No man, perhaps, is so wicked as to commit evil for its own sake. Evil is generally committed under the hope of some advantage the pursuit of virtue seldom obtains. Yet the most successful result of the most virtuous heroism is never without its alloy.

Mistrusts sometimes come over one's mind of the justice of God. But let a real misery come again, and to whom do we fly? To whom do we instinctively and immediately look up?

Danger is the very basis of superstition. It produces a searching after help supernaturally when human means are no longer supposed to be available.

Beware of the beginnings of vice. Do not delude yourself with the belief that it can be argued against in the presence of the exciting cause. Nothing but actual flight can save you.

Satan is to be punished eternally in the end, but for a while he triumphs.

Nothing is difficult; it is only we who are indolent.

There surely is in human nature an inherent propensity to extract all the good out of all the evil.