Frozen by distance.—Wordsworth.
Short absence quickens love, long absence kills it.—Mirabeau.
We often wish most for our friends when they are absent. Even in married life love is not diminished by distance. A man, like a burning-glass, should be placed at a certain distance from the object he wishes to dissolve, in order that the proper focus may be obtained.—Richter.
Abstinence.—Refrain to-night, and that shall lend a hand of easiness to the next abstinence; the next more easy; for use almost can change the stamp of nature, and either curb the devil, or throw him out with wondrous potency.—Shakespeare.
Abuse.—Abuse is not so dangerous when there is no vehicle of wit or delicacy, no subtle conveyance. The difference between coarse and refined abuse is as the difference between being bruised by a club and wounded by a poisoned arrow.—Johnson.
Accident.—What reason, like the careful ant, draws laboriously together, the wind of accident collects in one brief moment.—Schiller.
What men call accident is God's own part.—P. J. Bailey.
Acquirements.—Every noble acquisition is attended with its risks: he who fears to encounter the one must not expect to obtain the other.—Metastasio.
Action.—Action can have no effect upon reasonable minds. It may augment noise, but it never can enforce argument. If you speak to a dog, you use action; you hold up your hand thus, because he is a brute; and in proportion as men are removed from brutes, action will have the less influence upon them.—Johnson.
Heaven ne'er helps the man who will not act.—Sophocles.