Judicious praise is to children what the sun is to flowers.

The selection of a subject is to the author what choice of position is to the general,--once skilfully determined, the battle is already half won. Of a few writers it may be said that they are popular in despite of their subjects--but of a great many more it may be observed that they are popular because of them.

The grandest of all laws is the law of progressive development. Under it, in the wide sweep of things, men grow wiser as they grow older, and societies better.

The nearest approximation to an understanding of life is to feel it--to realize it to the full--to be a profound and inscrutable mystery.

It is our relation to circumstances that determine their influence over us. The same wind that blows one ship into port may blow another off shore.

In politics, merit is rewarded by the possessor being raised, like a target, to a position to be fired at.

Luminous quotations, also, atone, by their interest, for the dulness of an inferior book, and add to the value of a superior work by the variety which they lend to its style and treatment.