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Joseph Addison Quotes (1672-1719)
Writer, Politician
About Joseph Addison
Joseph Addison (May 1 1672 – June 17 1719) was an English politician and writer. His name is often remembered in tandem with that of his friend, Richard Steele, with whom he founded The Spectator magazine.
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Explore our curated collection of the most famous and impactful Joseph Addison quotes.
“The fraternity of the henpecked.”
“Sweet are the slumbers of the virtuous man.”
“Thanks to the gods! my boy has done his duty.”
“Antidotes are what you take to prevent dotes.”
“Round-heads and Wooden-shoes are standing jokes.”
“Much might be said on both sides.”
“Cheerfulness is...the best promoter of health.”
“These widows, sir, are the most perverse creatures in the world.”
“Nature does nothing without purpose or uselessly.”
“Health and cheerfulness mutually beget each other.”
“There is nothing which we receive with so much reluctance as advice.”
“Better to die ten thousand deaths,
Than wound my honour.”
Than wound my honour.”
“Some virtues are only seen in affliction and some in prosperity.”
Joseph Addison Quotes by Topic
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Joseph Addison on Justice 4 quotes
View all 4 quotes on Justice →Joseph Addison on Journalism 4 quotes
“I would * * * earnestly advise them for their good to order this paper to be punctually served up, and to be looked upon as a part of the tea equipage.”
Joseph Addison on Courage 3 quotes
“'Tis pride, rank pride, and haughtiness of soul: I think the Romans call it Stoicism.”
Joseph Addison on Modesty 3 quotes
“True modesty avoids everything that is criminal; false modesty everything that is unfashionable.”
Joseph Addison on Heart 3 quotes
“When love once pleas admission to our hearts, (In spite of all the virtue we can boast), The woman that deliberates is lost.”
Joseph Addison on Love 3 quotes
“When love once pleads admission to our hearts, (In spite of all the virtue we can boast), The woman that deliberates is lost.”
Joseph Addison on Poetry about love 3 quotes
“When love once pleads admission to our hearts, (In spite of all the virtue we can boast), The woman that deliberates is lost.”
Joseph Addison on Immortality 3 quotes
“The stars shall fade away, the sun himself Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years, But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth, Unhurt amidst the wars of elements, The wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds.”
Joseph Addison on Honor 2 quotes
“Better to die ten thousand deaths, Than wound my honour.”
Joseph Addison on Soul 2 quotes
View all 2 quotes on Soul →Joseph Addison on England 2 quotes
“I look upon it as a peculiar blessing that I was born an Englishman.”
Joseph Addison on Friendship 2 quotes
“Great souls by instinct to each other turn, Demand alliance, and in friendship burn.”
What Joseph Addison Said About Others
Discover personal opinions Joseph Addison shared regarding contemporaries.
Joseph Addison on Women 6 quotes
View all 6 quotes on Women →Joseph Addison on Pompey
“Great Pompey's shade complains that we are slow, And Scipio's ghost walks unavenged amongst us!”
Joseph Addison on The Faerie Queene
“Old Spenser next, warmed with poetic rage, In ancient tales amused a barbarous age; An age that, yet uncultivate and rude, Where'er the poet's fancy led, pursued Through pathless fields and unfrequented floods, To dens of dragons and enchanted woods. But now the mystic tale, that pleased of yore, Can charm an understanding age no more: The long-spun allegories fulsome grow, While the dull moral lies too plain below. We view well-pleased at distance all the sights Of arms and palfreys, battles, fields, and fights, And damsels in distress, and courteous knights. But when we look too near, the shades decay, And all the pleasing landscape fades away.”
