Unbounded courage and compassion join'd, Tempering each other in the victor's mind, Alternately proclaim him good and great, And make the hero and the man complete.
Joseph AddisonRead
Good nature will always supply the absence of beauty; but beauty cannot supply the absence of good nature.
Interpretation
Good nature is more valuable than physical beauty, as it contributes positively to relationships and interactions.
This quote by Joseph Addison emphasizes the importance of good nature or character over mere physical beauty. While a person with a kind and pleasant disposition can compensate for a lack of traditional beauty, the reverse is not true; beauty alone cannot replace the value of a good nature. In essence, it suggests that true attractiveness stems from one's inner qualities rather than outer appearances.
In practice
Using this quote to remind friends that kindness is more important than looks.
Unbounded courage and compassion join'd, Tempering each other in the victor's mind, Alternately proclaim him good and great, And make the hero and the man complete.
Good nature is more agreeable in conversation than wit and gives a certain air to the countenance which is more amiable than beauty.
Ridicule is generally made use of to laugh men out of virtue and good sense, by attacking everything praiseworthy in human life.
Admiration is a very short lived passion that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object, unless it still be fed with fresh discoveries, and kept alive by a new perpetual succession of miracles rising up to its view.
It is impossible for us, who live in the latter ages of the world, to make observations in criticism, morality, or in any art or science, which have not been touched upon by others. We have little else left us but to represent the common sense of mankind in more strong, more beautiful, or more uncommon lights.
An ostentatious man will rather relate a blunder or an absurdity he has committed, than be debarred from talking of his own dear person.
The truth is, our civilization is not Christian; it is a tragic compound of great ideal and fearful practice, of loving charity and fearful clutching of possessions.
How wonderful is the human voice! It is indeed the organ of the soul. The intellect of man is enthroned visibly on his forehead and in his eye, and the heart of man is written on his countenance, but the soul, the soul reveals itself in the voice only.
I am one of billions. I am stardust gathered fleetingly into form. I will be ungathered. The stardust will go on to be other things someday and I will be free.
I shall gather myself into my self again, _x000D_ I shall take my scattered selves and make them one.
Not only around our infancy Doth heaven with all its splendors lie; Daily, with souls that cringe and plot, We Sinais climb and know it not.
It may be in the cultural particularities of people β in their oddities β that some of the most instructive revelations of what it is to be generically human are to be found.
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