A brave man struggling in the storms of fate, And greatly falling with a falling state.

Placed on this isthmus of a middle state.

The greatest advantage I know of being thought a wit by the world is, that it gives one the greater freedom of playing the fool.

We think our fathers fools, so wise we grow. Our wiser sons, no doubt will think us so.

Some men's wit is like a dark lantern, which serves their own turn and guides them their own way, but is never known (according to the Scripture phrase) either to shine forth before men, or to glorify their Father in heaven.

On life's vast ocean diversely we sail, Reason the card, but passion is the gale; Nor God alone in the still calm we find, He mounts the storm, and walks upon the wind.

Order is Heaven's first law; and this confessed, some are, and must be, greater than the rest, more rich, more wise; but who infers from hence that such are happier, shocks all common sense. Condition, circumstance, is not the thing; bliss is the same in subject or in king.