It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little.
Sydney Smith Quotes
1771–1845 England
Sydney Smith (3 June 1771 – 22 February 1845) was an English clergyman, critic, philosopher and wit.
- England
- Clergy
- Critics
- Journalists
- Non-fiction authors
Also known as: Smith, Sydney
100 quotes
Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl
And, scarce suspected, animate the whole.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Great men hallow a whole people and lift up all who live in their time.
It is always right that a man should be able to render a reason for the faith that is within him.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Economy, in the estimation of common minds, often means the absence of all taste and comfort.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
The Smiths never had any arms, and have invariably sealed their letters with their thumbs.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
It requires a surgical operation to get a joke well into a Scotch understanding.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
You find people ready enough to do the Samaritan, without the oil and twopence.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Never give way to melancholy; resist it steadily, for the habit will encroach.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
As the French say, there are three sexes — men, women, and clergymen.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Avoid shame, but do not seek glory: nothing so expensive as glory.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Daniel Webster struck me much like a steam-engine in trousers.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
We cultivate literature on a little oatmeal.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Magnificent spectacle of human happiness.
God calls all the passions out in their keenness and vigour, for the present safety of mankind.
Elementary Sketches of Moral Philosophy (1849)
My living in Yorkshire was so far out of the way, that it was actually twelve miles from a lemon.
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855)
Attribution
Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Sydney Smith (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.