Definition of being

"being" in the noun sense

1. being, beingness, existence, face of the earth

the state or fact of existing

"a point of view gradually coming into being"

"laws in existence for centuries"

"he appeared on the face of the earth one day"

2. organism, being

a living thing that has (or can develop) the ability to act or function independently

"being" in the verb sense

1. be

have the quality of being (copula, used with an adjective or a predicate noun

"John is rich"

"This is not a good answer"

2. be

be identical to be someone or something

"The president of the company is John Smith"

"This is my house"

3. be

occupy a certain position or area be somewhere

"Where is my umbrella?"

"The toolshed is in the back"

"What is behind this behavior?"

4. exist, be

have an existence, be extant

"Is there a God?"

5. be

happen, occur, take place this was during the visit to my parents' house"

"I lost my wallet

"There were two hundred people at his funeral"

"There was a lot of noise in the kitchen"

6. equal, be

be identical or equivalent to

"One dollar equals 1,000 rubles these days!"

7. constitute, represent, make up, comprise, be

form or compose

"This money is my only income"

"The stone wall was the backdrop for the performance"

"These constitute my entire belonging"

"The children made up the chorus"

"This sum represents my entire income for a year"

"These few men comprise his entire army"

8. be, follow

work in a specific place, with a specific subject, or in a specific function

"He is a herpetologist"

"She is our resident philosopher"

9. embody, be, personify

represent, as of a character on stage

"Derek Jacobi was Hamlet"

10. be

spend or use time

"I may be an hour"

11. be, live

have life, be alive

"Our great leader is no more"

"My grandfather lived until the end of war"

12. be

to remain unmolested, undisturbed, or uninterrupted

13. cost, be

be priced at

"These shoes cost $100"

Source: WordNet® (An amazing lexical database of English)

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Quotations for being

Gather gear by every wile
That's justified by honor;
Not for to hide it in a hedge,
Nor for a train attendant;
But for the glorious privilege
Of being independent. [ Burns ]

Being natural is simply a pose. [ Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey ]

The tidal wave of deepest souls
Into our inmost being rolls,
And lifts us unawares
Out of all meaner cares. [ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ]

Bold from being armed with faith. [ Motto ]

Beauty is its own excuse for being. [ Ralph Waldo Emerson ]

Live, live today; tomorrow never yet
On any human being rose or set. [ Marsden ]

A craw's nae whiter for being washed. [ Scotch Proverb ]

It is your virtue, being men, to try;
And it is ours, by virtue to deny. [ Drayton ]

With women worth the being won.
The softest lover ever best succeeds. [ Hill ]

Being too blind to have desire to see. [ Tennyson ]

A thing is the bigger of being shared. [ Gaelic Proverb ]

What 'twas weak to do,
'Tis weaker to lament, once being done. [ Shelley ]

Press onward through each varying hour;
Let no weak fears thy course delay;
Immortal being! feel thy power,
Pursue thy bright and endless way. [ Andrews Norton ]

The world is ashamed of being virtuous. [ Sterne ]

Life is the art of being well-deceived. [ Hazlitt ]

Thy credit wary keep, 'tis quickly gone;
Being got by many actions, lost by one. [ Randolph ]

If eyes were made for seeing,
Then beauty is its own excuse for being. [ Emerson ]

Melancholy is the pleasure of being sad. [ Victor Hugo ]

The atrocious crime of being a young man. [ William Pitt ]

Their chief pleasure is being displeased. [ Whipple ]

Virtue rejoices in being put to the test.

Seven cities warred for Homer being dead,
Who living had no roof to shroud his head. [ Thos. Heywood ]

My pen is at the bottom of a page,
Which being finished, here the story ends;
'Tis to be wish'd it had been sooner done,
But stories somehow lengthen when begun. [ Byron ]

But when I tell him he hates flatterers,
He says he does, being then most flattered. [ William Shakespeare ]

All good is the better for being diffusive. [ Proverb ]

Goodness and being in the gods are one;
He who imputes ill to them makes them none. [ Euripides ]

Whistling to keep myself from being afraid. [ Dryden ]

Daffodils,
That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets dim.
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes.
Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses,
That die unmarried ere they can behold
Bright Phoebus in his strength - a malady
Most incident to maids; bold oxlips and
The crown-imperial; lilies of all kinds,
The flower-de-luce being one! [ William Shakespeare ]

A little fire is quickly trodden out;
Which, being suffer'd, rivers cannot quench. [ William Shakespeare ]

Who to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being ever resigned;
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing lingering look behind? [ Gray ]

The grave, where sets the orb of being, sets
To rise, ascend, and culminate above
Eternity's horizon evermore. [ Abraham Coles ]

Knowledge and wisdom, far from being one,
Have ofttimes no connection. Knowledge dwells
In heads replete with thoughts of other men;
Wisdom, in minds attentive to their own. [ William Cowper ]

The Eternal Being is forever if He is at all. [ Pascal ]

A mastiff grows the fiercer for being tied up. [ Proverb ]

They say, best men are moulded out of faults;
And, for the most, become much more the better
For being a little bad. [ William Shakespeare ]

Tell them, dear, if eyes were made for seeing,
Then beauty is its own excuse for being. [ Emerson ]

Dreams in their development have breath,
And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy.
They have a weight upon our waking thoughts,
They take a weight from off our waking toils,
They do divide our being. [ Byron ]

Tears are nature's lotion for the eyes
The eyes see better for being washed with them. [ Bovee ]

Not a man, for being simply man,
Hath any honour, but honour for those honours
That are without him, as place, riches, favour,
Prizes of accident, as oft as merit. [ William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida ]

We are not ourselves
When nature, being oppress'd, commands the mind
To suffer with the body. [ William Shakespeare ]

A lovely being, scarcely formed or moulded,
A rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded. [ Byron ]

For highest looks have not the highest mind,
Nor haughty words most full of highest thought;
But are like bladders blown up with the wind,
That being pricked evanish into nought. [ Spenser ]

An honest tale speeds best, being plainly told. [ William Shakespeare ]

Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs;
Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;
Being vex'd, a sea nourish'd with lovers' tears:
What is it else? A madness most discreet,
A choking gall, and a preserving sweet. [ William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet ]

Bounty, being free itself, thinks all others so. [ William Shakespeare ]

All things in their being are good for something. [ English Proverb, collected by George Herbert ]

Live on, brave lives, chained to the narrow round
Of Duty; live, expend yourselves, and make
The orb of Being wheel onward steadfastly
Upon its path--the Lord of Life alone
Knows to what goal of Good; work on, live on. [ Lewis Morris ]

You will never repent of being patient and sober. [ Proverb ]

The guilt being great, the fear doth still exceed. [ William Shakespeare ]

He changes his flag to conceal his being a pirate. [ Proverb ]

O happiness! our being's end and aim!
Good, pleasure, ease, content! whatever thy name;
That something still which prompts the eternal sigh
For which we bear to live, or dare to die. [ Pope ]

Trust not the treason of those smiling looks.
Until ye have their guileful trains well tried;
For they are like but unto golden hooks.
That from the foolish fish their baits do hide:
So she with flattering smiles weak hearts doth guide
Unto her love, and tempt to their decay;
Whom, being caught, she kills with cruel pride,
And feeds at pleasure on the wretched prey. [ Spenser ]

The present is never a happy state to any human being; [ Dr. Johnson ]

Faith is like love; it does not admit of being forced. [ Arthur Schopenhauer ]

Order is man's greatest need, and his true well-being. [ Amiel ]

Plagiarists are always suspicious of being stolen from. [ Coleridge ]

Poverty is not a shame, but the being ashamed of it is. [ Proverb ]

Moderation consists in being moved as angels are moved. [ Joubert ]

We can do more good by being good than in any other way. [ Rowland Hill ]

Being a man, know and remember always that thou art one. [ Philemon Comicus ]

No man can be a good poet without first being a good man. [ Ben Jonson ]

Go steal a horse, and then you'll die without being sick. [ Proverb ]

Great genial power consists in being altogether receptive. [ Ralph Waldo Emerson ]

Censure's the tax a man pays the public for being eminent. [ Proverb ]

Being alone when one's belief is firm, is not to be alone. [ Auerbach ]

He is in great danger, who being sick, thinks himself well. [ Proverb ]

A man may have a just esteem of himself without being proud. [ Proverb ]