Joseph Addison on Sappho
“Among the mutilated poets of antiquity, there is none whose fragments are so beautiful as those of Sappho. They give us a taste of her way of writing, which is perfectly conformable with that extraordinary character we find of her in the remarks of those great critics who were conversant with her works when they were entire. One may see, by what is left of them, that she followed nature in all her thoughts, without descending to those little points, conceits, and turns of wit, with which many of our modem lyrics are so miserably infected. Her soul seems to have been made up of love and poetry: she felt the passion in all its warmth, and described it in all its symptoms. She is called by ancient authors the tenth muse; and by Plutarch is compared to Cacus, the son of Vulcan, who breathed out nothing but flame. I do not know, by the character that is given of her works, whether it is not for the benefit of mankind that they are lost. They were filled with such bewitching tenderness and rapture, that it might have been dangerous to have given them a reading.”
Joseph Addison on Isaac Newton
“According to Sir Isaac Newton's Calculations, the last Comet that made its Appearance in 1680, imbib'd so much Heat by its Approaches to the Sun, that it would have been two thousand times hotter than red hot Iron, had it been a Globe of that Metal; and that supposing it as big as the Earth, and at the same Distance from the Sun, it would be fifty thousand Years in cooling, before it recovered its natural Temper. In the like manner, if an Englishman considers the great Ferment into which our Political World is thrown at present, and how intensely it is heated in all its Parts, he cannot suppose that it will cool again in less than three hundred Years. In such a Tract of Time it is possible that the Heats of the present Age may be extinguished, and our several Classes of great Men represented under their proper Characters. Some eminent Historian may then probably arise that will not write recentibus odiis (as Tacitus expresses it) with the Passions and Prejudices of a contemporary Author, but make an impartial Distribution of Fame among the Great Men of the present Age.”
Quotes About Joseph Addison
Gain deeper perspective through quotes about Joseph Addison from others.
James Boswell on Joseph Addison
“In our way to the Club to-night, when I regretted that Goldsmith would, upon every occasion, endeavour to shine, by which he often exposed himself; Mr. Langton observed, that he was not like Addison, who was content with the fame of his writings, and did not aim also at excellency in conversation, for which he found himself unfit; and that he said to a lady, who complained of his having talked little in company, "Madam, I have but nine-pence in ready money, but I can draw for a thousand pounds".”
James G. Frazer on Joseph Addison
“The last place in London to which I will ask the reader to accompany me with Addison is one which has changed but little since his time, and has been of late very much in all our thoughts—I mean Westminster Abbey. He tells us that in his serious and pensive moods he very often walked there by himself, where the gloominess of the place, with the solemnity of the building, and the condition of the people who lie in it, filled his mind with a melancholy, or rather a thoughtfulness, that was not unpleasing.”
A. C. Guthkelch on Joseph Addison
Samuel Johnson on Joseph Addison
“Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar, but not coarse, and elegant, but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison.”
Thomas Macaulay on Joseph Addison
“As a man, he may not have deserved the adoration which he received from those who, bewitched by his fascinating society, and indebted for all the comforts of life to his generous and delicate friendship, worshipped him nightly, in his favourite temple at Button’s. But, after full inquiry and impartial reflection, we have long been convinced that he deserved as much love and esteem as can be justly claimed by any of our infirm and erring race. Some blemishes may undoubtedly be detected in his character; but the more carefully it is examined, the more it will appear, to use the phrase of the old anatomists, sound in the noble parts, free from all taint of perfidy, of cowardice, of cruelty, of ingratitude, of envy. Men may easily be named, in whom some particular good disposition has been more conspicuous than in Addison. But the just harmony of qualities, the exact temper between the stern and the humane virtues, the habitual observance of every law, not only of moral rectitude, but of moral grace and dignity, distinguish him from all men who have been tried by equally strong temptations, and about whose conduct we possess equally full information.”
Thomas Tickell on Joseph Addison 2 quotes
“Just men, by whom impartial laws were given; And saints who taught and led the way to heaven. Ne'er to these chambers, where the mighty rest, Since their foundation came a nobler guest; Nor e’er was to the bowers of bliss conveyed A fairer spirit or more welcome shade.”
