God, we are told, looked upon the world after he had created it and pronounced it good; but ascetic pietists, in their wisdom, cast their eyes over it, and substantially pronounce it a dead failure, a miserable production, a poor concern.

The most brilliant flashes of wit come from a clouded mind, as lightning leaps only from an obscure firmament.

Women seldom forfeit their claims to respect to men whom they respect.

As threshing separates the wheat from the chaff, so does affliction purify virtue.

In the assurance of strength there is strength; and they are the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in themselves or their powers.

The past is the sepulchre of our dead emotions.

A genuine passion is like a mountain stream; it admits of no impediment; it cannot go backward; it must go forward.