On apprend en faillant—One learns by failing. Fr. Pr.
On attrape plus de mouches avec du miel qu'avec du vinaigre—More flies are caught with honey than vinegar. Fr. Pr.
On avale à pleine gorgée le mensonge qui nous flatte, et l'on boit goute à goute une vérité qui nous est amère—We swallow at one draught the lie that flatters us, and drink drop by drop the truth which is bitter to us. Diderot.
On commence par être dupe, / On finit par être 20 fripon—People begin by being dupes, and end by being knaves. Mme. Deshoulières, on gambling.
On connaît les amis au besoin—Friends are known in time of need. Fr. Pr.
On devient innocent quand on est malheureux—We become innocent when we are unfortunate. La Fontaine.
On dit—They say; a flying rumour or current report. Fr.
On dit de gueux qu'ils ne sont jamais dans leur chemins, parce qu'ils n'ont point de demeure fixe. Il en est de même de cause qui disputent, sans avoir des notions déterminées—It is said of beggars that they are never on their way, for they have no fixed dwelling-place; it is the same with people who dispute without having definite ideas. Fr.
On dit, est souvent un grand menteur—"They 25 say" is often a great liar. Fr. Pr.
On dit, et sans horreur je ne puis le redire—It has been said, and I cannot without horror repeat it. Racine.
On dit que Dieu est toujours pour les gros bataillons—They say God is always with the heaviest battalions. Voltaire.
On doit être heureux sans trop penser à l'être—One ought to be happy without thinking too much of being so. Fr. Pr.
On doit des égards aux vivants; on ne doit aux morts que la vérité—Respect is due to the living; to the dead nothing but truth. Motte.
On donne des conseils, mais on ne donne point 30 la sagesse d'en profiter—We may give advice, but not the sense to profit by it. La Roche.
On eagles' wings immortal scandals fly, / While virtuous actions are but born to die. Pope.
On entre et on crie, / Et voilà la vie! / On crie et on sort, / Et voilà la mort!—We come and cry, and that is life; we cry and go, and that is death. Fr.
On est aisément dupé par ce qu'on aime—We are easily duped by those we love. Molière.
On est, quand on le veut, le maître de son sort—A man, when he wishes, is the master of his fate. Ferrier.
On every stage the foes of peace attend / 35 Hate dogs their flight, and insult mocks their end. Johnson.
On every thorn delightful wisdom grows; / In every rill a sweet instruction flows. Young.
On fait souvent tort à la vérité par la manière dont on se sert pour la défendre—We often injure the truth by our manner of defending it. Fr.
On fait toujours le loup plus gros qu'il n'est—People always make the wolf more formidable than he is. Fr. Pr.
On gagne peu de choses par habileté—It is little that one gains by cleverness. (?)
On God and godlike men we build our trust. 40 Tennyson.
On his own saddle one rides safest. Pr.
On jette enfin de la terre sur la tête, et en voilà pour jamais—Little earth is cast in the end upon the head, and there is no more of it for ever. Pascal.
On life's vast ocean diversely we sail, / Reason the card, but passion is the gale. Pope.
On Monday morning don't be looking for Saturday night. Pr.
On n'a jamais bon marché de mauvaise marchandise—Bad 45 ware is never cheap. Fr. Pr.
On n'a rien pour rien—Nothing can be had for nothing. Fr. Pr.
On n'aime plus comme on aimait jadis—People no longer love as they used to do long ago. Fr.
On n'auroit guère de plaisir, si l'on ne se flattoit point—A man should have little pleasure if he did not sometimes flatter himself. Fr.
On n'est jamais si bien servi que par soi-même—A man is never so well served as by himself. Etienne.
On n'est jamais si heureux, ni si malheureux 5 qu'on se l'imagine—People are never either so happy or so miserable as they imagine. La Roche.
On n'est jamais si riche que quand on déménage—People are never so rich as when they are moving their stuff. Fr. Pr.
On n'est jamais si ridicule par les qualités que l'on a que par celles que l'on affecte d'avoir—We are never so ridiculous by the qualities we have as by those we affect to have. La Roche.
On n'est jamais trahi que par ses siens—A man is never betrayed except by his friends. Fr.
On n'est souvent mécontent des autres que parce qu'on l'est de soi-même—We are often dissatisfied with others because we are so with ourselves. Fr. Pr.
On ne considère pas assez les paroles comme 10 des faits—We don't sufficiently consider that words are deeds. Fr.
On ne cherche point à prouver la lumière—There is no need to prove the existence of light. Fr. Pr.
On ne doit pas juger du mérite d'un homme par ses grandes qualités, mais par l'usage qu'il en sait faire—We should not judge of the merit of a man by his great gifts, but by the use he makes of them. La Roche.
On ne donne rien si libéralement que ses conseils—People are not so liberal with anything as with advice. La Roche.
On ne gouverne les hommes que en les servant; la règle est sans exception—Men are governed only by serving them; the rule is without exception. V. Cousin.
On ne jette des pierres qu'à l'arbre chargé de 15 fruits—People throw stones only at the tree which is loaded with fruit. Fr. Pr.
On ne loue d'ordinaire que pour être loué—Praise is generally given only that it may be returned. La Roche.
On ne lui fait pas prendre des vessies pour des lanternes—You won't get him to take bladders for lanterns. Fr. Pr.
On ne méprise pas tous ceux qui ont des vices, mais on méprise tous ceux qui n'ont aucune vertu—We do not despise all those who have vices, but we despise all those who have no virtue. La Roche.
On ne perd les états que par timidité—It is only through timidity that states are lost. Voltaire.
On ne peut contenter tout le monde et son 20 père—There is no pleasing everybody and one's father. La Fontaine.
