He that has energy enough in his constitution to root out a vice should go a little further, and try to plant a virtue in its place; otherwise he will have his labor to renew. A strong soil that has produced weeds may be made to produce wheat with far less difficulty than it would cost to make it produce nothing.

Subtract from many modern poets all that may be found in Shakespeare, and trash will remain.

Make the most of the day, by determining to spend it on two sorts of acquaintances only--those by whom something may be got, and those from whom something may be learned.

Be very slow to believe that you are wiser than all others; it is a fatal but common error. Where one has been saved by a true estimation of another's weakness, thousands have been destroyed by a false appreciation of their own strength.

Reply to wit with gravity, and to gravity with wit.

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

It is with disease of the mind, as with those of the body; we are half dead before we understand our disorder, and half cured when we do.