Man is an imitative being, and the foremost leads the flock. [ Friedrich Schiller ]

One is very near being ungrateful when one weighs a service. [ Mme. de Flahaut ]

There is much more pleasure in loving, than in being beloved. [ Proverb ]

Nothing makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. [ Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey ]

Man's chief wisdom consists in being sensible of his follies. [ Rochefoucauld ]

Much is set to music that is not even worthy of being spoken. [ Beaumarchais ]

The applause of a single human being is of great consequence. [ Dr. Johnson ]

Languages begin by being a music, and end by being an algebra. [ Ampere ]

The second vice is lying, the first being that of owing money. [ Proverb ]

Nowadays, those who love nature are accused of being romantic. [ Chamfort ]

Censure is the tax a man pays to the public for being eminent. [ Jonathan Swift ]

What prevents us from being natural is the desire to appear so. [ La Rochefoucauld ]

Character is centrality, the impossibility of being overthrown. [ Emerson ]

If God were not a necessary being of Himself,
He might almost seem to be made for the use and benefit of men. [ John Tillotson ]

There is only one mendacious being in the world, and that is man. [ Arthur Schopenhauer ]

It is no sin to be tempted; the wickedness lies in being overcome. [ Balzac ]

The eyes, being in the highest part, have the office of sentinels. [ Cicero ]

God is a being who gives everything but punishment in over measure. [ Henry Ward Beecher ]

Only that being can surmise the infinite who is chosen for infinity. [ Liedge ]

Great hearts alone understand how much glory there is in being good. [ Michelet ]

Surely man is a being wonderfully vain, changeable, and vacillating. [ Montaigne ]

Celebrity: the advantage of being known to those who do not know us. [ Chamfort ]

A man gains nothing by being vain-glorious, but contempt and hatred. [ Proverb ]

It is folly to seek the approbation of any being besides the Supreme. [ Addison ]

Science must have originated in the feeling of something being wrong. [ Carlyle ]

It is riot being deceived, but undeceived, that renders us miserable. [ Mme. Sophie Arnould ]

Being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned. [ Samuel Johnson ]

Being educated puts one almost on a level with the commercial classes. [ Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband ]

To be happy is not the purpose of our being, but to deserve happiness. [ Fichte ]

Joy, being altogether wanting. It doth remember me the more of sorrow. [ William Shakespeare ]

It is inconceivable how much wit it requires to avoid being ridiculous. [ Chamfort ]

Wherever there is a human being there is an opportunity for a kindness. [ Seneca ]

It is only great souls that know how much glory there is in being good. [ Sophocles ]

Greatness lies, not in being strong, but in the right using of strength. [ Beecher ]

O, there is naught on earth worth being known but God and our own souls! [ Bailey ]

It destroys one's nerves to be amiable every day to the same human being. [ Beaconsfield ]

Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. [ Ralph Waldo Emerson ]

To blame a young man for being in love is like chiding one for being ill. [ Duclos ]

The first condition of education is being put to wholesome and useful work. [ John Ruskin ]

Nothing so much prevents one from being natural as the desire to appear so. [ La Roche ]

The secret of life is to appreciate the pleasure of being terribly deceived. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

Genius - the free and harmonious play of all the faculties of a human being. [ Alcott ]

'Tis a word that's quickly spoken. Which being restrained, a heart is broken. [ Beaumont and Fletcher ]

Truth, like gold, is not the less so for being newly brought out of the mine. [ Locke ]

A well-bred youth neither speaks of himself, nor, being spoken to, is silent. [ English Proverb, collected by George Herbert ]

A thought embodied and embrained in fit words walks the earth a living being. [ Whipple ]

Being without well-being is a curse; and the greater being, the greater curse. [ Bacon ]

He alone is an acute observer who can observe minutely without being observed. [ Lavater ]

Of all things that man possesses, women alone take pleasure in being possessed. [ Malherbe ]

Deal mildly with his youth; for young hot colts, being raged, do rage the more. [ William Shakespeare ]

There is no praise in being upright, where no one can, or tries to corrupt you. [ Cicero ]

True repentance consists in the heart being broken for sin, and broken from sin. [ Thornton ]

Every genuine work of art has as much reason for being as the earth and the sun. [ Ralph Waldo Emerson ]

The fresh and buoyant sense of being that bounds in youth's yet careless breast. [ Moore ]

As for environments, the kingliest being ever born in the flesh lay in a manger. [ Chapin ]

Nothing in nature, much less conscious being, was ever created solely for itself. [ Young ]

We are born but to die (die in being born), and our end hangs on to our beginning. [ Manilius ]

Influence is exerted by every human being from the hour of birth to that of death. [ Chapin ]

Love of truth shows itself in being able everywhere to find and value what is good. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]

There is a noble manner of being poor, and who does not know it will never be rich. [ Seneca ]

A friend is a being that is willing to bear with us in all our faults and failings. [ G. Forster ]

Honesty is one part of eloquence. We persuade others by being in earnest ourselves. [ Hazlitt ]

Great men lose somewhat of their greatness by being near us; ordinary men gain much. [ Landor ]

I go at what I am about as if there was nothing else in the world for the time being. [ Charles Kingsley ]

True virtue, being united to heavenly grace of faith, makes up the highest perfection. [ Milton ]

Love is old, old as eternity, but not outworn; with each new being born or to be born. [ Byron ]

Laughter is one of the very privileges of reason, being confined to the human species. [ Leigh Hunt ]

In saying aye or no, the very safety of our country and the sum of our well-being lies. [ L'Estrange ]

Habits are soon assumed; but when we strive to strip them off, 'tis being flayed alive. [ Cowper ]

Nothing can make a man truly great but being truly good and partaking of God's holiness. [ Matthew Henry ]

Error is none the better for being common, nor truth the worse for having lain neglected. [ John Locke ]

A friend should be like money, tried before being required, not found faulty in our need. [ Plutarch ]

Being myself no stranger to suffering, I have learned to relieve the sufferings of others. [ Virgil ]

The time will come to every human being when it must be known how well he can bear to die. [ Johnson ]

He who is lord of himself, and exists upon his own resources, is a noble but a rare being. [ Sir E. Brydges ]

There is small difference (to the eye of the world) in being Naught, and being thought so. [ Proverb ]

We're not ourselves when Nature, being oppressed, commands the mind to suffer with the body. [ William Shakespeare ]

To love for the sake of being loved is human, but to love for the sake of loving is angelic. [ Lamartine ]

It is the hardest thing in the world to be a good thinker without being a good self-examiner. [ Shaftesbury ]

Nothing is so dangerous as being too modern; one is apt to grow old fashioned quite suddenly. [ Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband ]

Beware of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in, bear it, that the opposer may beware of thee. [ William Shakespeare ]

No soul is desolate as long as there is a human-being for whom it can feel trust and reverence. [ George Eliot ]

Art is the right hand of Nature. The latter has only given us being, the former has made us men. [ Schiller ]

We often console ourselves for being unhappy by a certain pleasure that we find in appearing so. [ De Barthelemy ]

The greatest misfortune one can wish his enemy is that he may love without being loved in return. [ Labouisse ]

The lowest boor may laugh on being tickled, but a man must have intelligence to be amused by wit. [ L'Estrange ]

With an evening coat and a white tie, even a stock broker can gain a reputation for being civilized. [ Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey ]

Strong as our passions are, they may be starved into submission, and conquered without being killed. [ Colton ]

Often turn the stile (correct with care) if you expect to write anything worthy of being read twice. [ Horace ]

Superstition is the poesy of practical life; hence, a poet is none the worse for being superstitious. [ Goethe ]

The only way to atone for being occasionally over-dressed is by being always absolutely overeducated. [ Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest ]

Desert being the essential condition of praise, there can be no reality in the one without the other. [ Washington Allston ]

A world all sincere, a believing world; the like has been; the like will again be - cannot help being. [ Carlyle ]

There is no objection to plain women being Puritans ; it is the only excuse they have for being plain. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

Fine writing, according to Mr. Addison, consists of sentiments which are natural without being obvious. [ Hume ]

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. [ Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey ]

It is not so much the being exempt from faults, as the having overcome them, that is an advantage to us. [ Alexander Pope ]

A bond is necessary to complete our being, only we must be careful that the bond does not become bondage. [ Mrs. Jameson ]

Men are so necessarily fools that it would be being a fool in a higher strain of folly, not to be a fool. [ Pascal ]

