Top Joseph Addison Quotes
Joseph Addison was a British poet, essayist, playwright as well as politician. He has written some well known plays like a Tragedy and Cato. Here are some of the famous quotes by Joseph Addison.
- “Reading is a basic tool in the living of a good life.” - Joseph Addison
- “Sunday clears away the rust of the whole week.” - Joseph Addison
- “Talking with a friend is nothing else but thinking aloud.” - Joseph Addison
- “Music, the greatest good that mortals know, and all of heaven we have below.” - Joseph Addison
- “Admiration is a very short-lived passion, that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object.” - Joseph Addison
- “Cheerfulness is the best promoter of health, and is as friendly to the mind as to the body.” - Joseph Addison
- “Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.” - Joseph Addison
- “I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable.” - Joseph Addison
- “To be an atheist requires an infinitely greater measure of faith than to receive all the great truths which atheism would deny” - Joseph Addison
- “Better to die ten thousand deaths than wound my honor.” - Joseph Addison
- “All well-regulated families set apart an hour every morning for tea and bread and butter” - Joseph Addison
- “Cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, filling it with a steady and perpetual serenity” - Joseph Addison
- “Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body.” - Joseph Addison
- “Our real blessings often appear to us in the shape of pains, losses and disappointments; but let us have patience and we soon shall see them in their proper figures.” - Joseph Addison
- “If you wish to succeed in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother, and hope your guardian genius.” - Joseph Addison
- “No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority.” - Joseph Addison
- “A true critic ought to dwell upon excellencies rather than imperfections, to discover the concealed beauties of a writer, and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observation.” - Joseph Addison
- “Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind, which are delivered down from generation to generation as presents to the posterity of those who are yet unborn.” - Joseph Addison
- “Mysterious love, uncertain treasure, hast thou more of pain or pleasure! Endless torments dwell about thee: Yet who would live, and live without thee!” - Joseph Addison
- “All well-regulated families set apart an hour every morning for tea and bread and butter” - Joseph Addison
- “The fear of death often proves mortal, and sets people on methods to save their Lives, which infallibly destroy them.” - Joseph Addison
- “When men are easy in their circumstances, they are naturally enemies to innovations.” - Joseph Addison
- “Everything that is new or uncommon raises a pleasure in the imagination, because it fills the soul with an agreeable surprise, gratifies its curiosity, and gives it an idea of which it was not before possessed.” - Joseph Addison
- “Jealousy is that pain which a man feels from the apprehension that he is not equally beloved by the person whom he entirely loves” - Joseph Addison
- “To be exempt from the passions with which others are tormented, is the only pleasing solitude” - Joseph Addison
- “Certain is it that there is no kind of affection so purely angelic as of a father to a daughter. In love to our wives there is desire; to our sons, ambition; but to our daughters there is something which there are no words to express.” - Joseph Addison
- “True happiness arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one’s self, and in the next, from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions.” - Joseph Addison
- “Admiration is a very short-lived passion that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object, unless it be still fed with fresh discoveries, and kept alive by a perpetual succession of miracles rising into view.” - Joseph Addison
- “Men may change their climate, but they cannot change their nature. A man that goes out a fool cannot ride or sail himself into common sense.” - Joseph Addison
- “What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but scattered along life’s pathway, the good they do is inconceivable.” - Joseph Addison
- “Good nature is more agreeable in conversation than wit, and gives a certain air to the countenance which is more amiable than beauty” - Joseph Addison
- “Justice is an unassailable fortress, built on the brow of a mountain which cannot be overthrown by the violence of torrents, nor demolished by the force of armies.” - Joseph Addison
- “A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world.” - Joseph Addison
- “One should take good care not to grow too wise for so great a pleasure of life as laughter.” - Joseph Addison
- “Modesty is not only an ornament, but also a guard to virtue” - Joseph Addison
- “Of all the diversions of life, there is none so proper to fill up its empty spaces as the reading of useful and entertaining authors.” - Joseph Addison
- “The friendships of the world are oft confederacies in vice, or leagues of pleasures” - Joseph Addison
- “Prejudice and self-sufficiency naturally proceed from inexperience of the world, and ignorance of mankind.” - Joseph Addison
- “Mirth is like a flash of lightning, that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity.” - Joseph Addison
- “The important question is not, what will yield to man a few scattered pleasures, but what will render his life happy on the whole amount.” - Joseph Addison
- “A man must be both stupid and uncharitable who believes there is no virtue or truth but on his own side.” - Joseph Addison
- “No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority.” - Joseph Addison
- “The greatest sweetener of human life is friendship. To raise this to the highest pitch of enjoyment, is a secret which but few discover.” - Joseph Addison
- “Mere bashfulness without merit is awkwardness.” - Joseph Addison
- “A good conscience is to the soul what health is to the body; it preserves constant ease and serenity within us; and more than countervails all the calamities and afflictions which can befall us from without.” - Joseph Addison
- “Nothing is capable of being well set to music that is not nonsense.” - Joseph Addison
- “What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul.” - Joseph Addison
- “Nothing is more amiable than true modesty, and nothing more contemptible than the false” - Joseph Addison
- “The most violent appetites in all creatures are lust and hunger; the first is a perpetual call upon them to propagate their kind, the latter to preserve themselves.” - Joseph Addison
Exceeding were some of the best quotes by Joseph Addison, if you have more of his quotes do feel free to share through your comments.
