Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington Quotes

Tears may be dried up, but the heart - never.

Genius is the gold in the mine, talent is the miner who works and brings it out.

Borrowed thoughts, like borrowed money, only show the poverty of the borrower.

Prejudices are the chains forged by ignorance to keep men apart.

[His mind] was like a volcano, full of fire and wealth, sometimes calm, often dazzling and playful, but ever threatening. It ran swift as the lightning from one subject to another, and occasionally burst forth in passionate throes of intellect, nearly allied to madness.

Happiness consists not in having much, but in being content with little.

We never respect those who amuse us, however we may smile at their comic powers

Our weaknesses are the indigenous produce of our characters; but our strength is the forced fruit.

There is no cosmetic like happiness

There are no persons capable of stooping so low as those who desire to rise in the world.

Satire, like conscience, reminds us of what we often wish to forget.

Talent, like beauty, to be pardoned, must be obscure and unostentatious.

Religion converts despair, which destroys, into resignation, which submits.

The chief prerequisite for a escort is to have a flexible conscience and an inflexible politeness.

We have a reading, a talking, and a writing public. When shall we have a thinking?

Wit is the lightning of the mind, reason the sunshine, and reflection the moonlight.

Memory seldom fails when its office is to show us the tombs of our buried hopes.

People are always willing to follow advice when it accords with their own wishes.

I see little alteration at Lyons since I formerly passed through it. Its manufactories are, nevertheless, flourishing, though less improvement than could be expected is visible in the external aspect of the place.

In France, a woman may forget that she is neither young nor handsome; for the absence of these claims to attention does not expose her to be neglected by the male sex.

When we bring back with us the objects most dear, and find those we left unchanged, we are tempted to doubt the lapse of time; but one link in the chain of affection broken, and every thing seems altered.

The vices of the rich and great are mistaken for error; and those of the poor and lowly, for crimes.

A mother's love! O holy, boundless thing! Fountain whose waters never cease to spring!

Men are capable of making great sacrifices, who are not willing to make the lesser ones, on which so much of the happiness of life depends. The great sacrifices are seldom called for, but the minor ones are in daily requisition; and the making them with cheerfulness and grace enhances their value.

Superstition is only the fear of belief, while religion is the confidence.

Love in France is a comedy; in England a tragedy; in Italy an opera seria; and in Germany a melodrama.

Those who are formed to win general admiration are seldom calculated to bestow individual happiness.

Love matches are made by people who are content, for a month of honey, to condemn themselves to a life of vinegar.

... I never will allow myself to form an ideal of any person I desire to see, for disappointment never fails to ensue.

Bores: People who talk of themselves, when you are thinking only of yourself.

Calumny is the offspring of Envy.

There are some chagrins of the heart which a friend ought to try to console without betraying a knowledge of their existence, as there are physical maladies which a physician ought to seek to heal without letting the sufferer know that he has discovered their extent.

Imagination, which is the Eldorado of the poet and of the novel-writer, often proves the most pernicious gift to the individuals who compose the talkers instead of the writers in society.

Conversation is the legs on which thought walks; and writing, the wings by which it flies.

Society punishes not the vices of its members, but their detection.

Praise is the only gift for which people are really grateful.

When the sun shines on you, you see your friends. It requires sunshine to be seen by them to advantage!

Mediocrity is beneath a brave soul.

Here Fashion is a despot, and no one dreams of evading its dictates.

Many minds that have withstood the most severe trials have been broken down by a succession of ignoble cares.

A beautiful woman without fixed principles may be likened to those fair but rootless flowers which float in streams, driven by every breeze.

A poor man defended himself when charged with stealing food to appease the cravings of hunger, saying, the cries of the stomach silenced those of the conscience.

To amend mankind, moralists should show them man, not as he is, but as he ought to be.

Pleasure is like a cordial - a little of it is not injurious, but too much destroys.

You were wise not to waste years in a lawsuit ... he who commences a suit resembles him who plants a palm-tree which he will not live to see flourish.

The infirmities of genius are often mistaken for its privileges.

Despotism subjects a nation to one tyrant; democracy, to many.

Life would be as insupportable without the prospect of death, as it would be without sleep.

It is a sad thing to look at happiness only through another's eyes.

Mountains appear more lofty the nearer they are approached, but great men resemble them not in this particular.