoken at the fireside and now congeals in newspapers, - tradition is responsible for all contrary averments. — Nathaniel Hawthorne

I affirm that gain is precisely that which comes oftener to the bad man than to the good; for illegitimate gains never come to the good at all, because they reject them. And lawful gains rarely come to the good, because, since much anxious care is needful thereto, and the anxious care of the good man is directed to weightier matters, rarely does the good man give sufficient attention thereto. Wherefore it is clear that in every way the advent of these riches is iniquitous. — Dante Alighieri

For they was never a young man yet who don't want to go out and right a wrong, or kill a man, or have to do something to earn his right to what is there for the taking, all along. Only he don't think he can ask, nor take, without earning it. Without no pain. Oftener than not, a young man's a regular fool. — Lee Smith

Discord generally operates in little things; it is inflamed ... by contrariety of taste oftener than principles. — Samuel Johnson

I told her how many things on earth have a fixed colour. Let us say, the green leaves. In our eyes, a red or a yellow leaf is beautiful. Even better if the leaf is shaded in several hues. So we paint the yellows and reds in our paintings oftener. And we forget the ordinary green, the best in nature. — Anuradha Bhattacharyya

He [Washington] has often declared to me that he considered our new constitution as an experiment on the practicability of republican government, and with what dose of liberty man could be trusted for his own good; that he was determined the experiment should have a fair trial, and would lose the last drop of his blood in support of it. And these declarations he repeated to me the oftener and the more pointedly. — Thomas Jefferson

Many is the mirage I chased. Always I was overreaching myself. The oftener I touched reality, the harder I bounced back to the world of illusion, which is the name for everyday life. — Henry Miller

Believe me, the man who earns his bread by the sweat of his brow, eats oftener a sweeter morsel, however coarse, than he who procures it by the labor of his brains. — Washington Irving

I've been broke even oftener than I've been wealthy. Of the two, being broke is more interesting, as a man who doesn't know where his next meal is coming from is never bored. He may be angry or several other things - but not bored. His predicament sharpens his thoughts, spurs him into action, adds zest to his life, whether he knows it or not. — Robert A. Heinlein

Necessity, oftener than facility, has been the mother of invention; and the most prolific school of all has been the school of difficulty. — Samuel Smiles

Men, as well as women, are much oftener led by their hearts than by their understandings. — Lord Chesterfield

Like a sun: but a small sun, which she had within her, warming her from the inside out. She was conscious of a feeling she had had before, a sense that she was looking at him, and at all of them, from some far way off, or from a great height. There had been a time when she seemed to herself to be snug, and small, within the large house of Smokey, a safe inhabitant, room to run in yet never leave his encompassment. Now she oftener felt otherwise: over time it was he who seemed to have become a mouse within the house of her. — John Crowley

That older and greater church to which I belong: the church where the oftener you laugh the better, because by laughter only can you destroy evil without malice — George Bernard Shaw

Mr. Bennet missed his second daughter exceedingly; his affection for her drew him oftener from home than anything else could do. He delighted in going to Pemberley, especially when he was least expected. — Jane Austen

Good-humor will sometimes conquer ill-humor, but ill-humor will conquer it oftener; and for this plain reason, good-humor must operate on generosity, ill-humor on meanness. — Sir Fulke Greville

I have no liking for novels or stories - none in the world; and so, whenever I read one - which is not oftener than once in two years, and even in these same cases I seldom read beyond the middle of the book - my distaste for the vehicle always taints my judgment of the literature itself, as a matter of course; and also of course makes my verdict valuless. Are you saying "You have written stories yourself." Quite true: but the fact that an Indian likes to scalp people is no evidence that he likes to be scalped. — Mark Twain

Those whom the world has delighted to honor have oftener been influenced in their doings by ambition and vanity than by patriotism. — Francois De La Rochefoucauld

Most people think that faith means believing something; oftener it means trying something, giving it a chance to prove itself — Henry Ford

I study much, and the more I study, the oftener I go back to those first principles which are so simple that childhood itself can lisp them. — Sophie Swetchine

People say of me, 'She's peculiar.' They do not understand me. If they did they would say so oftener and with emphasis. — Mary MacLane

An old medical friend gave me some excellent practical advice. He said: "You will have for some time to go much oftener down steps than up steps. Never mind! win the good opinions of washerwomen and such like, and in time you will hear of their recommendations of you to the wealthier families by whom they are employed." I did so, and found it succeed as predicted. — William Crawford Williamson

Don't ever become a pessimist ... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events. — Robert A. Heinlein

Teach us to pray often, that we may pray oftener. — Jeremy Taylor

I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds
With coldness still returning;
Alas! the gratitude of men
Has oftener left me mourning. — William Wordsworth

It is a mistake to suppose that men succeed through success; they much oftener succeed through failures. Precept, study, advice, and example could never have taught them so well as failure has done. — Samuel Smiles

Life is a succession of lessons enforced by immediate reward, or, oftener, by immediate chastisement. — Ernest Dimnet

A man far oftener appears to have a decided character from persistently following his temperament than from persistently following his principles. — Friedrich Nietzsche