In politics, merit is rewarded by the possessor being raised, like a target, to a position to be fired at. [ Bovee ]

The happiest man is he, who being above the troubles which money brings, has his hands the fullest of Work. [ Anthony Trollope ]

The heart of a wise man should resemble a mirror, which reflects every object without being sullied by any. [ Confucius ]

We are not that we are, nor do we treat or esteem each other for such, but for that we are capable of being. [ Thoreau ]

See deep enough, and you see musically; the heart of Nature being everywhere music, if you can only reach it. [ Carlyle ]

The true scholar learns from the known to unfold the unknown, and approaches more and more to being a master. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]

A philosopher being asked what was the first thing necessary to win the love of a woman, answered. Opportunity! [ Moore ]

War suspends the rules of moral obligation, and what is long suspended is in danger of being totally abrogated. [ Burke ]

Methinks a being that is beautiful becomes more so as it looks on beauty, the eternal beauty of undying things. [ Byron ]

The sun's power cannot draw a wandering star from its path. How then could a human being fall out of God's love! [ Rückert ]

There must be hearts which know the depths of our being, and swear by us, even when the whole world forsakes us. [ Gutzkow ]

Either a wise man will not go into bunkers, or, being in, he will endure such things as befall him wJth patience. [ A. Lang ]

Pride, though it cannot prevent the holy affections of nature from beings felt, may prevent them from being shown. [ Jeremy Taylor ]

He is just as truly running counter to God's will by being intentionally wretched as by intentionally doing wrong. [ W. R. Greg ]

Friends are the leaders of the bosom, being more ourselves than we are, and we complement our affections in theirs. [ A. Bronson Alcott ]

Time is, after all, the greatest of poets; and the sons of Memory stand a better chance of being the heirs of Fame. [ Lowell ]

Learning the liberal arts and sciences thoroughly, softens men's manners, and prevents their being a pack of brutes. [ Ovid ]

Intellectual progress, separated from moral progress, gives a fearful result: a being possessing nothing but brains. [ A. de Gasparin ]

Sincerity is impossible unless it pervades the whole being; and the pretence saps the very foundations of character. [ Lowell ]

We deem those happy who, from the experience of life, have learned to bear its ills, without being overcome by them. [ Juvenal ]

You pity a man who is lame or blind; but you never pity him for being a fool, which is often a much greater misfortune. [ Sydney Smith ]

There is none but he whose being I do fear; and, under him, my genius is rebuked, as it is said Antony's was by Caesar. [ William Shakespeare ]

In the eye of that Supreme Being to whom our whole internal frame is uncovered, dispositions hold the place of actions. [ Blair ]

What is fame? The advantage of being known by people of whom you yourself know nothing, and for whom you care as little. [ Stanislaus ]

Some men so dislike the dust kicked up by the generation they belong to, that, being unable to pass, they lag behind it. [ Hare ]

Let go quarrel and contention, nor embroil thyself in trouble and differences by being over-solicitous in thy own defence. [ Thomas à Kempis ]

It is a wretched thing to lean on the reputation of others, lest the pillars being withdrawn the roof should fall in ruins. [ Juvenal ]

If thou wilt receive profit, read with humility, simplicity, and faith: and seek not at any time the fame of being learned. [ Thomas a Kempis ]

Men live best upon a little; Nature has given to all the privilege of being happy, if they but knew how to use their gifts. [ Claudianus ]

Talent, lying in the understanding, is often inherited; genius, being the action of reason and imagination, rarely or never. [ Coleridge ]

Have the courage to be ignorant of a great number of things, in order to avoid the calamity of being ignorant of every thing. [ Sydney Smith ]

The mind is the master over every kind of fortune: itself acts in both ways, being the cause of its own happiness and misery. [ Seneca ]

The art of being able to make a good use of moderate abilities wins esteem and often confers more reputation than real merit. [ La Bruyere ]

There's no possibility of being witty without a little ill-nature; the malice of a good thing is the barb that makes it stick. [ Sheridan ]

The feeling of friendship is like that of being comfortably filled with roast beef; love, like being enlivened with champagne. [ Johnson ]

The greatest geniuses have always attributed everything to God, as if conscious of being possessed of a spark of His divinity. [ B. R. Haydon ]

It is only with the best judges that the highest works of art would lose none of their honor by being seen in their rudiments. [ J. F. Boyes ]

A woman repents sincerely of her fault, only after being weaned from her infatuation for the one who induced her to commit it. [ Latena ]

It is not easy to be a widow: one must reassume all the modesty of girlhood, without being allowed to even feign its ignorance. [ Mme. de Girardin ]

If the calumniator bespatters and belies me, I will endeavor to convince him by my life and manners, but not by being like him. [ South ]

Happy the man to whom Heaven has given a morsel of bread without his being obliged to thank any other for it than Heaven itself. [ Cervantes ]

Foppery, being the chronic condition of women, is not so much noticed as it is when it breaks out on the person of the male bird. [ Balzac ]

God hath given to mankind a common library, His creatures; to every man a proper book, himself being an abridgment of all others. [ T. Fuller ]

All thought is immoral. Its very essence is destruction. If you think of anything you kill it. Nothing survives being thought of. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

Having sown the seed of secrecy, it should be properly guarded and not in the least broken; for being broken, it will not prosper. [ Hitopadesa ]

There is no such thing as being agreeable without a thorough good-humour, a natural sweetness of temper, enlivened by cheerfulness. [ Lady Montagu ]

I am above being injured by fortune; though she snatch away much, more will remain to me. The blessings I now enjoy transcend fear. [ Ov ]

Books are a guide in youth, and an entertainment for age. They support us in solitude, and keep us from being a burden to ourselves. [ J. Collier ]

The happiness of the human race in this world does not consist in our being devoid of passions, but in our learning to command them. [ From the French ]

I am persuaded that he who is capable of being a bitter enemy can never possess the necessary virtues that constitute a true friend. [ Fitzosborne ]

There is a mean in all things. Even virtue itself hath its stated limits; which not being strictly observed, it ceases to be virtue. [ Horace ]

Latent genius is but a presumption. Everything that can be, is bound to come into being, and what never comes into being is nothing. [ Amiel ]

No man lives without jostling and being jostled; in all ways he has to elbow himself through the world, giving and receiving offence. [ Carlyle ]

Life, to be worthy of a rational being, must be always in progression: we must always purpose to do more or better than in time past. [ Johnson ]

Birth into this life was the death of the embryo life that preceded, and the death of this will be birth into some new mode of being. [ Rev. Dr. Hedge ]

A single word is often a concentrated poem, a little grain of pure gold, capable of being beaten out into a broad extent of gold-leaf. [ Trench ]

In the midst of the sun is the light, in the midst of the light is the truth, and in the midst of the truth is the imperishable being. [ The Vedas ]

The art of conversation is to be prompt without being stubborn, to refute without argument, and to clothe great matters in a motley garb. [ Beaconsfield ]

You may fail to shine, in the opinion of others, both in your conversation and actions, from being superior, as well as inferior to them. [ Greville ]

It is by bribing, not so often by being bribed, that wicked politicians bring ruin on mankind. Avarice is a rival to the pursuits of many. [ Burke ]

Whatever the will commands, the whole man must do; the empire of the will over all the faculties being absolutely overruling and despotic. [ South ]

'Tis only from the belief of the goodness and wisdom of a Supreme Being that our calamities can be borne in that manner which becomes a man. [ Mackenzie ]

There is not less wit, nor less invention, in applying rightly a thought one finds in a book, than in being the first author of that thought. [ Pierre Boyle ]

When a government is arrived to that degree of corruption as to be incapable of reforming itself, it would not lose much by being new moulded. [ Montesquieu ]

A careless and blasphemous use of the name of the Divine Being is not only sinful, but it is also prima facie evidence of vulgar associations. [ Hosea Ballou ]

Conflict, which rouses up the best and highest powers in some characters, in others not only jars the whole being, but paralyzes the faculties. [ Mrs. Jameson ]

Many are ambitious of saying grand things, that is, of being grandiloquent. Eloquence is speaking out - a quality few esteem, and fewer aim at. [ Hare ]

Let the current of your being set towards God, then your life will be filled and calmed by one master-passion which unites and stills the soul. [ Alexander Maclaren ]

