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Agreement
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He that complies against his will is of his own opinion still.
-Samuel Butler
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Alcohol/Alcoholism
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It is immoral to get drunk because the headache comes after the drinking, but if the headache came first and the drunkenness afterwards, it would be moral to get drunk.
-Samuel Butler
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Animals
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Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.
-Samuel Butler
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Argument & Debate
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Arguments are like fire-arms which a man may keep at home but should not carry about with him.
-Samuel Butler
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We are not won by arguments that we can analyze, but by tone and temper; by the manner, which is the man himself.
-Samuel Butler
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Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.
-Samuel Butler
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It is not he who gains the exact point in dispute who scores most in controversy -- but he who has shown the better temper.
-Samuel Butler
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Authors & Writing
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The only living works are those which have drained much of the author's own life into them.
-Samuel Butler
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Belief
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Belief like any other moving body follows the path of least resistance.
-Samuel Butler
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Birth
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Birth and death are so closely related that one could not destroy either without destroying the other at the same time. It is extinction that makes creation possible.
-Samuel Butler
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Boredom
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The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore.
-Samuel Butler
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Men are seldom more commonplace than on supreme occasions.
-Samuel Butler
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Charity
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Because they did not see merit where they should have seen it, people, to express their regret, will go and leave a lot of money to the very people who will be the first to throw stones at the next person who has anything to say and finds a difficulty in getting a hearing.
-Samuel Butler
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Christianity
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People in general are equally horrified at hearing the Christian religion doubted, and at seeing it practiced.
-Samuel Butler
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If there is any moral in Christianity, if there is anything to be learned from it, if the whole story is not profitless from first to last, it comes to this: that a man should back his own opinion against the world s.
-Samuel Butler
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Common Sense
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The voice of the Lord is the voice of common sense, which is shared by all that is.
-Samuel Butler
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Community
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Union may be strength, but it is mere blind brute strength unless wisely directed.
-Samuel Butler
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Conscience
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Conscience is thoroughly well-bred and soon leaves off talking to those who do not wish to hear it.
-Samuel Butler
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Conviction
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The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing is to be taken too seriously.
-Samuel Butler
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Crime
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The thief. Once committed beyond a certain point he should not worry himself too much about not being a thief any more. Thieving is God's message to him. Let him try and be a good thief.
-Samuel Butler
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Culture
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A man should be just cultured enough to be able to look with suspicion upon culture at first, not second hand.
-Samuel Butler
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Death
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To die is but to leave off dying and do the thing once for all.
-Samuel Butler
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The dead should be judged like criminals, impartially, but they should be allowed the benefit of the doubt.
-Samuel Butler
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There is nothing which at once affects a man so much and so little as his own death.
-Samuel Butler
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Deception/Lying
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Any fool can tell the truth, but it requires a man of some sense to know how to lie well.
-Samuel Butler
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Books by and about Samuel Butler