Courage without fortune destroys a man. [ Proverb ]
Those whom God to ruin has designed.
He fits for fate, and first destroys their mind. [ Dryden ]
Prosperity destroys fools, and endangers the wise. [ Proverb ]
Solitude cherishes great virtues, and destroys little ones. [ Sydney Smith ]
Idleness is not a vice: it is a rust that destroys all virtues. [ Duc de Nemours ]
It destroys one's nerves to be amiable every day to the same human being. [ Beaconsfield ]
Poverty destroys pride. It is difficult for an empty bag to stand upright. [ A. Dumas fils ]
Religion converts despair, which destroys, into resignation, which submits. [ Lady Blessington ]
Time destroys the speculations of man, but it confirms the judgment of nature. [ Cicero ]
It is not the disease but neglect of the remedy which generally destroys life. [ From the Latin ]
We become wiser by adversity; prosperity destroys our appreciation of the right. [ Seneca ]
All our life goeth like Penelope's web, - what one hour effects the next destroys. [ St. Augustine ]
Silence is a solvent that destroys personality, and gives us leave to be great and universal. [ Ralph Waldo Emerson ]
Time destroys the groundless conceits of man, but confirms that which is founded on nature and reality. [ Cicero ]
Imitate time; it destroys everything slowly; it undermines, it wears away, it detaches, it does not wrench. [ Joubert ]
Beautiful are the roses of your youth; but time destroys them; only talents, only virtue age not and never die. [ Pfeffel ]
Men will always act according to their passions. Therefore the best government is that which inspires the nobler passions and destroys the meaner. [ Jacobi ]
Loveliness does more than destroy ugliness; it destroys matter. A mere touch of it in a room, in a street, even on a door-knocker, is a spiritual force. [ Prof. Drummond ]
As good almost kill a man as kill a good book; who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God's image; but he who destroys a good book kills reason itself. [ Milton ]
The misfortune is that when man has found honey, he enters upon the feast with an appetite so voracious that he usually destroys his own delight by excess and satiety. [ Knox ]
True, the poisonous breath of the world destroys our illusions, but they resuscitate at once when a ray of love falls upon our benumbed hearts, as the warmth of the sun revives the poor flowers withered by the ices of winter. [ De Finod ]
Real beauty ends where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself an exaggeration and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think one becomes all nose or all forehead, or something horrid. [ Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey ]
It is not work that kills men; it is worry. Work is healthy; you can hardly put more upon a man than he can bear. Worry is rust upon the blade. It is not the revolution that destroys the machinery, but the friction. Fear secretes acids; but love and trust are sweet juices. [ Beecher ]
Parents fear the destruction of natural affection in their children. What is this natural principle so liable to decay? Habit is a second nature, which destroys the first. Why is not custom nature? I suspect that this nature itself is but a first custom, as custom is a second nature. [ Pascal ]
How often in the halls of legislation does eloquence unmask corruption, expose intrigue, and overthrow tyranny! In the cause of mercy it is omnipotent. It is bold in the consciousness of its superiority, fearless and unyielding in the purity of its motives. All opposition it destroys; all power it defies. [ Henry Melville ]
Gaze not on beauty too much, lest it blast thee; nor too long, lest it blind thee; nor too near, lest it burn thee. If thou like it, it deceives thee; if thou love it, it disturbs thee; if thou hunt after it, it destroys thee. If virtue accompany it, it is the heart's paradise; if vice associate it, it is the soul's purgatory. It is the wise man's bonfire, and the fool's furnace. [ Quarles ]
A town, before it can be plundered and deserted, must first be taken; and in this particular Venus has borrowed a law from her consort Mars. A woman that wishes to retain her suitor must keep him in the trenches; for this is a siege which the besieger never raises for want of supplies, since a feast is more fatal to love than a fast, and a surfeit than a starvation. Inanition may cause it to die a slow death, but repletion always destroys it by a sudden one. [ Colton ]