Love is like the painter, who, being to draw the picture of a friend having a blemish in one eye, would picture only the other side of his face. [ South ]

The woman who loves us is only a woman, but the woman we love is a celestial being whose defects disappear under the prism through which we see her. [ E. de Girardin ]

Grief is a species of idleness, and the necessity of attention to the present, preserves us from being lacerated and devoured by sorrow for the past. [ Dr. Johnson ]

God is the only being who has time enough; but a prudent man, who knows how to seize occasion, can commonly make a shift to find as much as he needs. [ Lowell ]

There is no being eloquent for atheism. In that exhausted receiver the mind cannot use its wings, - the clearest proof that it is out of its element. [ Hare ]

The poorest being that crawls on earth, contending to save itself from injustice and oppression, is an object respectable in the eyes of God and man. [ Burke ]

No lover should have the insolence to think of being accepted at once, nor should any girl have the cruelty to refuse at once, without severe reasons. [ John Ruskin ]

Let men say, we be men of good government; being governed, as the sea is, by our noble and chaste mistress the moon, under whose countenance we steal. [ William Shakespeare ]

That friendship only is, indeed, genuine when two friends, without speaking a word to each other, can, nevertheless, find happiness in being together. [ Georg Ebers ]

The genius of the Spanish people is exquisitely subtle, without being at all acute; hence there is so much humor and so little wit in their literature. [ Coleridge ]

Is not this a lamentable thing, that of the skin of an innocent lamb should be made parchment? That parchment, being scribbled o'er, should undo a man? [ William Shakespeare ]

We gain nothing by being with such as ourselves. We encourage one another in mediocrity. I am always longing to be with men more excellent than myself. [ Lamb ]

The happiest end of life is this: when the mind and the other senses being unimpaired, the same nature which put it together takes asunder her own work. [ Cicero ]

The calumniator is like the dragon that pursued a woman, but, not being able to overtake her, opened his mouth and threw a flood after her to drown her. [ Edward Blunt ]

There should be, methinks, as little merit in loving a woman for her beauty as in loving a man for his prosperity; both being equally subject to change. [ Pope ]

Heroes are men who set out to be demi-gods in their own eyes, and who end by being so at certain moments by dint of despising and combating all humanity. [ George Sand ]

Being happy - being appreciative, being grateful - is not altogether a matter of temperament. Nor is it dependent upon outward circumstances. Not at all. [ Ossian Lang ]

Of all things known to mortals wine is the most powerful and effectual for exciting and inflaming the passions of mankind, being common fuel to them all. [ Lord Bacon ]

A leveller has long ago been set down as a ridiculous and chimerical being, who, if he could finish his work today, would have to begin it again tomorrow. [ Colton ]

Our favorites are few: since only what rises from the heart reaches it, being caught and carried on the tongues of men wheresoever love and letters journey. [ Alcott ]

No man ever did or ever will become truly eloquent without being a constant reader of the Bible, and an admirer of the purity and sublimity of its language. [ Fisher Ames ]

I never listen to calumnies, because, if they are untrue, I run the risk of being deceived, and if they are true, of hating persons not worth thinking about. [ Montesquieu ]

There is a greatness in being generous, and there is only simple justice in satisfying creditors. Generosity is the part of the soul raised above the vulgar. [ Goldsmith ]

Greatness lies not in being strong, but in the right using of strength. He is greatest whose strength carries up the most hearts by the attraction of his own. [ Ward Beecher ]

Ethical maxims are bandied about as a sort of current coin of discourse, and, being never melted down for use, those that are of base metal are never detected. [ Bishop Whately ]

Newspapers are to the body politic what arteries are to the human body, their function being to carry blood and sustenance and repair to every part of the body. [ Henry Ward Beecher ]

One should never take sides in anything - taking sides is the beginning of sincerity, and earnestness follows shortly after, and the human being becomes a bore. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

There is never the body of a man, how strong and stout soever, if it be troubled and inflamed, but will take more harm and offense by wine being poured into it. [ Plutarch ]

The man abandoned by his friends, one after another, without just cause, will acquire the reputation of being hard to please, changeable, ungrateful, unsociable. [ Joseph Roux ]

Every thought and word and deed, of every human being, is followed by its inevitable consequence: for the one we are responsible; with the other we have nothing to do. [ Gail Hamilton ]

Teeth, hair, nails, and the human species, prosper not when separated from their place. A wise man, being informed of this, should not totally forsake his native home. [ Hitopadesa ]

I am told so many ill things of a man, and I see so few in him, that I begin to suspect he has a real but troublesome merit, as being likely to eclipse that of others. [ Bruyere ]

So far is it from being true that men are naturally equal, that no two people can be half an hour together but one shall acquire an evident superiority over the other. [ Johnson ]

True art is like good company; it constrains us in the most charming way to recognise the standard after which and up to which our innermost being is shaped by culture. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]

Plain women are always jealous of their husbands, beautiful women never are; they have no time, they are always so occupied in being jealous of other people's husbands. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

Men love better books which please them than those which instruct. Since their ennui troubles them more than their ignorance, they prefer being amused to being informed. [ L'Abbe Dubois ]

The imputation of being a fool is a thing which mankind, of all others, is the most impatient of, it being a blot upon the prime and specific perfection of human nature. [ South ]

A tool is but the extension of a man's hand, and a machine is but a complex tool. And he that invents a machine augments the power of a man and the well-being of mankind. [ Henry Ward Beecher ]

Knowledge being to be had only of visible and certain truth, error is not a fault of our knowledge, but a mistake of our judgment, giving assent to that which is not true. [ John Locke ]

It is curious how tyrannical the habit of reading is, and what shifts we make to escape thinking. There is no bore we dread being left alone with so much as our own minds. [ Lowell ]

My mind can take no hold on the present world, nor rest in it a moment, but my whole nature rushes onward with irresistible force towards a future and better state of being. [ Fichte ]

Friendship, unlike love, which is weakened by fruition, grows up, thrives, and increases by enjoyment; and being of itself spiritual, the soul is reformed by the habit of it. [ Montaigne ]

Try to be happy in this present moment, and put not off being so to a time to come, - as though that time should be of another make from this, which has already come and is ours. [ Fuller ]

There is not so agonizing a feeling in the whole catalogue of human suffering, as the first conviction that the heart of the being whom we most tenderly love is estranged from us. [ Bulwer ]

To the understanding of anything, two conditions are equally required - intelligibility in the thing itself being no whit more indispensable than intelligence in the examiner of it. [ Carlyle ]

Man is not merely a thinking, he is at the same time a sentient, being. He is a whole, a unity of manifold, internally connected powers, and to this whole must the work of art speak. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]

Wickedness may well be compared to a bottomless pit, into which it is easier to keep one's self from falling, then, being fallen, to give one's self any stay from falling infinitely. [ Sir P. Sidney ]

In oratory, affectation must be avoided; it being better for a man by a native and clear eloquence to express himself than by those words which may smell either of the lamp or inkhorn. [ Lord Herbert ]

True generosity is a duty as indispensably necessary as those imposed upon us by the law. It is a rule imposed upon us by reason, which should be the sovereign law of a rational being. [ Goldsmith ]

It seems that nature, which has so wisely disposed our bodily organs with a view to our happiness, has also bestowed on us pride, to spare us the pain of being aware of our imperfections. [ Rochefoucauld ]

Half the world is on the wrong scent in the pursuit of happiness. They think it consists in having and getting, and in being served by others. It consists in giving and in serving others. [ Henry Drummond ]

Haste turns usually upon a matter of ten minutes too late, and may be avoided by a habit like that of Lord Nelson, to which he ascribed his success in life, of being ten minutes too early. [ Bovee ]

Man lives in Time, has his whole earthly being, endeavour, and destiny shaped for him by Time; only in the transitory Time-symbol is the ever-motionless eternity we stand on made manifest. [ Carlyle ]

We may deserve grief; but why should women be unhappy? - except that we know heaven chastens those whom it loves best, being pleased by repeated trials to make these pure spirits more pure. [ Thackeray ]

God has sometimes converted wickedness into madness; and it is to the credit of human reason that men who are not in some degree mad are never capable of being in the highest degree wicked. [ Burke ]

If much reason is necessary to remain in celibacy, still more is required to marry. One must then have reason for two; and often all the reason of the two does not make one reasonable being. [ Balzac ]

