I believe a person of any fine feeling scarcely ever sees a new face without a sensation akin to a shock, for the reason that it presents a new and surprising combination of unedifying elements.

Will without intellect is the most vulgar and common thing in the world, possessed by every blockhead, who, in the gratification of his passions, shows the stuff of which he is made.

We may divide thinkers into those who think for themselves and those who think through others. The latter are the rule and the former the exception. The first are original thinkers in a double sense, and egotists in the noblest meaning of the word.

Men are by nature merely indifferent to one another; but women are by nature enemies.

Poverty and slavery are thus only two forms ofthe same thing, the essence of which is that a man's energies are expended for the most part not on his own behalf but on that of others.

In youth it is the outward aspect of things that most engages us; while in age, thought or reflection is the predominating qualityof the mind. Hence, youth is the time for poetry, and age is more inclined to philosophy. In practical affairs it is the same: a man shapes his resolutions in youth more by the impression that the outward world makes upon him; whereas, when he is old, it is thought that determines his actions.

Of all the intellectual faculties, judgment is the last to mature. A child under the age of fifteen should confine its attention either to subjects like mathematics, in which errors of judgment are impossible, or to subjects in which they are not very dangerous, like languages, natural science, history, etc.