Samuel Butler

The worst of rebels never arm
To do their king or country harm,
But draw their swords read more

The worst of rebels never arm
To do their king or country harm,
But draw their swords to do them good,
As doctors cure by letting blood.

Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises.

Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises.

God cannot alter the past, though historians can.

God cannot alter the past, though historians can.

The function of vice is to keep virtue within reasonable bounds.

The function of vice is to keep virtue within reasonable bounds.

He'd undertake to prove, by force
Of argument, a man's no horse.
He'd prove a buzzard is read more

He'd undertake to prove, by force
Of argument, a man's no horse.
He'd prove a buzzard is no fowl,
And that a Lord may be an owl,
A calf an Alderman, a goose a Justice,
And rooks, Committee-men or Trustees.