On ne peut faire qu'en faisant—One can do only by doing. Fr. Pr.
On ne peut sonner les cloches et aller à la procession—One cannot ring the bells and join the procession. Fr. Pr.
On ne prête qu'aux riches—People lend only to the rich. Fr. Pr.
On ne ramène guère un traître par l'impunité, au lieu que par la punition l'on en rend mille autres sages—No one ever reclaimed a traitor by letting him off, whereas punishment may keep thousands in the right way. (?)
On ne réussit dans ce monde qu'à la pointe de 25 l'épée, et on meurt les armes à la main—Success in life is won at the point of the sword, and we die with the weapon in our hands. (?)
On ne sait pour qui on amasse—We know not for whom we gather. Fr. Pr.
On ne se blame que pour être loué—Persons only blame themselves in order to obtain praise. La Roche.
On ne sent bien que ses propres maux—We feel only the evils that affect ourselves. Fr. Pr.
On ne trouve jamais l'expression d'un sentiment que l'on n'a pas; l'esprit grimace et le style aussi—It is ever impossible to express a sentiment which we do not feel; the mind grimaces, and the style too. Lamennais.
On ne va jamais si loin que lorsqu'on ne sait 30 pas où l'on va—One never goes so far as when he does not know where he is going. Fr. Pr.
On ne vaut dans ce monde que ce qu'on veut valoir—A man's worth in this world is estimated according to the value he puts upon himself. La Bruyère.
On ne vit dans la mémoire du monde que par des travaux pour le monde—One lives in the world's memory only by what he has done in the world's behalf. Fr.
[Greek: hon hoi theoi philousin apothnêskei neos]—He whom the gods love dies young. Menander.
On pardonne aisément un tort que l'on partage—We easily pardon an offence which we had part in. Jouy.
On parle peu quand la vanité ne fait pas parler—People 35 speak little when vanity does not prompt them. La Roche.
On perd tout le temps qu'on peut mieux employer—All the time is lost which might be better employed. (?)
On peut attirer les cœurs par les qualités qu'on montre, mais on ne les fixe que par celles qu'on a—People's affections may be attracted by the qualities which we affect, but they can only be won by those which we really possess. Fr.
On peut dire que son esprit brille aux dépens de sa mémoire—We may say his wit shines at the expense of his memory. Le Sage.
On peut dominer par la force, mais jamais par la seule adresse—We may lord it by force, but never by adroitness alone. Vauvenargues.
On peut être plus fin qu'un autre, mais non 40 pas plus fin que tous les autres—A man may be sharper than another, but not than all others. La Roche.
On peut mépriser le monde, mais on ne peut pas s'en passer—We may despise the world, but we cannot do without it. Fr. Pr.
On prend le peuple par les oreilles, comme on fait un pot par les anses—The public are to be caught by the ears, as one takes a pot by the handles. Pr.
On prend son bien où on le trouve—One takes what is his own wherever he finds it. Fr. Pr.
On prend souvent l'indolence pour la patience—Indolence is often taken for patience. Fr. Pr.
On Reason build Resolve! / That column of 45 true majesty in man. Young.
On respecte un moulin, on vole une province!—They (obliged by law) spare a mill, but steal a province!
On revient toujours à ses premiers amours—We always come back to our first loves. Etienne.
On se heurte toujours où l'on a mal—One always knocks himself on the spot where the sore is. Fr. Pr.
On se persuade mieux pour l'ordinaire par les raisons qu'on a trouvées soi-même, que par celles qui sont venues dans l'esprit des autres—We are ordinarily more easily satisfied with reasons that we have discovered ourselves, than by those which have occurred to others. Pascal.
On some men's bread butter will not stick. Pr. 5
On spécule sur tout, même sur la famine—People speculate on everything, even on famine. Armand Charlemagne.
On termine de longs procès / Par un peu de guerre civile—We end protracted law-suits by a little civil war.
On the beaten road there is tolerable travelling; but it is sore work, and many have to perish, fashioning a way through the impassable. Carlyle.
On the brink of the waters of life and truth we are miserably dying. Emerson.
On the day of the resurrection, those who 10 have indulged in ridicule will be called to the door of Paradise, and have it shut in their faces when they reach it. Mahomet.
On the field of foughten battle still, / Woe knows no limits save the victor's will. The Gaulliad.
On the neck of the young man sparkles no gem so gracious as enterprise. Hafiz.
On the pinnacle of fortune man does not stand long firm. Goethe.
On the sea sail, on the land settle. Pr.
On the soft bed of luxury most kingdoms have 15 expired. Young.
On the stage man should stand a step higher than in life. Börne.
On this account is the Bible a book of eternally effective power, because, as long as the world lasts, no one will step forward and say: I comprehend it in the whole and understand it in the particular; but we modestly say: In the whole it is venerable, and in the particular practicable (anwendbar). Goethe.
On veut avoir ce qu'on n'a pas, / Et ce qu'on a cesse de de plaire—We wish to have what we have not, and what we have ceases to please. Monvel.
On voit mourir et renaître les roses; il n'en est pas ainsi de nos beaux jours—We see roses die and revive again; it is not so with our fine days. Charleval.
On wrong / Swift vengeance waits; and art 20 subdues the strong. Pope.
Once a knave, always a knave. Pr.
Once a man and twice a child. Pr.
Once for all, beauty remains undemonstrable; it appears to us as in a dream, when we behold the works of the great poets and painters, and, in short, of all feeling artists. Goethe.
Once is no custom. Pr.
Once is no rule. Pr. 25
Once resolved, the trouble is over. It. Pr.
