Our admiration of fine writing will always be in proportion to its real difficulty and its apparent ease.

Our actions must clothe us with an immortality loathsome or glorious.

To be satisfied with the acquittal of the world, though accompanied with the secret condemnation of conscience, this is the mark of a little mind; but it requires a soul of no common stamp to be satisfied with its own acquittal, and to despise the condemnation of the world.

There are many women who have never intrigued, and many men who have never gamed; but those who have done either but once are very extraordinary animals.

In answering an opponent, arrange your ideas, but not your words.

Public charities and benevolent associations for the gratuitous relief of every species of distress, are peculiar to Christianity; no other system of civil or religious policy has originated them; they form its highest praise and characteristic feature.

Like the rainbow, peace rests upon the earth, but its arch is lost in heaven. Heaven bathes it in hues of light--it springs up amid tears and clouds--it is a reflection of the eternal sun--it is an assurance of calm--it is the sign of a great covenant between God and man--it is an emanation from the distant orb of immortal light.