The Freethinker; Or, Essays, on Ignorance, Superstition, Bigotry, Enthusiam, Craft, & Intermix'd with Several Pieces of Wit and Humour, Volume 3

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Brindley, 1733
 

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Page 169 - Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding. For the merchandise of it is better than the merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold.
Page 211 - Oh that my grief were thoroughly weighed, And my calamity laid in the balances together ! For now it would be heavier than the sand of the sea : Therefore my words are swallowed up. For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, The poison whereof drinketh up my spirit : The terrors of God do set themselves in array against me.
Page 45 - I repose in the firmness and spring of my joints, and in the strength of my pinions! But I have lived enough to nature, and even to glory : neither will any of you whom I leave behind have equal satisfaction in life, in the dark, declining age, which I see is already begun.
Page 46 - What hath pride profited us? or what good hath riches with our vaunting brought us? All those things are passed away like a shadow, and as a post that hasted by; and as a ship that passeth over the waves of the water, which when it is gone by, the trace thereof cannot be found, neither the pathway of the keel in the waves...
Page 84 - Day minted out into Hours, the Industrious know how to employ every Piece of Time to a real Advantage in their different Professions: And he that is prodigal of his Hours, is, in Effect, a Squanderer of Money.
Page 47 - ... or as when a bird hath flown through the air, there is no token of her way to be found, but the light air being beaten with the stroke of her wings, and parted with the violent noise and motion of them, is passed through, and therein afterwards no sign where she went is to be found...
Page 44 - Changes and Revolutions I have seen in my "Country, the manifold private Misfortunes to which "we are all liable, and the fatal Diseases incident to "our Race, have abundantly taught me this Lesson, "that no Happiness can be secure or lasting, which "is placed in Things, that are out of our Power. "Great is the Uncertainty of Life.
Page 20 - Submiflion ; not daring to lift up his Eyes, nor to call him Brother. THE Day after this Interview, Florio pretended, that he muft abfent himfelf from the Court, and make a Journey fecretly to marry a Princefs of a neighbouring Kingdom. But under this Pretence, he went to vifit his Mother ; to whom he related what he had done at Court ; and he fupply'd her, at the fame time, with a convenient Sum of Money, knowing me ftood in need of it.
Page 46 - ... in the very dawn'; and the man (out of a million] who lingers on to the evening twilight, is not accounted happy. , The right ufe of this reflection is, not to make men regardlefs of pofterity; nor to flacken their diligence in the purfuit of any kind of knowledge...
Page 16 - Dare to be great, without a guilty crown ; View it, and lay the bright temptation down : 'Tis base to seize on all, because you may; That's empire, that, which I can give away : There's joy when to wild will you laws prescribe, When you bid Fortune carry back her bribe : A joy, which none but greatest minds can taste ; A fame, which will to endless ages last.

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