A new acquaintance is like a new book. I prefer it, even if bad, to a classic.

Patriotism depends as much on mutual suffering as on mutual success; and it is by that experience of all fortunes and all feelings that a great national character is created.

It is well-known what a middleman is: he is a man who bamboozles one party and plunders the other.

Be thine own privy counsellor.

Free trade is not a principle, it is an expedient.

Never argue. In society nothing must be; give only results. If any person differs from you, bow, and turn the conversation.

When a man fell into his anecdotage it was a sign for him to retire from the world.