Once sufficiently enforce the eighth commandment, the whole "rights of man" are well cared for; I know no better definition of the rights of man: "Thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not be stolen from." What a society were that! Plato's Republic, More's Utopia mere emblems of it. Carlyle.
Once thoroughly our own, knowledge ceases to give us pleasure. Ruskin.
Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, / In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side. Lowell.
Once true, still more twice true, in the life of 30 the spirit is always true. Ed.
Ond Gierning har Vidne i Barmen—There is a witness of the evil deed in one's own bosom. Dan. Pr.
Ondt bliver aldrig godt för halv værre kommer—Bad is never good till worse befall. Dan. Pr.
One abides not long on the summit of fortune. Pr.
One, although not possessed of a mine of gold, may find the offspring of his own nature, that noble ardour, which hath for its object the accomplishment of the whole assemblage of virtues. Hitopadesa.
One always has time enough if one will apply 35 it well. Goethe.
One and God make a majority. Fred. Douglas.
One anecdote is worth a volume of biography. Channing.
One barking dog sets all the street a-barking. Pr.
One beats the bush, and another catches the bird. Pr.
One Bible I know, of whose plenary inspiration 40 doubt is not so much as possible; nay, with my own eyes I saw the God's hand writing it; whereof all other Bibles are but leaves, say, in picture-writing, to assist the weaker faculty. Carlyle.
One born on the glebe comes by habit to belong to it; the two grow together, and the fairest ties are spun from the union. Goethe.
One can be very happy without demanding that others should agree with one. Goethe.
One can bear to be rebuked, but not to be laughed at. Molière.
One can live in true freedom, and yet not be unbound. Goethe.
One can live on little, but not on nothing. 45 Pr.
One can never know at the first moment what may, at a future time, separate itself from the rough experience as true substance. Goethe.
One cannot help doing a good office when it comes in one's way. Le Sage.
One cannot say that the rational is always beautiful; but the beautiful is always rational, or at least ought to be so. Goethe.
One cannot speak the truth with false words. Goethe.
One can't shoe a runaway horse. Dutch Pr. 50
One chick keeps a hen busy. Pr.
One cloud is enough to eclipse all the sun. Pr.
One could not commit a greater crime against public interests than to show indulgence to those who violate them. Richelieu.
One could not wish any man to fall into a fault; yet it is often precisely after a fault, or a crime even, that the morality which is in a man first unfolds itself, and what of strength he as a man possesses, now when all else is gone from him. Goethe.
One could take down a book from a shelf ten times more wise and witty than almost any man's conversation. Campbell.
One crime is everything; two, nothing. Mme. Deluzy.
One crow never pulls out another's eyes. 5 Pr.
One crowded hour of glorious life / Is worth an age without a name. Scott.
One does not love the heaven's lightning (seen in a great man) in the way of caresses altogether. Carlyle.
One dog can drive a flock of sheep. Pr.
One doth not know / How much an ill word may empoison liking. Much Ado, iii. 1.
One drop of hatred left in the cup of joy 10 turns the most blissful draught into poison. Schiller.
One enemy is too many, and a hundred friends too few. Pr.
One enemy may do us more harm than a hundred friends can do us good. Pr.
One eye of the master does more than both his hands. Pr.
One eye-witness is better than ten hearsays. Pr.
One false move may lose the game. Pr. 15
One feels clearly that it is a kindly spirit which actually constitutes the human element in man. Schiller.
One finds human nature everywhere great and little, beautiful and ugly.... Go on bravely working. Goethe.
One fire burns out another's burning; / One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish. Rom. and Jul., i. 1.
One fool makes many. Pr.
One futile person, that maketh it his glory to 20 tell, will do more hurt than many that know it their duty to conceal. Bacon.
One gets easier accustomed to a silken bed than to a sack of leaves. Auerbach.
One God, one law, one element, / And one far-off divine event, / To which the whole creation moves. Tennyson.
One good deed dying tongueless / Slaughters a thousand, waiting upon that. Winter's Tale, i. 2.
One good head is better than a hundred strong hands. Pr.
One good mother is worth a hundred schoolmasters. 25 Pr.
One good turn deserves another. Pr.
One good way I know of to find happiness is not by boring a hole to fit the plug. Billings.
One grain fills not a sack, but helps his fellows. Pr.
One hair of a woman draws more than a team of horses.
One half of the world knows not how the 30 other half lives. Rabelais.
One half of the world must sweat and groan that the other half may dream. Longfellow.
One half the world laughs at the other. Fr. and Ger. Pr.
One hand full of money is more persuasive than two full of truth. Dan. Pr.
One hand washes another. Pr.
One hard word brings on another. Pr. 35
One head cannot hold all wisdom. Pr.
One hour in the execution of justice is worth seventy years of prayer. Mahometan Pr.
One hour's sleep before midnight is worth two after. Pr.
One impulse from a vernal wood / May teach you more of man, / Of moral evil and of good, / Than all the sages can. Wordsworth.
One is always making good use of one's time 40 when engaged with a subject that daily forces one to make advances in self-culture. Goethe.
One is not a whit the happier when he attains what he has wished for. Goethe.
One is scarcely sensible of fatigue whilst he marches to music. Carlyle.
One jeer seldom goeth forth but it bringeth back its equal. Pr.
One keep-clean is better than ten make-cleans. Pr.
One learns taciturnity best among those people 45 who have none, and loquacity among the taciturn. Jean Paul.
One lie makes many. Pr.
One lie needs seven lies to wait upon it. Pr.
One life—a little gleam of time between two eternities. Carlyle.
One link broken, the whole chain is broken. Pr.
One loss brings another. Pr. 50
One man is born to money, and another to the purse. Dan. Pr.
One man makes a chair, and another man sits in it. Pr.
One man may lead a horse to the water, but twenty cannot make him drink. Pr.
One man may steal a horse more safely than another may look at him over a hedge. Pr.
One man receives crucifixion as the reward of 55 his villainy; another a regal crown. Juv.
One man that has a higher wisdom in him is not stronger than ten men, or than ten thousand, but than all men that have it not. Carlyle.
One man's eyes are spectacles to another to read his heart with. Johnson.
One man's justice is another man's injustice; one man's beauty, another's ugliness; one man's wisdom, another's folly; as one beholds the same objects from a higher point. Emerson.
One man's meat is another man's poison. Pr.
One man's opinion is no man's opinion. Pr. 60
One may forsake a person to save a family; one may desert a whole family for the sake of a village; and sacrifice a village for the safety of the community; but for one's self one may abandon the whole world. Hitopadesa.
One may give him a hundred instances from Holy Writ that he should not dispute; still, it is the character of a fool to make a disturbance without a cause. Hitopadesa.
One may make the house a palace of sham, or he can make it a home—a refuge. Mark Twain.
One may often find as much thought on the reverse of a medal as in a canto of Spenser. Addison.
One may see that with half an eye. Pr.
One may smile, and smile, and be a villain. 5 Ham., i. 5.
One may summon his philosophy when he is beaten in battle, not till then. John Burroughs.
One misfortune is the vigil of another. It. Pr.
One monster there is in this world: the idle man. Carlyle.
One mother is more venerable than a thousand fathers. Manu.
One murder made a villain; / Millions, a hero. 10 Bp. Porteous.
One must be careful in announcing great happiness. Schopenhauer.
One must be somebody in order to have an enemy. One must be a force before he can be resisted by another force. Mme. Swetchine.
One must be something in order to do something. Goethe.
One must believe in simplicity, in what is simple, in what is originally productive, if one wants to go the right way. This, however, is not granted to every one; we are born in an artificial state, and it is far easier to make it more artificial still than to return to what is simple. Goethe.
One must have lived greatly whose record 15 would bear the full light of day from its beginning to its close. A. B. Alcott.
One must not look a gift horse in the mouth. Pr.
One must not swerve in one's self, not even a hair's breadth from the highest maxims of art and life; but in empiricism, in the movement of the day, I would rather allow what is mediocre to pass than mistake the good, or even find fault with it. Goethe.
One must take a pleasure in the shell till one has the happiness to arrive at the kernel. Goethe.
One must weigh men by avoirdupois weight, and not by the jeweller's scales. Goethe.
One need only take a thing properly in hand 20 for it to be done. Goethe.
One need only utter something that flatters indolence and conceit to be sure of plenty of adherents among commonplace people. Goethe.
One never goes farther than when he does not know whither he is going. Goethe.
One never needs his wit so much as when he argues with a fool. Chinese Pr.
One of the best rules in conversation is, never say a thing which any of the company can reasonably wish we had left unsaid. Swift.
One of the chief misfortunes of honest people 25 is that they are cowardly. Voltaire.
One of the most fatal sources of the prevailing misery and crime lies in the generally accepted quiet assumption that because things have long been wrong, it is impossible they should ever be right. Ruskin.
One of the most singular gifts, or, if abused, most singular weaknesses, of the human mind, is its power of persuading itself to see whatever it chooses; a great gift if directed to the discernment of the things needful and pertinent to its own work and being; a great weakness if directed to the discovery of things profitless or discouraging. Ruskin.
One of the noblest qualities in our nature is that we are able so easily to dispense with greater perfection. Vauvenargues.
One of the old man's miseries is that he cannot easily find a companion able to partake with him of the past. Johnson.
One of the sublimest things in the world is 30 plain truth. Bulwer Lytton.
One of the worst diseases to which the human creature is liable is its disease of thinking. If it would only just look at a thing instead of thinking what it must be like, or do a thing instead of thinking it cannot be done, we should all get on far better. Ruskin.
One of these days is none of these days. Pr.
One on God's side is a majority. Wendell Phillips.
One ought not to praise a great man unless he is as great as he. Goethe.
One pair of heels is often worth two pair of 35 hands. (?)
One pirate gets nothing of another but his cask. Pr.
One ploughs, another sows; / Who will reap, no one knows. Pr.
One power rules another, but no power can cultivate another; in each endowment, and not elsewhere, lies the force that must complete it. Goethe.
One precedent creates another. They soon accumulate and constitute law. What yesterday was fact to-day is doctrine. Examples are supposed to justify the most dangerous measures; and where they do not suit exactly, the defect is supplied by analogy. Junius.
One rarely sees how deeply one is in debt till 40 one comes to settle one's accounts. Goethe.
One really gains nothing from such interests (as occupy the newspapers). Goethe.
One religion after another fades away; but the religious sense, which created them all, can never become dead to humanity. Jean Paul.
One says more, and with more heart, in an hour than is written in years. Goethe.
One science only can one genius fit, / So vast is art, so narrow human wit. Pope.
One scream of fear from a mother may resound 45 through the whole life of her daughter. Jean Paul.
One sheep follows another. Pr.
One should abandon that country wherein there is neither respect, nor employment, nor connections, nor the advancement of science. Hitopadesa.
One should never ask anybody if one means to write anything. Goethe.
One should never risk a joke, even of the mildest and most unexceptionable character, except among people of culture and wit. La Bruyère.
One should never think of death. One should think of life: that is real piety. Disraeli.
One should not lift the rod against our enemies upon the private information of another. Hitopadesa.
One should not neglect from time to time to renew friendly relations by personal intercourse. Goethe.
One shriek of hate would jar all the hymns of heaven: / True Devils with no ear, they howl in tune / With nothing but the Devil! Tennyson.
