
“It is more profitable to be mindful of our own faults than of those of our age.”
Aphorisms and Reflections (1901)
April 9, 1778
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol III
“It is more profitable to be mindful of our own faults than of those of our age.”
Aphorisms and Reflections (1901)
“But when an old man dances,
His locks with age are grey.
But he's a child in mind.”
Odes, XXXIX. (XXXVII), 3.
“The tragedy of old age, when a man’s too weak to hit his own child.”
Bad News, Chapter 12
“In an old man all his other vices grow old, but avarice alone grows younger.”
De' Magistrati, p. 127.
Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 430.
1930s, Wisehart interview (1930)
Context: Much reading after a certain age diverts the mind from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking, just as the man who spends too much time in the theaters is apt to be content with living vicariously instead of living his own life.
Preface to the Treatise on Vacuum (c.1651)
1920s, Viereck interview (1929)
George Gordon, Lord Byron, from The Works of Lord Byron, ed. Rowland E. Prothero (1901), vol. V: Letters and Journals, ch. XXIII: "Detached Thoughts" (15 October 1821 - 18 May 1822), paragraph 72 (p. 445)
Misattributed
“Old age means realizing you will never own all the dogs you wanted to.”