david strasser

Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Post #2963

Common sense is in spite of, not because of age.
—Edward Thurlow, 1st Baron Thurlow

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Post #2962

To give and to lose, is nothing ; but to lose and to give still, is the part of a great mind.
—Seneca

Monday, November 18, 2019

Post #2961

Conscience is a great ledger book in which all our offences are written and registered, and which time reveals to the sense and feeling of the offender.
—Robert Burton

Friday, November 15, 2019

Post #2960

A man of integrity will never listen to any reason against conscience.
—Alec Douglas-Home

Thursday, November 14, 2019

Post #2959

No evil is intolerable but a guilty conscience.
—William Ellery Channing

Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Post #2958

An evil gain equals a loss.
—Publilius Syrus

Tuesday, November 12, 2019

Post #2957

Time is short, your obligations are infinite.
—Jean Baptiste Massillon

Monday, November 11, 2019

Post #2956

Confidence in conversation has a greater share than wit.
—François de La Rochefoucauld

Friday, November 08, 2019

Post #2955

To do evil is more within the reach of every man, in public as in private life, than to do good.
—Samuel Parr

Thursday, November 07, 2019

Post #2954

Wind puffs up empty bladders; opinion, fools.
—Socrates

Wednesday, November 06, 2019

There is no moment like the present; not only so, but moreover, there is no moment at all, that is, no instant force and energy, but in the present. The man who will not execute his resolutions when they are fresh upon him, can have no hope from them afterward; they will be dissipated, lost, and perish in the hurry and scurry of the world.
—Miss Edgeworth

Tuesday, November 05, 2019

Post #2952

Men believe what willingly they wish to be true.

—Julius Caesar

Monday, November 04, 2019

Post #2951

1. Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.
2. Never trouble another for what you can do yourself.
3. Never spend your money before you have it.
4. Never buy what you do not want because it is cheap.
5. Pride costs us more than hunger, thirst and cold.
6. We seldom repent of having eaten too little.
7. Nothing is troublesome that we do willingly.
8. How much pain the evils have cost us that have never happened.
9. Take things always by the smooth handle.
10. When angry count ten before you speak. If very angry a hundred.
—JEFFERSON'S TEN RULES

Friday, November 01, 2019

Post #2950

Many have been ruined by their fortunes, and many have escaped ruin by the want of fortune. To obtain it the great have become little, and the little great.
—Johann Georg von Zimmermann

Thursday, October 31, 2019

Post #2949

Reason lies between the spur and the bridle.
—George Herbert

The Penalty of Leadership

In every field of human endeavor, he that is first must perpetually live in the white light of publicity. ¶Whether the leadership be vested in a man or in a manufactured product, emulation and envy are ever at work. ¶In art, in literature, in music, in industry, the reward and the punishment are always the same. ¶The reward is widespread recognition; the punishment, fierce denial and detraction. ¶When a man’s work becomes a standard for the whole world, it also becomes a target for the shafts of the envious few. ¶If his work be mediocre, he will be left severely alone – if he achieve a masterpiece, it will set a million tongues a -wagging. ¶Jealousy does not protrude its forked tongue at the artist who produces a commonplace painting. ¶Whatsoever you write, or paint, or play, or sing, or build, no one will strive to surpass or to slander you unless your work be stamped with the seal of genius. ¶Long, long after a great work or a good work has been done, those who are disappointed or envious, continue to cry out that it cannot be done. Spiteful little voices in the domain of art were raised against our own Whistler as a mountebank, long after the big world had acclaimed him its greatest artistic genius. ¶Multitudes flocked to Bayreuth to worship at the musical shrine of Wagner, while the little group of those whom he had dethroned and displaced argued angrily that he was no musician at all. ¶The little world continued to protest that Fulton could never build a steamboat, while the big world flocked to the river banks to see his boat steam by. ¶The leader is assailed because he is a leader, and the effort to equal him is merely added proof of that leadership. Failing to equal or to excel, the follower seeks to depreciate and to destroy – but only confirms once more the superiority of that which he strives to supplant. ¶There is nothing new in this. It is as old as the world and as old as human passions – envy, fear, greed, ambition, and the desire to surpass. ¶And it all avails nothing. ¶If the leader truly leads, he remains – the leader. ¶Master-poet, master-painter, master-workman, each in his turn is assailed, and each holds his laurels through the ages. ¶That which is good or great makes itself known, no matter how loud the clamor of denial. ¶That which deserves to live — lives.
written by Theodore F. MacManus