One sickly sheep infects the flock. Pr. 5
One sin opens the door to another. Pr.
One single moment is decisive both of man's life and his whole future. However he may reflect, each resolution he forms is but the work of a moment; the prudent alone seize the right one. Goethe.
One sinner destroyeth much good. Bible.
One solitary philosopher may be great, virtuous, and happy in the depth of poverty, but not a whole people. L. Iselin.
One soul may have a decided influence upon 10 another merely by means of its silent presence. Goethe.
One soweth and another reapeth. Heb. Pr.
One step above the sublime makes the ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous makes the sublime again. Paine.
One stumble is enough to deface the character of an honourable life. L'Estrange.
One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine. Young.
One swallow does not make a summer. Pr. 15
One sword keeps another in the scabbard. Pr.
One "Take this" is better than two "I will give you." Sp. Pr.
"One thing above all others," says Goethe, "I have never thought about thinking." What a thrift of thinking faculty there; thrift almost of itself equal to a fortune in these days. Carlyle.
One thing at a time, all things in succession. That which grows fast withers as rapidly; that which grows slowly endures. J. G. Holland.
One thing is needful. Jesus. 20
One thing there is which no child brings into the world with him; and yet it is on this one thing that all depends for making man in every point a man;—and that is Reverence (Ehrfurcht). Goethe.
One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning. Lowell.
One thought includes all thought, in the sense that a grain of sand includes the universe. Coleridge.
One tires of a page of which every sentence sparkles with points, of a sentimentalist who is always pumping the tears from his eyes or your own. Thackeray.
One to another cannot be a perfect physician. 25 George Herbert.
One to-day is worth two to-morrows. Ben. Franklin.
One tongue is sufficient for a woman. Milton, in reference to foreign languages.
One touch of Nature makes the whole world kin. Troil. and Cress., iii. 3.
One 'ud think, an' hear some folk talk, as the men war cute enough to count the corns in a bag o' wheat wi' only smelling at it. George Eliot.
One who, either in conversation or in letters, 30 affects to shine and to sparkle always, will not please long. Blair.
One who has nothing to admire, nothing to love, except his own poor self, may be reckoned a completed character; (but) he is in the minimum state of moral perfection—no more can be made of him. Carlyle.
One who is master of ever so little art may be able, on a great occasion, to root up trees with as much ease as the current of a river the reeds and grass. Hitopadesa.
One who is out of his own country is defeated by a very trifling enemy. Hitopadesa.
One woe doth tread upon another's heel, / So fast they follow. Ham., iv. 7.
One word with two meanings is the traitor's 35 shield and shaft. Caucasian Pr.
One wrong step may give you a great fall. Pr.
One's morning indolence is soon gone when one has once persuaded one's self to put a foot out of bed. Goethe.
One's piety is best displayed in his pursuits. A. B. Alcott.
One's too few, three's too many. Pr.
Oneness and otherness. It is impossible to 40 speak or think without embracing both. Emerson.
Only a Christ could have conceived a Christ. Joseph Parker.
Only a great pride, that is, a great and reverential repose in one's own being, renders possible a noble humility. D. A. Wasson.
Only a sweet and virtuous soul, / Like seasoned timber, never gives: / But when the whole world turns to coal, / Then chiefly lives. George Herbert.
Only action gives life strength; only moderation gives it a charm. Jean Paul.
Only an artist can interpret the meaning of 45 life. Novalis.
Only an inventor knows how to borrow, and every man is, or should be, an inventor. Emerson.
Only by joy and sorrow does a man know anything about himself and his destiny, learn what he ought to seek and what to shun. Goethe.
Only by pride cometh contention; but with the well-advised is wisdom. Bible.
Only great men have any business with great defects. La Roche.
Only great souls know the grandeur there is 50 in charity. Bossuet.
Only he can be trusted with gifts who can present a face of bronze to expectations. Thoreau.
Only he deserves freedom who has day by day to fight for it. Goethe.
Only he helps who unites with many at the proper hour; a single individual helps not. Goethe.
Only I discern / Infinite passion, and the pain / Of finite hearts that yearn. Browning.
Only in complicated critical cases do men find 55 out what is within them. Goethe.
Only in looking heavenward, take it in what sense you may, not in looking earthward, does what we call union, mutual love, society, begin to be possible. Carlyle.
Only in the world I fill up a place, which may be better supplied when I have made it empty. As You Like It, i. 2.
Only learn to catch happiness, for happiness is ever by you. Goethe.
Only lofty character is worth describing at all. Ruskin.
Only people who possess firmness can possess 5 true gentleness. La Roche.
Only regard for law can give us freedom. Goethe.
Only so far as a man is happily married to himself is he fit for married life and family life generally. Novalis.
Only such persons interest us, Spartans, Romans, Saracens, English, Americans, who have stood in the jaws of need, and have by their own wit and might extricated themselves, and made man victorious. Emerson.
Only suffering draws / The inner heart of song, and can elicit / The perfumes of the soul. Lewis Morris.
Only that good profits which we can taste with 10 all doors open, and which serves all men. Emerson.
Only that is poetry which purifies and mans me. Emerson.
Only the actions of the just / Smell sweet and blossom in the dust. Shirley.
Only the idle among the poor revolt against their state; the brave workers die passively, and give no sign. Ruskin.
Only the man of worth can recognise worth in men. Carlyle.
Only the person should give advice in a 15 matter where he himself will co-operate. Goethe.
Only the word of God and the heart of man can govern. Ruskin.
Only they who have hope live. Halm.
Only those books come down which deserve to last. Emerson.
Only those live who do good. Tolstoi.
Only those who love with the heart can animate 20 the love of others. Abel Stephens.
