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
evil action sin
An evil intention perverts the best actions, and makes them sins.
mind action good-intentions
It is of unspeakable advantage to possess our minds with an habitual good intention, and to aim all our thoughts, words, and actions at some laudable end.
action fame ultimate-happiness
Many actions calculated to procure fame are not conducive to ultimate happiness.
may action notoriety
Even the greatest actions of a celebrated person labor under this disadvantage, that however surprising and extraordinary they may be, they are no more than what are expected from him.
believe thinking our-actions
For my own part, I am apt to join in the opinion with those who believe that all the regions of Nature swarm with spirits, and that we have multitudes of spectators on all our actions when we think ourselves most alone.
force gives great ideas lively sight themselves
Words, when well chosen, have so great a force in them that a description often gives us more lively ideas than the sight of things themselves
eternity joyful short song thy utter
Through all eternity to thee, a joyful song I'll raise; for oh! Eternity's too short to utter all thy praise.
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Marriage enlarges the scene of our happiness and of our miseries. A marriage of love is pleasant, of interest, easy, and where both meet, happy. A happy marriage has in it all the pleasures of friendship, all the enjoyments of sense and reason, and,
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Method is not less requisite in conversation than in writing, provided a man would talk to make himself understood
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I remember when our whole island was shaken with an earthquake some years ago, there was an impudent mountebank who sold pills which (as he told the country people) were very good against an earthquake.
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We are growing serious, and let me tell you, that's the very next step to being dull
growing next step
We are growing serious, and let me tell you, that's the next step to being dull.
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Those Marriages generally abound most with Love and Constancy that are preceded by a long Courtship.
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True happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noise