I cannot hold with those who wish to put down the insignificant chatter of the world.

That I can read and be happy while I am reading, is a great blessing. Could I have remembered, as some men do, what I read, I should have been able to call myself an educated man. But that power I have never possessed. Something is always left--something dim and inaccurate--but still something sufficient to preserve the taste for more. I am inclined to think that it is so with most readers.

Credit is a matter so subtle in its essence, that, as it may be obtained almost without reason, so, without reason, may it be made to melt away.

Till we can become divine, we must be content to be human, lest in our hurry for change we sink to something lower.

I have no ambition to surprise my reader. Castles with unknown passages are not compatible with my homely muse.

A man's own dinner is to himself so important that he cannot bring himself to believe that it is a matter utterly indifferent to anyone else.

He possessed the rare merit of making a property of his time and not a burden.