Leisure and solitude are the best effect of riches, because mother of thought. Both are avoided by most rich men, who seek company and business, which are signs of being weary of themselves. [ Sir W. Temple ]

I have heard with admiring submission the experience of the lady who declared that the sense of being well dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquillity which religion is powerless to bestow. [ Emerson ]

Proverbs are somewhat analogous to those medical formulas which, being in frequent use, are kept ready made up in the chemists' shops, and which often save the framing of a distinct prescription. [ Whately ]

We are always more disposed to laugh at nonsense than at genuine wit; because the nonsense is more agreeable to us, being more conformable to our own natures: fools love folly, and wise men wisdom. [ Marguerite de Valois ]

The bed of death brings every human being to his pure individuality; to the intense contemplation of that deepest and most solemn of all relations, the relation between the creature and his Creator. [ Daniel Webster ]

All the arts, which have a tendency to raise man in the scale of being, have a certain common band of union. and are connected, if I may be allowed to say so, by blood-relationship with one another. [ Cicero ]

Gold is called the bait of sin, the snare of souls, and the hook of death; which being aptly applied may be compared to a fire, whereof a little is good to warm one, but too much will burn him altogether. [ Sir R. Filmer ]

The world has always laughed at its own tragedies, that being the only way in which it has been able to bear them; consequently, whatever the world has treated seriously belongs to the comedy side of things. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

Gunpowder is the emblem of politic revenge, for it biteth first and barketh afterwards; the bullet being at the mark before the noise is heard, so that it maketh a noise not by way of warning, but of triumph. [ Fuller ]

Genius is intensity of life; an overflowing vitality which floods and fertilizes a continent or a hemisphere of being; which makes a nature many-sided and whole, while most men remain partial and fragmentary. [ Hamilton W. Mabie ]

No possession can surpass, or even equal, a good library to the lover of books. Here are treasured up for his daily use and delectation, riches which increase by being consumed, and pleasures which never cloy. [ John Alfred Langford ]

Friendship has steps which lead up on the throne of God, through all spirits, even to the Infinite; only love is satiable, and like truth admits no three degrees of comparison; and a single being fills the heart. [ Richter ]

We adorn graves with flowers and redolent plants, just emblems of the life of man, which has been compared in the Holy Scriptures to those fading beauties whose roots, being buried in dishonor, rise again in glory. [ Evelyn ]

More marriages are ruined nowadays by the common sense of the husband than by anything else. How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly rational being. [ Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance ]

Poetry is musical thought, thought of a mind that has penetrated into the inmost heart of a thing, detected the melody that lies hidden in it, ... the heart of Nature being everywhere music, if you can only reach it. [ Carlyle ]

Next to clothes being fine, they should be well made, and worn easily; for a man is only the less genteel for a fine coat, if, in wearing it, he shows a regard for it, and is not as easy in it as if it was a plain one. [ Chesterfield ]

In sculpture did ever anybody call the Apollo a fancy piece? Or say of the Laocoon how it might be made different? A masterpiece of art has in the mind a fixed place in the chain of being, as much as a plant or a crystal. [ Emerson ]

Many readers judge of the power of a book by the shock it gives their feelings, - as some savage tribes determine the power of their muskets by their recoil; that being considered best which fairly prostrates the purchaser. [ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ]

I shall pass through this world but once. Any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again. [ A. B. Hegeman ]

The power of painter or poet to describe rightly what he calls an ideal thing depends upon its being to him not an ideal, but a real thing. No man ever did or ever will work well but either from actual sight or sight of faith. [ Ruskin ]

When I meet with any persons who write obscurely or converse confusedly, I am apt to suspect two things; first, that such persons do not understand themselves; and secondly, that they are not worthy of being understood by others. [ Colton ]

I have often reflected within myself on this unaccountable humor in womankind of being smitten with everything that is showy and superficial, and on the numberless evils that befall the sex from this light fantastical disposition. [ Addison ]

I have remarked that those who love women most, and are most tender in their intercourse with them, are most inclined to speak ill of them, us if they could not forgive them for not being as irreproachable as they wish them to be. [ T. Gautier ]

Love and the Soul, working together, might go on producing Venuses without end, each different, and all beautiful; but divorced and separated, they may continue producing indeed, yet no longer any being, or even thing, truly godlike. [ Ed ]

When I take up a book I have read before, I know what to expect; the satisfaction is not lessened by being anticipated. I shake hands with, and look our old tried and valued friend in the face, - compare notes and chat the hour away. [ Hazlitt ]

The most heaven-like spots I have ever visited have been certain rooms in which Christ's disciples were awaiting the summons of death. So far from being a house of mourning, I have often found such a house to be a vestibule of glory. [ T. L. Cuyler ]

Art is the effort of man to express the ideas which nature suggests to him of a power above nature, whether that power be within the recesses of his own being, or in the Great First Cause of which nature, like himself, is but the effect. [ Edward Bulwer-Lytton ]

If we steal thoughts from the moderns, it will be cried down as plagiarism; if from the ancients, it will be cried up as erudition. But in this respect every author is a Spartan, being more ashamed of the discovery than of the depredation. [ Colton ]

Wisdom is like electricity. There is no permanently wise man, but men capable of wisdom, who, being put into certain company, or other favorable conditions, become wise for a short time, as glasses rubbed acquire electric power for a while. [ Emerson ]

All men who have sense and feeling are being continually helped; they are taught by every person they meet, and enriched by everything that falls in their way. The greatest is he who has been oftenest aided. Originality is the observing eye. [ Ruskin ]

Persons are love's world, and the coldest philosopher cannot recount the debt of the young soul, wandering here in nature to the power of love, without being tempted to unsay, as treasonable to nature, aught derogatory to the social instincts. [ Ralph Waldo Emerson ]

He is a treacherous supplanter and underminer of the peace of all families and societies. This being a maxim of an unfailing truth, that nobody ever pries into another man's concerns but with a design to do, or to be able to do him a mischief. [ South ]

He who boasts of being perfect is perfect in folly. I never saw a perfect man. Every rose has its thorns, and every day its night. Even the sun shows spots, and the skies are darkened with clouds; and faults of some kind nestle in every bosom. [ Spurgeon ]

The curse and peril of language in our day, and particularly in this country, is that it is at the mercy of men who, instead of being content to use it well according to their honest ignorance, use it ill according to their affected knowledge. [ Richard Grant White ]

Love one human being with warmth and purity, and thou wilt love the world. The heart, in that celestial sphere of love, is like the sun in its course. From the drop on the rose to the ocean, all is for him a mirror, which he fills and brightens. [ Jean Paul ]

The human mind, in proportion as it is deprived of external resources, sedulously labours to find within itself the means of happiness, learns to rely with confidence on its own exertions, and gains with greater certainty the power of being happy. [ Zimmermann ]

How dear the sure counsel of a present friend, whose heavenly power failing, the lonely one sinks in silence; for earnest thought and resolution, locked within his breast, are slowly ripened; the presence of the loved one soon warms them into being. [ Goethe ]

As the mind of Johnson was robust, but neither nimble nor graceful, so his style was void of all grace and ease, and, being the most unlike of all styles to the natural effusion of a cultivated mind, had the least pretension to the praise of eloquence. [ Sir J. Mackintosh ]

Simplicity is the straightforwardness of a soul which refuses to reflect on itself or its deeds. Many are sincere without being simple; they do not wish to be taken for other than they are, but they are always afraid of being taken for what they are not. [ Fénelon ]

A little neglect may breed great mischief. For want of a nail the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a horse the rider was lost, being overtaken and slain by the enemy; all for want of a little care about a horse-shoe nail. [ Benjamin Franklin ]

It were happy if we studied nature more in natural things; and acted according to nature, whose rules are few, plain, and most reasonable. Let us begin where she begins, go her pace, and close always where she ends, and we cannot miss of being good naturalists. [ William Penn ]

All the religions known in the world are founded, so far as they relate to man or the unity of man, as being all of one degree. Whether in heaven or in hell, or in whatever state man may be supposed to exist hereafter, the good and the bad are the only distinctions. [ Thomas Paine ]

Bad company is like a nail driven into a post, which, after the first and second blow, may be drawn out with little difficulty; but being once driven up to the head, the pincers cannot take hold to draw it out, but which can only be done by the destruction of the wood. [ St. Augustine ]