G. M. Trevelyan."England Under Queen Anne on Joseph Addison
“The prose of Whig and Tory polemics contained a larger proportion of stuff destined to endure: Swift and Addison,as journalists spoke to the their day but have been overheard by the ages.”
Voltaire on Joseph Addison
“The first English Writer who compos'd a regular Tragedy and infus'd a Spirit of Elegance thro' every Part of it, was the illustrious Mr. Addison. His CATO is a Master-piece both with regard to the Diction, and to the Beauty and Harmony of the Numbers. The Character of Cato is, in my Opinion, vastly superiour to that of Cornelia in the POMPEY of Corneille: For Cato is great without any Thing like Fustian, and Cornelia, who besides is not a necessary Character, tends sometimes to bombast. Mr. Addison'''s Cato'' appears to me the greatest Character that was ever brought upon any Stage, but then the rest of them don't correspond to the Dignity of it: And this dramatic Piece so excellently well writ, is disfigur'd by a dull Love Plot, which spreads a certain Languor over the whole, that quite murders it.”
Edward Young on Joseph Addison
“He dismissed his physicians, and with them all hopes of life. But with his hopes of life he dismissed not his concern for the living, but sent for a youth nearly related and finely accomplished, but not above being the better for good impressions from a dying friend. He came; but, life now glimmering in the socket, the dying friend was silent. After a decent and proper pause, the youth said, "Dear sir, you sent for me: I believe and I hope that you have some commands; I shall hold them most sacred." May distant ages not only hear, but feel, the reply! Forcibly grasping the youth's hand, he softly said, "See in what peace a Christian can die!" He spoke with difficulty and soon expired. Through grace Divine, how great is man!”
Disputed Quotes
Quotes attributed to Joseph Addison that are questionable.
“If you wish success in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother and hope your guardian genius.”
“What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but scattered along life's pathway, the good they do is inconceivable.”
“If men would consider not so much where they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling in the world.”
“The greatest sweetener of human life is Friendship. To raise this to the highest pitch of enjoyment, is a secret which but few discover.”
Misattributed Quotes
Quotes mistakenly credited to Joseph Addison
“There is not any present moment that is unconnected with some future one. The life of every man is a continued chain of incidents, each link of which hangs upon the former. The transition from cause to effect, from event to event, is often carried on by secret steps, which our foresight cannot divine, and our sagacity is unable to trace. Evil may at some future period bring forth good; and good may bring forth evil, both equally unexpected.”
“Justice is an unassailable fortress, built on the brow of a mountain which cannot be overthrown by the violence of torrents, nor demolished by the force of armies.”
“It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are the more gentle and quiet we become towards the defects of others.”
“He that would pass the latter part of life with honour and decency, must, when he is young, consider that he shall one day be old; and remember, when he is old, that he has once been young.”
“No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority.”
“The unjustifiable severity of a parent is loaded with this aggravation, that those whom he injures are always in his sight.”
“Education...is a companion which no misfortunes can depress, no clime destroy, no enemy alienate, no despotism enslave: at home a friend, abroad an introduction, in solitude a solace, in society an ornament: it chastens vice, it guides virtue, it gives at once a grace and government to genius. Without it, what is man? A splendid slave, a reasoning savage.”
“They were a people so primitive they did not know how to get money, except by working for it.”
“Plenty of people wish to become devout, but no one wishes to be humble.”
“The beloved of the Almighty are: the rich who have the humility of the poor, and the poor who have the magnanimity of the rich.”
“Jesters do often prove prophets.”
“The chief ingredients in the composition of those qualities that gain esteem and praise, are good nature, truth, good sense, and good breeding.”
“The union of the Word and the Mind produces that mystery which is called Life... Learn deeply of the Mind and its mystery, for therein lies the secret of immortality.”
About Joseph Addison
Joseph Addison (May 1 1672 – June 17 1719) was an English politician and writer. His name is often remembered in tandem with that of his friend, Richard Steele, with whom he founded The Spectator magazine.