The policy that can strike only while the iron is hot will be overcome by that perseverance, which ... can make that iron hot by striking and he that can only rule the storm must yield to him who can both raise and rule it.

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

I will not be revenged, and this I owe to my enemy; but I will remember, and this I owe to myself.

Literature has her quacks no less than medicine, and they are divided into two classes; those who have erudition without genius, and those who have volubility without depth; we shall get second-hand sense from the one, and original nonsense from the other.

An Irish man fights before he reasons, a Scotchman reasons before he fights, an Englishman is not particular as to the order of precedence, but will do either to accommodate his customers.

Patience is the support of weakness; impatience the ruin of strength.

When we feel a strong desire to thrust our advice upon others, it is usually because we suspect their weakness; but we ought rather to suspect our own.