The knowledge beyond all other knowledge is the knowledge how to excuse.

It is safer to quote what is written than what is spoken. What a man writes it is fair to presume he believes as a matter of general conviction, but it is not so with what he utters in the freedom of conversation. In that he may only express the feeling of the moment, and not his settled judgment, or matured opinion.

Fortune, like a coy mistress, loves to yield her favors, though she makes us wrest them from her.

Troubles forereckoned are doubly suffered.

Dignity of position adds to dignity of character, as well as to dignity of carriage. Give us a proud position, and we are impelled to act up to it.

To death we owe our life; the passing of one generation opens a way for another.

In ambition, as in love, the successful can afford to be indulgent toward their rivals. The prize our own, it is graceful to recognize the merit that vainly aspired to it.