It is a delicious moment, certainly, that of being well nestled in bed, and feeling that you shall drop gently to sleep. The good is to come, not past; the limbs have just been tired enough to render the remaining in one posture delightful; the labor of the day is gone. [ Leigh Hunt ]

Heaven may have happiness as utterly unknown to us as the gift of perfect vision would be to a man born blind. If we consider the inlets of pleasure from five senses only, we may be sure that the same Being who created us could have given us five hundred, if He had pleased. [ Colton ]

The liberty of a people consists in being governed by laws which they have made themselves, under whatsoever form it may be of government; the liberty of a private man, in being master of his own time and actions, as far as may consist with the laws of God and of his country. [ Cowley ]

Words, those fickle daughters of the earth, are the creation of a being that is finite, and when applied to explain that which is infinite, they fail; for that which is made surpasses not the maker; nor can that which is immeasurable by our thoughts be measured by our tongues. [ Colton ]

Perfect friendship puts us under the necessity of being virtuous; as it can only be preserved among esteemable persons, it forces us to resemble them; you find in friendship the surety of good counsel, the emulation of good example, sympathy in our griefs, and succor in our distress. [ Mme. de Lambert ]

Liberty is the richest inheritance which man has received from the skies! When shall its sacred fire burn in every bosom, and kindling with the thrilling force of inspiration, spread from heart to heart and from mind to mind, and be the common privilege and birthright of every human being? [ Acton ]

The difference between a parable and an apologue is that the former, being drawn from human life, requires probability in the narration, whereas the apologue, being taken from inanimate things or the inferior animals, is not confined strictly to probability. The fables of Aesop are apologues. [ Fleming ]

When Anaxagoras was told of the death of his son, he only said, I knew he was mortal. So we in all casualties of life should say I knew my riches were uncertain, that my friend was but a man. Such considerations would soon pacify us, because all our troubles proceed from their being unexpected. [ Plutarch ]

The more readily we admit the possibility of our own cherished convictions being mixed with error, the more vital and helpful whatever is right in them will become; and no error is so conclusively fatal as the idea that God will not allow us to err, though He has allowed all other men to do so. [ Ruskin ]

He that abuses his own profession will not patiently bear with any one else who does so. And this is one of our most subtle operations of self-love. For when we abuse our own profession, we tacitly except ourselves; but when another abuses it, we are far from being certain that this is the case. [ Colton ]

Style! style, why, all writers will tell you that it is the very thing which can least of all be changed. A man's style is nearly as much a part of him as his physiognomy, his figure, the throbbing of his pulse, - in short, as any part of his being which is at least subjected to the action of the will. [ Fenelon ]

Anybody can be good in the country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people who live out of town are so uncivilized. There are only two ways of becoming civilized. One is by being cultured, the other is by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being either, so they stagnate. [ Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey ]

It is strictly and philosophically true in Nature and reason that there is no such thing as chance or accident; it being evident that these words do not signify anything really existing, anything that is truly an agent or the cause of any event; but they signify merely men's ignorance of the real and immediate cause. [ Adam Clarke ]

There are certain times in our life when we find ourselves in circumstances, that not only press upon us, but seem to weigh us down altogether. They give us, however, not only the opportunity, but they impose on us the duty of elevating ourselves, and thereby fulfilling the purpose of the Divine Being in our creation. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]

There is nothing more necessary to establish reputation than to suspend the enjoyment of it. He that cannot bear the sense of merit with silence must of necessity destroy it; for fame being the genial mistress of mankind, whoever gives it to himself insults all to whom he relates any circumstance to his own advantage. [ Steele ]

Hudibras has defined nonsense, as Cowley does wit, by negatives. Nonsense, he says, is that which is neither true nor false. These two great properties of nonsense, which are always essential to it, give it such a peculiar advantage over all other writings, that it is incapable of being either answered or contradicted. [ Addison ]

Now nature is not at variance with art, nor art with nature; they being both the servants of his providence. Art is the perfection of nature. Were the world now as it was the sixth day, there were yet a chaos. Nature hath made one world, and art another. In brief, all things are artificial; for nature is the art of God. [ Sir Thomas Browne ]

Gallantry to women (the sure road to their favor) is nothing but the appearance of extreme devotion to all their wants and wishes, a delight in their satisfaction, and a confidence in yourself as being able to contribute towards it. The slightest indifference with regard to them, or distrust of yourself is equally fatal. [ Hazlitt ]

Heroes have gone out; quacks have come in; the reign of quacks has not ended with the nineteenth century. The sceptre is held with a firmer grasp; the empire has a wider boundary. We are all the slaves of quackery in one shape or another. Indeed, one portion of our being is always playing the successful quack to the other. [ Carlyle ]

A good author, and one who writes carefully, often discovers that the expression of which he has been in search without being able to discover it, and which he has at last found, is that which was the most simple, the most natural, and which seems as if it ought to have presented itself at once, without effort, to the mind. [ Bruyere ]

The word necessary is miserably applied. It disordereth families, and overturneth government, by being so abused. Remember that children and fools want everything because they want judgment to distinguish; and therefore there is no stronger evidence of a crazy understanding than the making too large a catalogue of things necessary. [ Lord Halifax ]

To be a finite being is no crime, and to be the Infinite is not to be a creditor. As man was not consulted he does not find himself a party in a bargain, but a child in the household of love. Reconciliation, therefore, is not the consequence of paying a debt, or procuring atonement for an injury, but an organic process of the human life. [ John Weiss ]

Method, we are aware, is an essential ingredient in every discourse designed for the instruction of mankind; but it ought never to force itself on the attention as an object - never appear to be an end instead of an instrument; or beget a suspicion of the sentiments being introduced for the sake of the method, not the method for the sentiments. [ Robert Hall ]

We speak of persons as jovial, as being born under the planet Jupiter or Jove, which was the joyfullest star and the happiest augury of all. A gloomy person was said to be saturnine, as being born under the planet Saturn, who was considered to make those who owned his influence, and were born when he was in the ascendant, grave and stern as himself. [ Trench ]

Mankind are in the end always governed by superiority of intellectual faculties, and none are more sensible of this than the military profession. When, on my return from Italy, I assumed the dress of the Institute, and associated with men of science, I knew what I was doing: I was sure of not being misunderstood by the lowest drummer boy in the army. [ Napoleon I ]

Hair is the most delicate and lasting of our materials, and survives us, like love. It is so light, so gentle, so escaping from the idea of death, that, with a lock of hair belonging to a child or friend, we may almost look up to heaven and compare notes with the angelic nature, - may almost say, I have a piece of thee here not unworthy of thy being now. [ Leigh Hunt ]

The most influential books, and the truest in their influence, are works of fiction. They repeat, they re-arrange, they clarify the lessons of life; they disengage us from ourselves, they constrain us to the acquaintance of others; and they show us the web of experience, but with a singular change - that monstrous, consuming ego of ours being, nonce, struck out. [ Robert Louis Stevenson ]

Men that look no further than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabric hangs, do wonder that we are not always so; and considering the thousand doors that lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once. [ Sir Thomas Browns ]

The repose necessary to all beauty is repose, not of inanition, nor of luxury, nor of irresolution, but the repose of magnificent energy and being; in action, the calmness of trust and determination; in rest, the consciousness of duty accomplished and of victory won; and this repose and this felicity can take place as well in the midst of trial and tempest, as beside the waters of comfort. [ Ruskin ]

It is not so much in buying pictures as in being pictures, that you can encourage a noble school. The best patronage of art is not that which seeks for the pleasures of sentiment in a vague ideality, nor for beauty of form in a marble image, but that which educates your children into living heroes, and binds down the flights and the fondnesses of the heart into practical duty and faithful devotion. [ Ruskin ]

There have been many men who left behind them that which hundreds of years have not worn out. The earth has Socrates and Plato to this day. The world is richer yet by Moses and the old prophets than by the wisest statesmen. We are indebted to the past. We stand in the greatness of ages that are gone rather than in that of our own. But of how many of us shall it be said that, being dead, we yet speak? [ Beecher ]

The light of the sun, the light of the moon, and the light of the air, in nature and substance are one and the same light, and yet they are there distinct lights: the light of the sun being of itself, and from none; the light of the moon from the sun; and the light of the air from them both. So the Divine Nature is one, and the persons three; subsisting, after a diverse manner, in one and the same Nature. [ R. Newton ]

