“Even in common people, conceit has the virtue of making them cheerful; the man who thinks his wife, his baby, his house, his horse, his dog, and himself severally unequalled, is almost sure to be a good-humored person, though liable to be tedious at times.”

The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table (1858)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Even in common people, conceit has the virtue of making them cheerful; the man who thinks his wife, his baby, his house…" by Oliver Wendell Holmes?

Oliver Wendell Holmes135

Poet, essayist, physician 1809–1894

Related quotes

“Suppose that a man found his person and his means of survival incessantly menaced […]Even though this man might be asked to surrender a very considerable portion of his time and of his labor to someone who takes it upon himself to guarantee the peaceful possession of his person and his goods, wouldn't it be to his advantage to conclude this bargain?Still, it would obviously be no less in his self-interest to procure his security at the lowest price possible.”

Gustave de Molinari (1819–1912) Belgian political economist and classical liberal theorist

Source: The Production of Security (1849), p. 20-21

“Any brother of mine and I make one person, as do a good man and his good wife.”

Wolfram von Eschenbach book Parzival

Mîn bruodr und ich daz ist ein lîp,
als ist guot man unt des guot wîp.
Bk. 15, st. 740, line 29; p. 369.
Parzival

“The husband is not liable for the criminal conduct of his wife.”

John Eardley Wilmot (1709–1792) English judge

Lockwood v. Coysgarne (1764), 3 Burr. Part IV. 1681.

“No sociologist, for instance, should think himself too good, even in his old age, to make tens of thousands of quite trivial computations in his head and perhaps for months at a time”

Max Weber (1864–1920) German sociologist, philosopher, and political economist

Source: From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology (1946), p. 135 (in 2009 edition)

“Though the Earth, and all inferior Creatures be common to all Men, yet every Man has a Property in his own Person. Thus no Body has any Right to but himself.”

John Locke book Two Treatises of Government

Second Treatise of Government, Ch. V, sec. 27
Two Treatises of Government (1689)

“The worth of a wife is a man’s good fortune;
His jewels are his good children.”

Thiruvalluvar book Tirukkuṛaḷ

Verse VI.10
Tirukkural

“A person who doubts himself is like a man who would enlist in the ranks of his enemies and bear arms against himself. He makes his failures certain by himself being the first person to be convinced of it.”

Alexandre Dumas (1802–1870) French writer and dramatist, father of the homonym writer and dramatist

“Any brute will demand his right to be a law unto himself, beating his wife and his children as he pleases, and defend that right with his father’s rifle and think himself a patriot.”

Kage Baker book Mendoza in Hollywood

Part 3 “The Island Out There” Chapter 3 (pp. 304-305)
Mendoza in Hollywood (2000)

“Many a man isn't as good as his woman, but I never knew a husband who was better than his wife.”

Orson Scott Card book Saints

Saints (1983)

“An Englishman thinks first of his work — his job, he calls it — and then of his sport, and last — a good way last — of his wife.”

Agatha Christie book Death in the Clouds

Death in the Clouds (1935)

“Even in common people, conceit has the virtue of making them cheerful; the man who thinks his wife, his baby, his house, his horse, his dog, and himself severally unequalled, is almost sure to be a good-humored person, though liable to be tedious at times.”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Oliver Wendell Holmes135

Related quotes

Related topics