Only to the apt, the pure, and the true does Nature resign herself and reveal her secrets. Goethe.
Only truth can be polished. Ruskin.
Only what of the past was true will come back to us; that is the one asbestos that survives all fire. Carlyle.
Only when man weeps he should be alone, not because tears are weak, but they should be secret. Bulwer Lytton.
Onus probandi—The burden of proving. 25
Onus segni impone asello—Lay the burden on the lazy ass. Pr.
Open not your door when the devil knocks. Pr.
Open rebuke is better than secret love. Pr.
Opera illius mea sunt—His works are mine. M.
Operæ pretium est—'Tis worth while; worth 30 attending to.
Opere in longo fas est obrepere somnum—In a long work sleep must steal upon us. Hor.
Operosa parvus carmina fingo—I, a little one, compose laborious songs. Hor.
Operose nihil agunt—They toil at doing nothing. Sen.
Opes regum, corda subditorum—The wealth of kings is in the affections of their subjects. M.
[Greek: opse theôn aleousi myloi, aleousi de lepta]—The 35 mills of the gods grind slow, but they grind small.
Opiferque per orbem dicor—I am known over the world as the helper. M.
Opinion is a medium between knowledge and ignorance. Plato.
Opinion is, as it were, the queen of the world, but force is its tyrant. Pascal.
Opinion is the main thing which does good or harm in the world. It is our false opinions that ruin us. Marcus Antoninus.
Opinion is the mistress of fools. Pr. 40
Opinion rules the world. Carlyle.
Opinions concerning acts are not history; acts themselves alone are history. Wm. Blake.
Opinions, like showers, are generated in high places, but they invariably descend into lower ones. Colton.
Opinionum enim commenta delet dies, naturæ judicia confirmat—Time effaces the fabrications of opinion, but confirms the judgments of Nature. Cic.
Opportunities, like eggs, come one at a time. 45 Amer. Pr.
Opportunities neglected are irrecoverable. Pr.
Opportunity has hair in front, but is bald behind; if you meet her, seize her by the forelock, for Jove himself cannot catch her again if once let slip. Rabelais.
Opportunity is more powerful even than conquerors and prophets. Disraeli.
Opportunity makes desire. Dut. Pr.
Opportunity makes us known to others, but 50 more to ourselves. La Roche.
Oppose not rage while rage is in its force, but give it way awhile and let it waste. Shakespeare.
Opposition always enflames the enthusiast, never converts him. Schiller.
Oppress'd with grief, oppress'd with care, / A burden more than I can bear, / I sit me down and sigh; / O Life, thou art a galling load, / Along a rough and weary road, / To wretches such as I. Burns.
Oppression is more easily borne than insult. Junius.
Opprobrium medicorum—The disgrace of physicians. 55 Said of diseases that defy their skill, especially cancer.
Optat ephippia bos piger; optat arare caballus—The lazy ox covets the horse's trappings; the horse would fain plough. Hor.
Optics sharp it needs, I ween, / To see what is not to be seen. J. Trumbull.
Optima quæque dies miseris mortalibus ævi / Prima fugit; subeunt morbi tristisque senectus, / Et labor; et duræ rapit inclementia mortis—For wretched mortals each best day of life flies first; diseases soon steal on, and sad old age, and decay; and the cruelty of inexorable death snatches us away. Virg.
Optimi consiliarii mortui—The best counsellors are the dead. Pr.
Optimum obsonium labor—Labour is the best sauce. Pr.
Opum furiata cupido—The frantic passion for wealth. Ovid.
Ora et labora—Pray and work. M.
Oracles speak. Emerson.
Oral delivery aims at persuasion, at making 5 the listener believe he is convinced. Few persons are capable of being convinced; the majority allow themselves to be persuaded. Goethe.
Orando laborando—By prayer and labour. M.
Orandum est ut sit mens sana in corpore sano—We should pray for a sound mind in a sound body. Juv.
Orate pro anima—Pray for the soul of.
Orationis summa virtus est perspicuitas—The greatest virtue of speech is perspicuity. Quinct.
Orator improbus leges subvertit—An evil-disposed 10 orator subverts the laws.
Oratory is a warrior's eye flashing from under a philosopher's brow. Hare.
Oratory, like a drama, abhors lengthiness; like the drama, it must be kept doing. Bulwer Lytton.
Order all thy actions, so as readily and meekly to comply with the commands of thy superiors, the desires of thy equals, the requests of thy inferiors; so to do for all what thou lawfully mayest. Thomas à Kempis.
Order and quiet are good things when they can be had without the sacrifice of things that are better. Ward Beecher.
Order is a great man's need, and his true well-being. 15 Amiel.
Order is heaven's first law. Pope.
Order is power. Amiel.
Order is the sanity of the mind, the health of the body, the peace of the city, the security of the state. As the beams to a house, as the bones to the microcosm of man, so is order to all things. Southey.
Order is truth, each thing standing on the basis that belongs to it. Carlyle.
Order, thou eye of action. Aaron Hill. 20
Ordinary people think merely of spending time; a man with any brains, of using it. Schopenhauer.
Ore e sempre—Now and always. It.
Ore tenus—Merely from the mouth; oral.
Organic laws can only be serviceable to, and, in general, will only be written by, a public of honourable citizens, loyal to their state and faithful to each other. Ruskin.
[Greek: orgê philountôn oligon ischyei chronon]—The 25 anger of lovers does not last long. Menander.
Originality is a thing we constantly clamour for and constantly quarrel with, as if any, observes Jean Paul, but our own could be expected to content us. Carlyle.
Originality is simply a fresh pair of eyes. T. W. Higginson.
Originality is the one thing which unoriginal minds cannot feel the use of. J. S. Mill.
