Wit must be without effort. Wit is play, not work; a nimbleness of the fancy, not a laborious effort of the will; a license, a holiday, a carnival of thought and feeling, not a trifling with speech, a constraint upon language, a duress upon words.

Most books fail, not so much from a want of ability in their authors, as from an absence in their productions of a thorough development of their ability.

The method of the enterprising is to plan with audacity and execute with vigor.

Adhesion to one idea is monomania; to few, slavery.

Music is the fourth great material want, first food, then clothes, then shelter, then music.

It is only an error of judgment to make a mistake, but it argues an infirmity of character to adhere to it when discovered.

The beauty seen is partly in him who sees it.