There's only one person who needs a glass of water oftener than a small child tucked in for the night, and that's a writer sitting down to write. — Mignon McLaughlin

Riches are oftener an impediment than a stimulus to action; and in many cases they are quite as much a misfortune as a blessing. — Samuel Smiles

In the learned journal, in the influential newspaper, I discern no form; only some irresponsible shadow; oftener some monied corporation, or some dangler, who hopes, in the mask and robes of his paragraph, to pass for somebody. But through every clause and part of speech of the right book I meet the eyes of the most determined men; his force and terror inundate every word: the commas and dashes are alive; so that the writing is athletic and nimble,
can go far and live long. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

As a host, Lincoln was "never at a loss as to the subjects that please the different classes of visitors and there is a certain quaintness and originality about all he has to say, so that one cannot help feeling interested. His 'talk' is not brilliant," Villard observed. "His phrases are not ceremoniously set, but pervaded with a humorousness and, at times, with a grotesque joviality, that will always please. I think it would be hard to find one who tells better jokes, enjoys them better and laughs oftener than Abraham Lincoln. — Harold Holzer

No great player blundered oftener than I done. I was champion of the world for twenty-eight years because I was twenty years ahead of my time. I played on certain principles, which neither Zukertort nor anyone else of his time understood. The players of today, such as Lasker, Tarrasch, Pillsbury, Schlechter and others have adopted my principles, and as is only natural, they have improved upon what I began, and that is the whole secret of the matter. — Wilhelm Steinitz

It is observed in the course of worldly things, that men's fortunes are oftener made by their tongues than by their virtues; and more men's fortunes overthrown thereby than by vices. — Walter Raleigh

Rashness is oftener the resort of cowardice than of courage. — Duke Of Wellington

All that are printed and bound are not books; they do not necessarily belong to letters, but are oftener to be ranked with the other luxuries and appendages of civilized life. Base wares are palmed off under a thousand disguises. — Henry David Thoreau

Many people are seeking, at this very moment, to shelter themselves under the wing of the federal eagle; imagining, I presume, that her bosom has all the softness and snugness of an eider-down pillow. But she has no great tenderness, even in her best of moods, and, sooner or later,
oftener sooner than late,
is apt to fling off her nestlings with a scratch of her claw, a dab of her beak, or a rankling wound from her barbed arrows. — Nathaniel Hawthorne

If quarrelling be really the renewal of love, theirs had been renewed once a day at all events, and frequently much oftener. — Charlotte Riddell

One of the most interesting accomplishments of the film community, it seems to me, is that it has made real for America the exquisite beauty of incompatibility. Divorce among the gods possesses the sweet, holy sadness that has long been associated with marriage among the mortals. There is something infinitely tender about the inability of an actor to get along with an actress. When it is all over, and the decree is final, the two are even more attentive to each other, are seen oftener together, than ever before. — E.B. White

Think of God oftener than you breathe. — Epictetus

The changing styles are the expression of a restless search for something which shall commend itself to our aesthetic sense; but as each innovation is subject to the selective action of the norm of conspicuous waste, the range within which innovation can take place is somewhat restricted. The innovation must not only be more beautiful, or perhaps oftener less offensive, than that which it displaces, but it must also come up to the accepted standard of expensiveness. — Thorstein Veblen

There is nothing one sees oftener than the ridiculous and magnificent, such close neighbors that they touch. — Bernard Le Bovier De Fontenelle

We have oftener than once endeavoured to attach some meaning to that aphorism, vulgarly imputed to Shaftesbury, which however we can find nowhere in his works, that "ridicule is the test of truth." — John Keats

We are oftener deceived by being told some truth than no truth. — Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke

O thou who art able to write a book which once in the two centuries or oftener there is a man gifted to do, envy not him whom they name city-builder, and inexpressibly pity him whom they name conqueror or city-burner. — Thomas Carlyle

The mere reality of life would be inconceivably poor without the charm of fancy, which brings in its bosom, no doubt, as many vain fears as idle hopes, but lends much oftener to the illusions it calls up a gay flattering hue than one which inspires terror. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

As for clothing, to come at once to the practical part of the question, perhaps we are led oftener by the love of novelty, and a regard for the opinions of men, in procuring it, than by a true utility. Let him who has work to do recollect that the object of clothing is, first, to retain the vital heat, and secondly, in this state of society, to cover nakedness, and he may judge how much of any necessary or important work may be accomplished without adding to his wardrobe. — Henry David Thoreau

There is a truth and beauty in rhetoric; but it oftener serves ill turns than good ones. — William Penn

The laws keep up their credit, not by being just, but because they are laws; 'tis the mystic foundation of their authority; they have no other, and it well answers their purpose. They are often made by fools; still oftener by men who, out of hatred to equality, fail in equity; but always by men, vain and irresolute authors. — Michel De Montaigne

Come in the evening, or coming in the morning/Come when you're looked for, or come without warning/Kisses and welcomes you'll find here before you/And the oftener you come here the more I'll adore you. — Thomas Davis