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Charles Caleb Colton

41 quotes

English cleric, writer and collector Charles Caleb Colton has a gift for language that makes complex ideas feel instantly clear. Celebrated for his eccentricities, Charles Caleb Colton brought that same intensity to the written and spoken word. Explore 52 quotes by Charles Caleb Colton on subjects including Men, Happiness, Best, Wisdom, and Religion — each one a window into a distinctive way of seeing the world. Among their most shared lines: "In life we shall find many men that are great, and some that are good, but very few men that are both great and good."

“Power will intoxicate the best hearts, as wine the strongest heads. No man is wise enough, nor good enough to be trusted with unlimited power.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Best

All Quotes by Charles Caleb Colton

“Doubt is the vestibule through which all must pass before they can enter into the temple of wisdom.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Wisdom

“We often pretend to fear what we really despise, and more often despise what we really fear.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Fear

“There are three modes of bearing the ills of life, by indifference, by philosophy, and by religion.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Religion

“Of present fame think little, and of future less the praises that we receive after we are buried, like the flowers that are strewed over our grave, may be gratifying to the living, but they are nothing to the dead.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Future

“That writer does the most who gives his reader the most knowledge and takes from him the least time.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Knowledge

“Constant success shows us but one side of the world adversity brings out the reverse of the picture.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Success

“Friendship, of itself a holy tie, is made more sacred by adversity.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Friendship

“Death is the liberator of him whom freedom cannot release, the physician of him whom medicine cannot cure, and the comforter of him whom time cannot console.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Death

“Bigotry murders religion to frighten fools with her ghost.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Religion

“Patience is the support of weakness impatience the ruin of strength.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Patience

“Knowledge is two-fold, and consists not only in an affirmation of what is true, but in the negation of that which is false.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Knowledge

“Moderation is the inseparable companion of wisdom, but with it genius has not even a nodding acquaintance.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Wisdom

“Next to acquiring good friends, the best acquisition is that of good books.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Best

“To be obliged to beg our daily happiness from others bespeaks a more lamentable poverty than that of him who begs his daily bread.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Happiness

“In life we shall find many men that are great, and some that are good, but very few men that are both great and good.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Men

“Those who visit foreign nations, but associate only with their own country-men, change their climate, but not their customs. They see new meridians, but the same men and with heads as empty as their pockets, return home with traveled bodies, but untravelled minds.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Change

“There are two way of establishing a reputation, one to be praised by honest people and the other to be accused by rogues. It is best, however, to secure the first one, because it will always be accompanied by the latter.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Best

“If you cannot inspire a woman with love of you, fill her above the brim with love of herself all that runs over will be yours.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Love

“The excess of our youth are checks written against our age and they are payable with interest thirty years later.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Age

“The first requisite for success is the ability to apply your physical and mental energies to one problem incessantly without growing weary.”

— Charles Caleb Colton

Success