Originality provokes originality. Goethe.
Ornament is but the guilèd shore / To a most 30 dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf / Veiling an Indian beauty; in a word, / The seeming truth which cunning times put on / To entrap the wisest. Mer. of Ven., iii. 2.
Ornaments were invented by modesty. Joubert.
Oro è che oro vale—What is worth gold is gold. It. Pr.
Orthodoxy is my doxy; heterodoxy another man's doxy. Warburton.
Orthodoxy is the Bourbon of the world of thought; it learns not, neither can it forget. Huxley.
Os, orare, vale, communio, mensa negatur—Speech, 35 prayer, greeting, intercourse, and food are forbidden. The sentence of excommunication.
Ostentation is the signal flag of hypocrisy. Chapin.
Otez un vilain du gibet, il vous y mettra—Save a thief from the gallows, and he will cut your throat. Fr. Pr.
Othello's occupation's gone! Othello, iii. 3.
Other exercises develop single powers and muscles, but dancing, like a corporeal poesy, embellishes, exercises, and equalises all the muscles at once. Jean Paul.
Other heights in other lives, God willing. 40 Browning.
Other men are lenses through which we read our own minds. Emerson.
Other men laboured, and ye are entered into their labours. Jesus.
Others apart sat on a hill retired, / In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high / Of Providence, fore-knowledge, will, and fate, / Fix'd fate, free-will, fore-knowledge absolute; / And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost. Milton.
Others, more aspiring than achieving, / Achieve all in suggestion, ... / More helpful by their infinite reaching forth / Than all completed thinking. Dr. Walter Smith.
Otia si tollas, periere Cupidinis arcus—Remove 45 the temptations of idleness, and Cupid's bow is useless. Ovid.
Otiosis nullus adsistit Deus—No deity assists the idle. Pr.
Otium cum dignitate—Leisure with dignity.
Otium sine literis mors est, et hominis vivi sepultura—Leisure without literature is death and burial alive. Sen.
[Greek: ou chrê pannychion heudein boulêphoron andra]—It will not do for a counsellor to sleep all night. Hom.
[Greek: Ou legein deinos, alla sigan adynatos]—Not 50 formidable as a speaker, but unable to hold his tongue. Gr. (?)
Où peut-on être mieux qu'au sein de sa famille?—Where can a man be better than in the bosom of his family? Marmontel Grétry.
Où sont les neiges d'antan?—Where is the snow of last year? F. Villons.
[Greek: ou toi synechthein alla symphilein ephyn]—I am here not for mutual hatred, but for mutual affection. Soph.
Oublier d'éclairer sa lanterne—To express one's self obscurely (lit. to forget to light one's lantern). Fr.
Oublier ne puis—I can never forget. M. 55
[Greek: ouden ginetai ek tou mê ontos]—Nothing comes to be out of what is not. Epicurus.
[Greek: ouden rhêma syn kerdei kakon]—No word that is profitable is bad. Soph.
Oui et Non sont bien courts à dire, mais avant que de les dire, il y faut penser long-temps—"Yes" and "no" are very short words to say, but we should think for some length of time before saying them.
[Greek: ouk agathon polykoiraniê; heis koiranos estô, / Heis basileus]—That there should be a multitude of rulers is not good; let one be lord, one be king. Hom.
[Greek: ouk aischron ouden tôn anankaiôn brotois]—What is natural is never shameful. Eurip.
[Greek: ouk estin meizôn basanos chronou oudenos ergou, / hos kai hypo sternois andros edeixe noon]—There is no better test of a man's work than time, which also reveals the thought which lay hidden in his breast. Simonides.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill, / Our 5 fatal shadows that walk by us still. Fletcher.
Our admiration of the antique is not admiration of the old, but of the natural. Emerson.
Our affections are but tents of a night. Emerson.
Our affections, as well as our bodies, are in perpetual flux. Rousseau.
Our age is really up to nothing better than sweeping out the gutters—a scavenger age. Might it but do that well! It is the indispensable beginning of all. Carlyle.
Our age knows nothing but reactions, and 10 leaps from one extreme to another. Niebuhr.
Our ambiguous dissipating education awakens wishes when it should be animating tendencies; instead of forwarding our real capacities, it turns our efforts towards objects which are frequently discordant with the mind that aims at them. Goethe.
Our ancestors are very good kind o' folks; but they are the last people I should choose to have a visiting acquaintance with. Sheridan.
Our attachment to every object around us increases, in general, from the length of our acquaintance with it. Goldsmith.
Our best history is still poetry. Emerson.
Our best resolutions are frail when opposed 15 to our predominant inclinations. Scott.
Our best thoughts come from others. Emerson.
Our better mind / Is as a Sunday's garment, then put on / When we have nought to do; but at our work / We wear a worse for thrift. Crowe.
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting. Wordsworth.
Our books are false by being fragmentary; the sentences are "bon mots," and not parts of natural discourse; childish expressions of surprise or pleasure in nature—or worse. Emerson.
Our bounty, like a drop of water, disappears 20 when diffused too widely. Goldsmith.
Our brains are seventy-year clocks. The angel of life winds them up once for all, then closes the case, and gives the key into the hands of the angel of the resurrection. Holmes.
Our charity indeed should be universal, and extend to all mankind; but it is by no means convenient that our friendships and familiarities should do so too. Thomas à Kempis.
Our chief comforts often produce our greatest anxieties, and an increase of our possessions is but an inlet to new disquietudes. Goldsmith.
Our chief experiences have been casual. Emerson.
Our chief want in life is somebody who shall 25 make us do what we can. Emerson.
