Of all unfortunate men one of the unhappiest is a middling author endowed with too lively a sensibility for criticism.

No Government can be long secure without a formidable Opposition.

I am a Conservative to preserve all that is good in our constitution, a Radical to remove all that is bad.

The more you are talked about the less powerful you are.

Religion should be the rule of life, not a casual incident in it.

You know, all is development. The principle is perpetually going on. First, there was nothing, then there was something; then-I forget the next-I think there were shells, then fishes; then we came-let me see-did we come next? Never mind that; we came at last. And at the next change there will be something very superior to us-something with wings. Ah! That's it: we were fishes, and I believe we shall be crows.

Had it not been for you, I should have remained what I was when we first met, a prejudiced, narrow-minded being, with contracted sympathies and false knowledge, wasting my life on obsolete trifles, and utterly insensible to the privilege of living in this wondrous age of change and progress.