Joseph Addison (1672–1719) politician, writer and playwright
No. 231 (24 November 1711).
The Spectator (1711–1714)
“For what is modesty but hypocritical humility, by means of which, in a world swelling with vile envy, a man seeks to beg pardon for his excellences and merits from those who have none? For whoever attributes no merit to himself because he really has none is not modest, but merely honest.”
Vol. I, Ch. III, The World As Representation: Second Aspect
The World as Will and Representation (1819; 1844; 1859)
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Arthur Schopenhauer261
German philosopher 1788–1860Related quotes
“An excellent man: he has no enemies, and none of his friends like him.”
Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet
Quoted by George Bernard Shaw in a letter to Ellen Terry, 25 September 1896.
Context: On George Bernard Shaw An excellent man: he has no enemies, and none of his friends like him.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English poet, literary critic and philosopher
"The Great Good Man" (1802).
Context: How seldom, friend! a good great man inherits
Honor or wealth, with all his worth and pains!
It sounds like stories from the land of spirits
If any man obtain that which he merits,
Or any merit that which he obtains.
.........
Greatness and goodness are not means, but ends!
Hath he not always treasures, always friends,
The good great man? Three treasures,—love and light,
And calm thoughts, regular as infants' breath;
And three firm friends, more sure than day and night,—
Himself, his Maker, and the angel Death.
“Thy modesty's a candle to thy merit.”
Henry Fielding (1707–1754) English novelist and dramatist
Act I, sc. iii
Tom Thumb the Great (1730)
“On their own merits modest men are dumb.”
George Colman the Younger (1762–1836) English dramatist and writer
Epilogue to the Heir at Law, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).
“No man is born unto himself alone;
Who lives unto himself, he lives to none.”
Francis Quarles (1592–1644) English poet
Esther (1621), Sec. 1, Meditation 1.
“The man who knows his limitations, has none.”
David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest
Source: Infinite Jest
Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574) Italian painter, architect, writer and historian
Source: Lives of the Most Eminent Painters, Sculptors and Architects, 1852, p. 402.
“He makes his cook his merit,
And the world visits his dinners and not him.”
Que de son cuisinier il s'est fait un mérite,
Et que c'est à sa table à qui l'on rend visite.
Act II, sc. iv
Le Misanthrope (1666)