57 Quotes by William Gilmore Simms

The birth of a child is the imprisonment of a soul. The soul must work its way out of prison, and, in doing so, provide itself with wings for a future journey. It is for each of us to determine whether our wings shall be those of an angel or a grub!

Better that we should err in action than wholly refuse to perform. The storm is so much better than the calm, as it declares the presence of a living principle. Stagnation is something worse than death. It is corruption also.

The wonder is not that the world is so easily governed, but that so small a number of persons will suffice for the purpose. There are dead weights in political and legislative bodies as in clocks, and hundreds answer as pulleys who would never do for politicians.

The effect of character is always to command consideration. We sport and toy and laugh with men or women who have none, but we never confide in them.

The only rational liberty is that which is born of subjection, reared in the fear of God and the love of man.

The only true source of politeness is consideration,--that vigilant moral sense which never loses sight of the rights, the claims, and the sensibilities of others. This is the one quality, over all others, necessary to make a gentleman.

It should console us for the fact that sin has not totally disappeared from the world, that the saints are not wholly deprived of employment.

Our true acquisitions lie only in our charities – we gain only as we give.

Neither praise nor blame is the object of true criticism. Justly to discriminate, firmly to establish, wisely to prescribe and honestly to award – these are the true aims and duties of criticism.