Contentment is not happiness. An oyster may be contented. Happiness is compounded of richer elements.

What is taken from the fortune, also, may haply be so much lifted from the soul. The greatness of a loss, as the proverb suggests, is determinable, not so much by what we have lost, as by what we have left.

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 cheerful live longest in years, and afterwards in our regards. Cheerfulness is the off-shoot of goodness.

It is seldom that we find out how great are our resources until we are thrown upon them.

Wine is a treacherous friend who you must always be on guard for.

The past is the sepulchre of our dead emotions.