"Whatever you are by nature, keep to it; never desert your line of talent. Be what nature intended you for, and you will succeed."
"Avoid shame, but do not seek glory; nothing so expensive as glory."
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Source: Sydney Smith, Sarah Austin, Lady Saba Smith Holland Holland (1855). “A Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith”, p.88, London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans
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"If you want to improve your understanding, drink coffee."
"The main question to a novel is -- did it amuse? were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten? were you too late to dress? and did you sit up beyond the usual hour? If a novel produces these effects, it is good; if it does not -- story, language, love, scandal itself cannot save it. It is only meant to please; and it must do that or it does nothing."
"Life is to be fortified by many friendships. To love and to be loved is the greatest happiness of existence."
"Madam, I have been looking for a person who disliked gravy all my life; let us swear eternal friendship."
"Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea! How did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea."