A man may do very well with a very little knowledge, and scarce be found out in mixed company; everybody is so much more ready to produce his own, than to call for a display of your acquisitions.

Separate from the pleasure of your company, I don't much care if I never see another mountain in my life.

What a place to be in is an old library! It seems as though all the souls of all the writers that have bequeathed their labours to these Bodleians were reposing here as in some dormitory, or middle state. I do not want to handle, to profane the leaves, their winding-sheets. I could as soon dislodge a shade. I seem to inhale learning, walking amid their foliage; and the odor of their old moth-scented coverings is fragrant as the first bloom of the sciential apples which grew amid the happy orchard.

Asparagus inspires gentle thoughts.

To be thankful for what we grasp exceeding our proportion is to add hypocrisy to injustice.

There are like to be short graces where the devil plays host.

Alas! how light a cause may move Dissension between hearts that love! Hearts that the world in vain had tried, And sorrow but more closely tied; That stood the storm when waves were rough, Yet in a sunny hour fall off, Like ships that have gone down at sea When heaven was all tranquillity.