Think on thy sins. [ William Shakespeare ]
Praise is the reflection of virtue. [ Bacon ]
A soul without reflection, like a pile
Without inhabitants, to ruin runs. [ Young ]
- the blush is formed - and flies -
Nor owns reflection's calm control;
It comes, it deepens - fades and dies,
A gush of feeling from the soul. [ Mrs. Dinnies ]
The eye sees not itself
But by reflection, by some other things. [ William Shakespeare ]
The learn'd reflect on what before they knew. [ Pope ]
They only babble who practice not reflection,
I shall think - and thought is silence. [ Sheridan ]
They only babble that practise not reflection. [ Richard Brinsley Butler Sheridan ]
Echo is the voice of a reflection in a mirror. [ Hawthorne ]
There are things
Which make revenge a virtue by reflection,
And not an impulse of mere anger; though
The laws sleep, justice wakes, and injured souls
Oft do a public right with private wrong. [ Byron ]
Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see,
Thinks what never was, nor is, nor ever shall be. [ Pope ]
O lady, nobility is thine, and thy form is the reflection of thy nature! [ Euripides ]
There is one art of which man should be master, - the art of reflection. [ Coleridge ]
'Tis the fate of the noblest soul to sigh vainly for a reflection of itself. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]
Experience is a text to which reflection and knowledge supply the commentary. [ Arthur Schopenhauer ]
We believe at once in evil; we only believe in good upon reflection. Is not this sad? [ Madame Deluzy ]
The look of a gentleman is little else than the reflection of the looks of the world. [ Hazlitt ]
Reflection increases the vigor of the mind, as exercise does the strength of the body. [ Levis ]
All our first movements are good, generous, heroical; reflection weakens and kills them. [ Aime-Martin ]
Education begins the gentleman, but leading, good company, and reflection must finish him. [ Locke ]
There is no use or money equal to that of beneficence; here the enjoyment grows upon reflection. [ Mackenzie ]
A dear bargain is always disagreeable, particularly as it is a reflection upon the buyer's judgment. [ Pliny ]
Reflection is a flower of the mind, giving out wholesome fragrance; but revery is the same flower, when rank and running to seed. [ Tupper ]
Imagination is not thought, neither is fancy reflection; thought paceth like a hoary sage, but imagination hath wings as an eagle. [ Tupper ]
The custom of frequent reflection will keep their minds from running adrift, and call their thoughts home from useless unattentive roving. [ Locke ]
Every school boy and school girl who has arrived at the age of reflection ought to know something about the history of the art of printing. [ Horace Mann ]
How can we learn to know ourselves? Never by reflection, but only through action. Essay to do thy duty, and thou knowest at once what is in thee. [ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ]
By three methods we may learn wisdom: first, by reflection, which is the noblest; second, by imitation, which is the easiest; and third, by experience, which is the bitterest. [ Confucius ]
There is a gravity which is not austere nor captious, which belongs not to melancholy nor dwells in contraction of heart; but arises from tenderness and hangs upon reflection. [ Landor ]
Redundancy of language is never found with deep reflection. Verbiage may indicate observation, but not thinking. He who thinks much says but little in proportion to his thoughts. [ Washington Irving ]
Nothing, in truth, has such a tendency to weaken not only the powers of invention, but the intellectual powers in general, as a habit of extensive and various reading without reflection. [ Dugald Stewart ]
Had I children, my utmost endeavors would be to make them musicians. Considering I have no ear, nor even thought of music, the preference seems odd, and yet it is embraced on frequent reflection. [ H. Walpole ]
Reflection makes men cowards. There is no object that can be put in competition with life, unless it is viewed through the medium of passion, and we are hurried away by the impulse of the moment. [ Hazlitt ]
Eloquence, at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection, but addresses itself entirely to the fancy or the affections, captivates the willing hearers, and subdues their understanding. [ Hume ]
The advice of a scholar, whose piles of learning were set on fire by imagination, is never to be forgotten. Proportion an hour's reflection to an hour's reading, and so dispirit the book into the student.' [ Willmott ]
The solitary side of our nature demands leisure for reflection upon subjects on which the dash and whirl of daily business, so long as its clouds rise thick about us, forbid the intellect to fasten itself. [ Froude ]
Praise or Applause? We express our approbation by praise and applause. Praise is the general, applause, the specific term. Applause springs from impulse, while praise is the result of reason and reflection. [ Pure English, Hackett And Girvin, 1884 ]
Winckelmann wished to live with a work of art as a friend. The saying is true of pen and pencil. Fresh lustre shoots from Lycidas in a twentieth perusal. The portraits of Clarendon are mellowed by every year of reflection. [ Willmott ]
Eloquence, when at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection, but addresses itself entirely to the fancy or the affections, captivates the willing hearers, and subdues their understanding. Happily, this pitch it seldom attains. [ Hume ]
The growth of the intellect is spontaneous in every expansion. The mind that grows could not predict the times, the means, the mode of that spontaneity. God enters by a private door into every individual. Long prior to reflection is the thinking of the mind. [ Emerson ]
How little of our knowledge of mankind is derived from intentional accurate observation! Most of it has, unsought, found its way into the mind from the continual presentations of the objects to our unthinking view. It is a knowledge of sensation more than of reflection. [ John Foster ]
Nothing raises the price of a blessing like its removal; whereas it was its continuance which should have taught us its value. There are three requisitions to the proper enjoyment of earthly blessings, - a thankful reflection on the goodness of the Giver, a deep sense of our unworthiness, a recollection of the uncertainty of long possessing them. The first would make us grateful; the second, humble; and the third, moderate. [ Hannah More ]
I would rather have a young fellow too much than too little dressed; the excess on that side will wear off, with a little age and reflection; but if he is negligent at twenty, he will be a sloven at forty, and stink at fifty years old. Dress yourself fine where others are fine, and plain where others are plain; but take care always that your clothes are well made and fit you, for otherwise they will give you a very awkward air. [ Chesterfield ]
We have more poets than judges and interpreters of poetry. It is easier to write an indifferent poem than to understand a good one. There is, indeed, a certain low and moderate sort of poetry, that a man may well enough judge by certain rules of art: but the true, supreme, and divine poesy is equally above all rules and reason. And whoever discerns the beauty of it with the most assured and most steady sight sees no more than the quick reflection of a flash of lightning. [ Montaigne ]
There are chords in the human heart - strange varying strings - which are only struck by accident; which will remain mute and senseless to appeals the most passionate and earnest, and respond at last to the slightest casual touch. In the most insensible or childish minds there is some train of reflection which art can seldom lead or skill assist, but which will reveal itself, as great truths have done, by chance, and when the discoverer has the plainest and simplest end in view. [ Dickens ]
When I look upon the tombs of the great, every motion of envy dies; when I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire forsake me: when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tombs of the parents themselves, I reflect how vain it is to grieve for those whom we must quickly follow; when I see kings lying beside those who deposed them, when I behold rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men who divided the world with their contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the frivolous competitions, factions, and debates of mankind. [ Addison ]