It may be observed of good writing, as of good blood, that it is much easier to say what it is composed of than to compose it.

Heaven may have happiness as utterly unknown to us as the gift of perfect vision would be to a man born blind. If we consider the inlets of pleasure from five senses only, we may be sure that the same Being who created us could have given us five hundred, if He had pleased.

It is astonishing how much more anxious people are to lengthen life than to improve it; and as misers often lose large sums of money in attempting to make more, so do hypochondriacs squander large sums of time in search of nostrums by which they vainly hope they may get more time to squander.

The martyrs to vice far exceed the martyrs to virtue, both in endurance and in number.

Ignorance lies at the bottom of all human knowledge, and the deeper we penetrate, the nearer we arrive unto it.

If our eloquence be directed above the heads of our hearers, we shall do no execution. By pointing our arguments low, we stand a chance of hitting their hearts as well as their heads. In addressing angels, we could hardly raise our eloquence too high; but we must remember that men are not angels.

Pedantry prides herself on being wrong by rules; while common sense is contented to be right without them.