The wounded limb shrinks from the slightest touch; and a slight shadow alarms the nervous.
[Lat., Membra reformidant mollem quoque saucia tactum:
Vanaque sollicitis incutit umbra metum.]
Alas for the affairs of men! When they are fortunate you might compare them to a shadow; and if they are unfortunate, a wet sponge with one dash wipes the picture away.
Many critics are like woodpeckers, who, instead of enjoying the fruit and shadow of a tree, hop incessantly around the trunk, pecking holes in the bark to discover some little worm or other.
Wisdom is known only by contrasting it with folly; by shadow only we perceive that all visible objects are not flat. Yet Philanthropos would abolish evil!