I have somewhere met with the epitaph on a charitable man which has pleased me very much. I cannot recollect the words, but here is the sense of it: What I spent I lost; what I possessed is left to others; what I gave away remains with me. – Joseph Addison
We are always doing, says he, something for posterity, but I would see posterity do something for us. – Joseph Addison
A woman seldom asks advice before she has bought her wedding clothes. – Joseph Addison
Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind, which are delivered down from generation to generation as presents to the posterity of those who are yet unborn. – Joseph Addison
It is rare indeed that people give. Most people guard and keep; they suppose that it is they themselves and what they identify with themselves that they are guarding and keeping, whereas what they are actually guarding and keeping is their system of reality and what they assume themselves to be. – James Baldwin