Samuel Butler Quotes

Belief like any other moving body follows the path of least resistance.

Our minds want clothes as much as our bodies.

To give pain is the tyranny; to make happy, the true empire of beauty.

Logic is like the sword - those who appeal to it shall perish by it.

There is nothing which at once affects a man so much and so little as his own death.

Prayers are to men as dolls are to children.

Life is like music; it must be composed by ear, feeling, and instinct, not by rule.

You can do very little with faith, but you can do nothing without it.

All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income.

Words are like money; there is nothing so useless, unless when in actual use.

I do not mind lying, but I hate inaccuracy.

What is faith but a kind of betting or speculation after all? It should be, I bet that my Redeemer liveth.

It is tact that is golden, not silence.

A healthy stomach is nothing if it is not conservative. Few radicals have good digestion.

God was satisfied with his work, and that is fatal.

Fear is static that prevents me from hearing myself.

Friendship is like money, easier made than kept.

Life is one long process of getting tired.

The truest characters of ignorance are vanity and pride and arrogance.

Most people have never learned that one of the main aims in life is to enjoy it.

Death is only a larger kind of going abroad.

One of the first businesses of a sensible man is to know when he is beaten and to leave off fighting at once.

The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing is to be taken too seriously.

Life is not an exact science, it is an art.

In law, nothing is certain but the expense.

A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg.

Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.

God cannot alter the past, though historians can.

Brigands demand your money or your life; women require both.

Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises.

All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.

Don't learn to do, but learn in doing.