Candlesticks and incense not being portable into the maintop, the sailor perceives these decorations to be, on the whole, inessential to a maintop mass. Sails must be set and cables bent, be it never so strict a saint's day; and it is found that no harm comes of it. Absolution on a lee-shore must be had of the breakers, it appears, if at all; and they give plenary and brief without listening to confession. [ Ruskin ]

We readily excuse paralytics from labor; and shall we be angry with a hypochondriac for not being cheerful in company? Must we stigmatize such an unfortunate person as peevish, positive, and unfit for society? His disorder may no more suffer him to be merry, than the gout will suffer another to dance. The advising a melancholic to be cheerful is like bidding a coward to be courageous, or a dwarf be taller. [ Wollaston ]

We acquire the love of people who, being in our proximity, are presumed to know us; and we receive reputation or celebrity, from such as are not personally acquainted with us. Merit secures to us the regard of our honest neighbors, and good fortune that of the public. Esteem is the harvest of a whole life spent in usefulness; but reputation is often bestowed upon a chance action, and depends most on success. [ G. A. Sala ]

Society is but the contest of a thousand little opposite interests - an eternal contest between all the vanities that clash with each other, wounded, humiliated the one by the other, and which expiate tomorrow in the disgust of a defeat the triumph of today. To live in solitude, to avoid being crushed in the surging throng, is what the world calls being a nonentity - to have no existence. Poor, miserable humanity! [ Chamfort ]

I cannot look around me without being struck with the analogy observable in the works of God. I find the Bible written in the style of His other books of Creation and Providence. The pen seems in the same hand. I see it, indeed, write at times my steriously in each of these books: thus I know that mystery in the works of God is only another name for my ignorance. The moment, therefore, that I become humble, all becomes right. [ Richard Cecil ]

Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feeling, revives the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the springtime of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human nature, by vivid delineations of its tenderest and softest feelings, and, through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life. [ Channing ]

Out of the ashes of misanthropy benevolence rises again; we find many virtues where we had imagined all was vice, many acts of disinterested friendship where we had fancied all was calculation and fraud - and so gradually from the two extremes we pass to the proper medium; and, feeling that no human being is wholly good or wholly base, we learn that true knowledge of mankind which induces us to expect little and forgive much. The world cures alike the optimist and the misanthrope. [ Edward Bulwer-Lytton ]

Business in a certain sort of men is a mark of understanding, and they are honored for it. Their souls seek repose in agitation, as children do by being rocked in a cradle. They may pronounce themselves as serviceable to their friends as troublesome to themselves. No one distributes his money to others, but every one therein distributes his time and his life. There is nothing of which we are so prodigal as of those two things, of which to be thrifty would be both commendable and useful. [ Montaigne ]

No process is so fatal as that which would cast all men in one mould. Every human being is intended to have a character of his own, to be what no other is, to do what no other can do. Our common nature is to be unfolded in unbounded diversities. It is rich enough for infinite manifestations. It is to wear innumerable forms of beauty and glory. Every human being has a work to carry on within, duties to perform abroad, influences to exert, which are peculiarly his, and which no conscience but his own can teach. [ Channing ]

The first class of readers may be compared to an hour-glass, their reading being as the sand; it runs in and runs out, and leaves not a vestige behind. A second class resembles a sponge, which imbibes everything, and returns it in nearly the same state, only a little dirtier. A third class is like a jelly-bag, which allows all that is pure to pass away, and retains only the refuse and dregs. The fourth class may be compared to the slave of Golconda, who, casting aside all that is worthless, preserves only the pure gems. [ Coleridge ]

Some authors write nonsense in a clear style, and others sense in an obscure one; some can reason without being able to persuade, others can persuade without being able to reason; some dive so deep that they descend into darkness, and others soar so high that they give us no light; and some, in a vain attempt to be cutting and dry, give us only that which is cut and dried. We should labor, therefore, to treat with ease of things that are difficult; with familiarity, of things that are novel; and with perspicuity, of things that are profound. [ Colton ]

The province of music is rather to express the passions and feelings of the human heart than the actions of men, or the operations of nature. When employed in the former capacity, it becomes an eloquent language; when in the latter, a mere mimic - an imitator, and a very miserable one - or rather a buffoon, caricaturing what it cannot imitate; the idea of the different stages of a battle, or the progress of a tempest being represented to the eye or the ear, or even the imagination, by the quavering of a fiddler's elbow, or the squeaking of catgut, is preposterous. [ G. P. Morris ]

The first being that rushes to the recollection of a soldier or a sailor, in his heart's difficulty, is his mother; she clings to his memory and affection in the midst of all the f orgetf ulness and hardihood induced by a roving life; the last message he leaves is for her; his last whisper breathes her name. The mother, as she instills the lessons of piety and filial obligation into the heart of her infant son, should always feel that her labor is not in vain. She may drop into the grave, but she has left behind her influences that will work for her. The bow is broken, but the arrow is sped, and will do its ofiice. [ A. H. Motte ]

Greatness is not a teachable nor gainable thing, but the expression of the mind of a God-made man: teach, or preach, or labour as you will, everlasting difference is set between one man's capacity and another's; and this God-given supremacy is the priceless thing, always just as rare in the world at one time as another.... And nearly the best thing that men can generally do is to set themselves, not to the attainment, but the discovery of this: learning to know gold, when we see it, from iron-glance, and diamond from flint-sand, being for most of us a more profitable employment than trying to make diamonds of our own charcoal. [ John Ruskin ]

As a science, logic institutes an analysis of the process of the mind in reasoning, and investigating the principles on which argumentation is conducted; as an art, it furnishes such rules as may be derived from those principles, for guarding against erroneous deductions. Some are disposed to view logic as a peculiar method of reasoning, and not as it is, a method of unfolding and analysing our reason. They have, in short, considered logic as an art of reasoning. The logician's object being, not to lay down principles by which one may reason, but by which all must reason, even though they are not distinctly aware of them - to lay down rules not which may be followed with advantage, but which cannot possibly be deviated from in sound reasoning. [ R. Whately ]

Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge: it is immortal as the heart of men. If the labors of the men of science should ever create any revolution, direct or indirect, in our condition, and in the impressions which we habitually receive, the poet will then sleep no more than at present; he will be ready to follow the steps of the man of science, not only in those general indirect effects, but he will be at his side, carrying sensation into the midst of the objects of the science itself. The remotest discoveries of the chemist, the botanist, or mineralogist will be as proper objects of the poet's art as any upon which it can be employed, if the time should ever come when these things shall be familiar to us, and the relations under which they are contemplated by the followers of the respective sciences shall be manifestly and palpably material to us as enjoying and suffering beings. If the time should ever come when what is now called science, thus familiarized to men, shall be ready to put on. as it were, a form of flesh and blood, the poet will lend his divine spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the being thus produced as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man. [ Wordsworth ]

being in Scrabble®

The word being is playable in Scrabble®, no blanks required.

Scrabble® Letter Score: 8

Highest Scoring Scrabble® Plays In The Letters being:

BEING
(33)
BEGIN
(33)
BINGE
(33)
 

All Scrabble® Plays For The Word being

BEING
(33)
BEING
(30)
BEING
(28)
BEING
(27)
BEING
(27)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(20)
BEING
(20)
BEING
(18)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(13)
BEING
(12)
BEING
(11)
BEING
(10)
BEING
(10)
BEING
(10)
BEING
(10)
BEING
(9)
BEING
(9)
BEING
(9)
BEING
(8)

