Joseph Addison
Joseph Addison
Joseph Addisonwas an English essayist, poet, playwright, and politician. He was the eldest son of The Reverend Lancelot Addison. His name is usually remembered alongside that of his long-standing friend, Richard Steele, with whom he founded The Spectator magazine...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth1 May 1672
music art plato
Musick is certainly a very agreeable Entertainment, but if it would take the entire Possession of our Ears, if it would make us incapable of hearing Sense, if it would exclude Arts that have a much greater Tendency to the Refinement of human Nature; I must confess I would allow it no better Quarter than Plato has done, who banishes it out of his Common-wealth.
real men honor
Honor's a fine imaginary notion, that draws in raw and unexperienced men to real mischiefs.
laughter soul mind
Laughter, while it lasts, slackens and unbraces the mind, weakens the faculties, and causes a kind of remissness and dissolution in all the powers of the soul.
world may morality
A person may be qualified to do greater good to mankind and become more beneficial to the world, by morality without faith than by faith without morality.
health exercise substitutes
Physic is, for the most part, only a substitute for temperance and exercise.
men deceiving zeal
There is nothing in which men more deceive themselves than in what they call zeal.
genuine should zeal
If our zeal were true and genuine we should be much more angry with a sinner than a heretic.
believe heart pride
I would have every zealous man examine his heart thoroughly, and I believe he will often find that what be calls a zeal for his religion is either pride, interest, or ill-repute.
beautiful sex women
A virtuous mind in a fair body is indeed a fine picture in a food light, and therefore it is no wonder that it makes the beautiful sex all over charms.
wit incongruity
Wit is the fetching of congruity out of incongruity.
wise wisdom running
In the common run of mankind, for one that is wise and good you find ten of a contrary character.
marriage misery scene
Marriage enlarges the Scene of our Happiness and Miseries.
marriage husband giving
Good Nature, and Evenness of Temper, will give you an easie Companion for Life; Vertue and good Sense, an agreeable Friend; Love and Constancy, a good Wife or Husband. Where we meet one Person with all these Accomplishments, we find an Hundred without any one of them.
ambition men giving
Content has a kindly influence on the soul of man, in respect of every being to whom he stands related. It extinguishes all murmuring, repining, and ingratitude toward that Being who has allotted us our part to act in the world. It destroys all inordinate ambition; gives sweetness to the conversation, and serenity to all the thoughts; and if it does not bring riches, it does the same thing by banishing the desire of them.