Our clock strikes when there is a change from hour to hour; but no hammer in the Horologe of Time peals through the universe when there is a change from era to era. Carlyle.
Our compell'd sins / Stand more for number than accompt. Meas. for Meas., ii. 4.
Our complaint is the largest tribute heaven receives, and the sincerest part of our devotion. Swift.
Our content / Is our best having. Hen. VIII., ii. 3.
Our corn's to reap, for yet our tilth's to sow. 30 Meas. for Meas., iv. 1.
Our country is wherever we are well off. Milton.
Our dead are never dead to us until we have forgotten them. George Eliot.
Our decrees / Dead to infliction, to themselves are dead; / And liberty plucks justice by the nose, / The baby beats the nurse, and quite athwart / Goes all decorum. Meas. for Meas., i. 4.
Our deeds are fetters that we forge ourselves. George Eliot.
Our deeds are like children born to us; they 35 live and act apart from our own will. Children may be strangled, but deeds never. George Eliot.
Our deeds determine us as much as we determine our deeds. George Eliot.
Our delight in reason degenerates into idolatry of the herald. Emerson.
Our dissatisfaction with any other solution is the blazing evidence of immortality. Emerson.
Our domestic service is usually a foolish fracas of unreasonable demand on the one side and striking on the other. Emerson.
Our doubts are traitors, / And make us lose the 40 good we oft might win / By fearing to attempt. Meas. for Meas., i. 5.
Our dreams drench us in sense, and sense steeps us again in dreams. A. B. Alcott.
Our echoes roll from soul to soul, / And grow for ever and for ever. Tennyson.
Our energies are actually cramped by over-anxiety for success, and by straining our mental faculties beyond due bounds. Montaigne.
Our esteem of great powers, or amiable qualities newly discovered, may embroider a day or a week, but a friendship of twenty years is interwoven with the texture of life. Johnson.
Our expense is almost all for conformity. Emerson. 45
Our experiences of life sway and bow us either with joy or sorrow. They plant everything about us with heart-seeds. Thus a house becomes sacred. Every room has a thousand memories. Ward Beecher.
Our eyes see all around in gloom or glow—/ Hues of their own, fresh borrowed from the heart. Keble.
Our fear commonly meets us at the door by which we think to run from it. Pr.
Our feelings are always purest and most glowing in the hour of meeting and of farewell; like the glaciers, which are transparent and rosy-hued only at sunrise and sunset. Jean Paul.
Our first ideas of life are generally taken from fiction rather than fact. Schopenhauer.
Our flatterers are our worst enemies. Pr.
Our friends see not our faults, or conceal them, or soften them. Addison.
Our God is a household God, as well as a 5 heavenly one. He has an altar in every man's dwelling; let men look to it when they rend it lightly, and pour out its ashes. Ruskin.
Our grand business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand. Carlyle.
Our greatest, being also by nature our quietest, are perhaps those that remain unknown. Carlyle.
Our greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall. Goldsmith.
Our greatest misfortunes come to us from ourselves. Rousseau.
Our hand we open of our own free will, and the 10 good flies which we can never recall. Goethe.
Our hap is lost, our hope but sad despair. 3 Hen., ii. 3.
Our happiness in this world depends on the affections we are able to inspire. Duchess de Praslin.
Our happiness should not be laid on a too broad foundation. Schopenhauer.
Our hearts, frequently warmed by the contact of those whom we wish to resemble, will undoubtedly catch something of their way of thinking; and we shall receive in our own bosoms some radiation at least of their fire and splendour. Joshua Reynolds.
Our heavenward progress is something like 15 that of the Jerusalem pilgrims of old, who for three steps forward took one backward. Jean Paul.
Our high respect for a well-read man is praise enough of literature. Emerson.
Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great. Tennyson.
Our hopes are but our memories reversed. (?)
Our human laws are but the copies, more or less imperfect, of the eternal laws so far as we can read them. Froude.
Our humanity were a poor thing but for the 20 divinity that stirs within us. Bacon.
Our ideals are our better selves. A. B. Alcott.
Our ideas, like pictures, are made out of lights and shadows. Joubert.
Our life contains a thousand springs, / And dies if one be gone; / Strange that a harp of thousand strings / Should keep in tune so long. Watts.
Our life is compassed round with necessity; yet is the meaning of life itself no other than freedom, than voluntary force. Carlyle.
Our life is no dream, but it may and will perhaps 25 become one. Novalis.
Our life is not a mutual helpfulness; but rather, cloaked under due laws of war, named "fair competition," and so forth, it is a mutual hostility. Carlyle.
Our life might be much easier and simpler than we make it. Emerson.
Our life should feed the springs of fame / With a perennial wave, / As ocean feeds the bubbling founts / Which find in it their grave. Thoreau.
Our Lord God commonly gives riches to foolish people, to whom He gives nothing else. Luther.
Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, 30 not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time. Luther.
Our love is inwrought in our enthusiasm, as electricity is inwrought in the air, exalting its power by a subtle presence. George Eliot.
Our love of truth is evinced by our ability to discover and appropriate what is good wherever we come upon it. Goethe.
Our memories are independent of our wills. Sheridan.
Our minds cannot be empty; and evil will break in upon them if they are not pre-occupied by good. Johnson.
Our minds should be habituated to the contemplation 35 of excellence. Joshua Reynolds.
Our moral impressions invariably prove strongest in those moments when we are most driven back upon ourselves. Goethe.
Our most exalted feelings are not meant to be the common food of daily life. Contentment is more satisfying than exhilaration; and contentment means simply the sum of small and quiet pleasures. Ward Beecher.
Our narrow ken / Reaches too far, when all that we behold / Is but the havoc of wide-wasting Time, / Or what he soon shall spoil. Crowe.