Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Humility
Lowliness is the base of every virtue,
And he who goes the lowest builds the safest.
Bailey—Festus. Sc. Home.
He saw a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility!
And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride that apes humility.
Coleridge—Devil’s Walk. Original title, Devil’s Thoughts. Written jointly by Coleridge and Southey.
I am well aware that I am the ’umblest person going***let the other be where he may.
Dickens—David Copperfield. Vol. I. Ch. XVI.
’Umble we are, ’umble we have been, ’umble we shall ever be.
Dickens—David Copperfield. Vol. I. Ch. XVII.
Parvum parva decent.
Humble things become the humble.
Horace—Epistles. I. 7. 44.
God hath sworn to lift on high
Who sinks himself by true humility.
Keble—Miscellaneous Poems. At Hooker’s Tomb.
O be very sure
That no man will learn anything at all,
Unless he first will learn humility.
Owen Meredith (Lord Lytton)—Vanini. L. 327.
One may be humble out of pride.
Montaigne—Of Presumption. Bk. II. Ch. XVII.
Fairest and best adorned is she
Whose clothing is humility.
Montgomery—Humility.
Nearest the throne itself must be
The footstool of humility.
Montgomery—Humility.
Humility, that low, sweet root,
From which all heavenly virtues shoot.
Moore—Loves of the Angels. Third Angel’s Story. St. 11.
I was not born for Courts or great affairs;
I pay my debts, believe, and say my pray’rs.
Pope—Prologue to Satires. L. 268.
Humility is to make a right estimate of one’s self. It is no humility for a man to think less of himself than he ought, though it might rather puzzle him to do that.
Spurgeon—Gleanings Among the Sheaves. Humility.
The higher a man is in grace, the lower he will be in his own esteem.
Spurgeon—Gleanings Among the Sheaves. The Right Estimate.
Da locum melioribus.
Give place to your betters.
Terence—Phormio. III. 2. 37.