In all societies, it is advisable to associate if possible with the highest; not that the highest are always the best, but because, if disgusted there, we can descend at any time; but if we begin with the lowest, to ascend is impossible.

Hope is a prodigal young heir, and experience is his banker.

None of us are so much praised or censured as we think.

Light, whether it be material or moral, is the best reformer.

Nothing more completely baffles one who is full of trick and duplicity himself, than straight forward and simple integrity in another.

A public debt is a kind of anchor in the storm; but if the anchor be too heavy for the vessel, she will be sunk by that very weight which was intended for her preservation.

The hand that unnerved Belshazzar derived its most horrifying influence from the want of a body, and death itself is not formidable in what we do know of it, but in what we do not.