The 200 Highest Scoring Scrabble® Plays For Words Using The Letters In being

BEING
(33)
BEGIN
(33)
BINGE
(33)
BEING
(30)
BINGE
(30)
BEING
(28)
BEGIN
(28)
BINGE
(28)
BEGIN
(27)
BEGIN
(27)
BEING
(27)
BINGE
(27)
BEGIN
(27)
BEING
(27)
BINGE
(27)
BEGIN
(24)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(24)
BEGIN
(24)
BINGE
(24)
BEGIN
(24)
BINGE
(24)
BEING
(24)
BINGE
(24)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BEING
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BINGE
(20)
BEING
(20)
BEGIN
(20)
BEING
(20)
BEGIN
(18)
BIG
(18)
BIG
(18)
BIG
(18)
BEGIN
(18)
BINGE
(18)
BINGE
(18)
BEG
(18)
BEING
(18)
BEG
(18)
BEG
(18)
BEGIN
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BEING
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BEING
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BEGIN
(16)
BEING
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BEGIN
(16)
BEGIN
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BEGIN
(16)
BEGIN
(16)
BEN
(15)
BEN
(15)
NIB
(15)
BIN
(15)
NIB
(15)
BIN
(15)
BIN
(15)
BEN
(15)
NIB
(15)
BEING
(13)
BEGIN
(13)
GIN
(12)
GIN
(12)
BIG
(12)
GIN
(12)
BINGE
(12)
BINGE
(12)
BIG
(12)
BIG
(12)
BINGE
(12)
BIG
(12)
BEG
(12)
BE
(12)
BEGIN
(12)
BE
(12)
BEING
(12)
BEG
(12)
BEG
(12)
BEGIN
(12)
BEG
(12)
BEGIN
(11)
BIN
(11)
BEING
(11)
BIG
(11)
BINGE
(11)
BEG
(11)
BEN
(11)
NIB
(11)
BIN
(10)
BEGIN
(10)
BEGIN
(10)
BINGE
(10)
BINGE
(10)
BINGE
(10)
BEGIN
(10)
BINGE
(10)
BEG
(10)
NIB
(10)
BIN
(10)
BIN
(10)
BEGIN
(10)
BE
(10)
BEN
(10)
BEING
(10)
NIB
(10)
BEN
(10)
BEING
(10)
BIG
(10)
NIB
(10)
BEN
(10)
BEING
(10)
BEING
(10)
BINGE
(9)
BEING
(9)
BEGIN
(9)
NIB
(9)
BINGE
(9)
BEING
(9)
BEN
(9)
BEGIN
(9)
BIG
(9)
BEING
(9)
BIN
(9)
BEG
(9)
BE
(8)
BEG
(8)
BE
(8)
BEN
(8)
NIB
(8)
GIN
(8)
BEG
(8)
GIN
(8)
GIN
(8)
BEGIN
(8)
BIN
(8)
BIG
(8)
BIG
(8)
GIN
(8)
BEING
(8)
BINGE
(8)
BEN
(7)
NIB
(7)
BE
(7)
GIN
(7)
BIN
(7)
BIN
(7)
BEG
(7)
NIB
(7)
BEN
(7)
BIG
(7)
IN
(6)
IN
(6)
NIB
(6)
GIN
(6)
NIB
(6)
BE
(6)
BEN
(6)
GIN
(6)
BIG
(6)
BEG
(6)
BIN
(6)
BIN
(6)
EN
(6)
BEN
(6)
EN
(6)
GIN
(6)
NIB
(5)
BIN
(5)
BEN
(5)
GIN
(5)
GIN
(5)
BE
(5)
EN
(4)
EN
(4)
IN
(4)
IN
(4)
IN
(4)
IN
(4)
EN
(4)
EN
(4)
GIN
(4)
BE
(4)
IN
(3)
EN
(3)
EN
(3)
IN
(3)
EN
(2)

being in Words With Friends™

The word being is playable in Words With Friends™, no blanks required.

Words With Friends™ Letter Score: 11

Highest Scoring Words With Friends™ Plays In The Letters being:

BINGE
(57)
BEGIN
(57)
BEING
(57)
 

All Words With Friends™ Plays For The Word being

BEING
(57)
BEING
(51)
BEING
(45)
BEING
(44)
BEING
(39)
BEING
(38)
BEING
(34)
BEING
(33)
BEING
(33)
BEING
(33)
BEING
(30)
BEING
(28)
BEING
(26)
BEING
(25)
BEING
(24)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(21)
BEING
(21)
BEING
(19)
BEING
(18)
BEING
(17)
BEING
(17)
BEING
(16)
BEING
(15)
BEING
(15)
BEING
(15)
BEING
(15)
BEING
(14)
BEING
(14)
BEING
(13)
BEING
(13)
BEING
(13)
BEING
(12)
BEING
(12)
BEING
(11)

The 200 Highest Scoring Words With Friends™ Plays Using The Letters In being

BINGE
(57)
BEGIN
(57)
BEING
(57)
BEING
(51)
BINGE
(51)
BEING
(45)
BEGIN
(45)
BEING
(44)
BINGE
(44)
BEGIN
(44)
BEGIN
(39)
BINGE
(39)
BEGIN
(39)
BEING
(39)
BINGE
(39)
BEING
(38)
BEGIN
(38)
BINGE
(38)
BEING
(34)
BEGIN
(33)
BINGE
(33)
BEGIN
(33)
BEGIN
(33)
BEING
(33)
BEING
(33)
BINGE
(33)
BINGE
(33)
BEING
(33)
BEING
(30)
BEGIN
(30)
BINGE
(30)
BEGIN
(30)
BEING
(28)
BINGE
(28)
BEING
(26)
BINGE
(26)
BEGIN
(26)
BEGIN
(25)
BEING
(25)
BEING
(24)
BEG
(24)
BIG
(24)
BEGIN
(24)
BEGIN
(24)
BIG
(24)
BEG
(24)
BINGE
(24)
BINGE
(24)
BEG
(24)
BIG
(24)
BINGE
(23)
BEGIN
(23)
BEING
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BEING
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BEG
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BINGE
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BIG
(22)
BEGIN
(22)
BIN
(21)
BIN
(21)
BEN
(21)
BIN
(21)
BEING
(21)
BEING
(21)
BEN
(21)
BINGE
(21)
NIB
(21)
NIB
(21)
NIB
(21)
BEN
(21)
BEGIN
(21)
BEGIN
(21)
BINGE
(20)
NIB
(19)
BINGE
(19)
BEGIN
(19)
BIN
(19)
BEING
(19)
BEN
(19)
BEING
(18)
BEGIN
(18)
GIN
(18)
GIN
(18)
GIN
(18)
BINGE
(18)
BINGE
(17)
BEGIN
(17)
BINGE
(17)
BINGE
(17)
BEGIN
(17)
BEING
(17)
BINGE
(17)
BEING
(17)
BEGIN
(16)
BIG
(16)
BEG
(16)
BIG
(16)
BEGIN
(16)
BINGE
(16)
BIG
(16)
BEG
(16)
BEING
(16)
BEG
(16)
GIN
(16)
BEG
(16)
BIG
(16)
BINGE
(15)
BIG
(15)
BIN
(15)
BEG
(15)
BINGE
(15)
BINGE
(15)
BEING
(15)
BEGIN
(15)
BEING
(15)
BEING
(15)
NIB
(15)
BEGIN
(15)
BE
(15)
BEING
(15)
BEN
(15)
BE
(15)
BINGE
(14)
NIB
(14)
BEGIN
(14)
NIB
(14)
BIN
(14)
BEING
(14)
BIG
(14)
BEG
(14)
BIN
(14)
BINGE
(14)
BEING
(14)
NIB
(14)
BIN
(14)
BEN
(14)
BEN
(14)
BEGIN
(14)
BEN
(14)
NIB
(13)
BINGE
(13)
BEGIN
(13)
BE
(13)
BINGE
(13)
BEING
(13)
BINGE
(13)
BIN
(13)
BEN
(13)
BEING
(13)
BEGIN
(13)
BEING
(13)
BEGIN
(13)
BEGIN
(13)
BIG
(12)
GIN
(12)
BINGE
(12)
GIN
(12)
GIN
(12)
BEGIN
(12)
BEING
(12)
BEG
(12)
BEGIN
(12)
GIN
(12)
BINGE
(12)
BEING
(12)
GIN
(11)
BEING
(11)
BEN
(11)
BEN
(11)
NIB
(11)
BINGE
(11)
BEG
(11)
BIN
(11)
BIN
(11)
BIG
(11)
NIB
(11)
BEGIN
(11)
BE
(10)
BIG
(10)
BEG
(10)
GIN
(10)
BE
(10)
BEN
(9)
IN
(9)
GIN
(9)
IN
(9)
NIB
(9)
BEN
(9)

Words within the letters of being

2 letter words in being (3 words)

3 letter words in being (6 words)

5 letter words in being (Anagrams) (3 words)

being + 1 blank (7 words)

Words containing the sequence being

Words that start with being (2 words)

Words with being in them (2 words)

Words that end with being (3 words)

Word Growth involving being

Shorter words in being

be

in

Longer words containing being

beings nonbeings

nonbeing nonbeings

wellbeing