Edward Bulwer-Lytton Quotes
People praise us behind our backs, but we hear them not; few before our faces, and who is not suspicious of the truth of such praise?
I would rather have five energetic and competent enemies than one fool friend.
It is destiny phrase of the weak human heart! 'It is destiny' dark apology for every error! The strong and virtuous admit no destiny
To dispense with ceremony is the most delicate mode of conferring a compliment.
Earnestness is the best gift of mental power, and deficiency of heart is the cause of many men never becoming great.
Chance happens to all, but to turn chance to account is the gift of few.
Man must be disappointed with the lesser things of life before he can comprehend the full value of the greater.
What is past is past, there is a future left to all men, who have the virtue to repent and the energy to atone.
Fortune is said to be blind, but her favorites never are. Ambition has the eye of the eagle, prudence that of the lynx; the first looks through the air, the last along the ground.
Whatever the number of a man's friends, there will be times in his life when he has one too few; but if he has only one enemy, he is lucky indeed if he has not one too many.
He who doth not smoke hath either known no great griefs, or refuseth himself the softest consolation, next to that which comes from heaven.
Fate! There is no fate. Between the thought and the success God is the only agent. Fate is not the ruler, but the servant of Providence.
A man is arrogant in proportion to his ignorance. Man's natural tendency is to egotism. Man, in his infancy of knowledge, thinks that all creation was formed for him.
Happiness and virtue rest upon each other; the best are not only the happiest, but the happiest are usually the best.
When a man is not amused, he feels an involuntary contempt for those who are.
The heart of a man's like that delicate weed, / Which requires to be trampled on, boldly indeed / Ere it gives forth the fragrance you wish to extract.
O be very sure That no man will learn anything at all, Unless he first will learn humility.
Give, and you may keep your friend it you lose your money; lend, and the chances are that you lose your friend if ever you get back your money.
No author ever drew a character consistent to human nature, but he was forced to ascribe to it many inconsistencies.
Time, O my friend, is money! Time wasted can never conduce to money well managed.
A life of pleasure makes even the strongest mind frivolous at last.
The first essential to success in the art you practice is respect for the art itself.
In science, read, by preference, the newest works; in literature the oldest.
The man who smokes, thinks like a sage and acts like a Samaritan.
In all cases of heart-ache, the application of another man's disappointment draws out the pain and allays the irritation.
How little praise warms out of a man the good that is in him, as the sneer of contempt which he feels is unjust chill the ardor to excel.
If a good face is a letter of recommendation, a good heart is a letter of credit.
The affections are immortal! They are the sympathies which unite the ceaseless generations.
Vanity, indeed, is the very antidote to conceit; for while the former makes us all nerve to the opinion of others, the latter is perfectly satisfied with its opinion of itself.
Love is the business of the idle, but the idleness of the busy.
Tears are akin to prayer - Pharisees parade prayers, imposters parade tears.
In the lexicon of youth which fate reserves for a bright manhood, there is no such word as fail.
Happy is the man who hath never known what it is to taste of fame - to have it is a purgatory, to want it is a hell.
Imitation, if noble and general, insures the best hope of originality.
Common sense is only a modification of talent. Genius is an exaltation of it. The difference is, therefore, in degree, not nature.
To find what you seek in the road of life, the best proverb of all is that which says: Leave no stone unturned.