There are three kinds of power,--wealth, strength, and talent; but as old age always weakens, often destroys, the two latter, the aged are induced to cling with the greater avidity to the former.

All who have been great and good without Christianity would have been much greater and better with it. If there be, amongst the sons of men, a single exception to this maxim, the divine Socrates may be allowed to put in the strongest claim. It was his high ambition to deserve, by deeds, not by creeds, an unrevealed heaven, and by works, not by faith, to enter an unpromised land.

There are both dull correctness and piquant carelessness; it is needless to say which will command the most readers and have the most influence.

He that has energy enough to root out a vice should go further, and try to plant a virtue in its place.

Pride, like the magnet, constantly points to one object, self; but, unlike the magnet, it has no attractive pole, but at all points repels.

Expect not praise without envy until you are dead.

Men of great and shining qualities do not always succeed in life, but the fault lies more often in themselves than in others.