Hope is the best part of our riches. What sufficeth it that we have the wealth of the Indies in our pockets, if we have not the hope of heaven in our souls?

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.

Genius makes its observations in short-hand; talent writes them out at length.

The passions are like fire, useful in a thousand ways and dangerous only in one, through their excess.

There is probably no hell for authors in the next world - they suffer so much from critics and publishers in this.

Galileo called doubt the father of invention; it is certainly the pioneer.

Difficulties, by bracing the mind to overcome them, assist cheerfulness, as exercise assists digestion.