Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 3.djvu/104

It is only men of the highest understanding and men of the grossest dulness that do not change.

Of all people in the world young women and servants are the most difficult to keep in the house. If you are familiar with them they forget their position; but if you keep them at a distance, they are discontented.

A fool always has an excuse ready when he does wrong.

The failings of a great man are eclipses of the sun and moon. When he fails, all men see it; but when he recovers from his failing, all men look up to him as before.

We shall lose him, but God’s will be done. (On the occasion of a friend’s illness.)

If I have had an unworthy motive in doing that, may God forsake me! May God forsake me for ever!

Be not afraid. If God is going to destroy all civilisation in the world, it would not have been given to a mortal of this late generation to understand this civilisation. But if God is not going to destroy all civilisation in the world, what can the people of this place do to me? (Said to his disciples when he and they were threatened with personal danger)

Whether or not I shall succeed in carrying out my teaching among men, depends upon the will of God. What can that man do against the will of God? (Said with reference to a man who had slandered him.)

There are three things which a wise and good man holds in awe. He holds in awe the Laws of God, persons in authority, and the words of wisdom of holy men. A fool, on the other hand, does not know that there are Laws of God; he therefore has no reverence