Curiosity is the most superficial of all the affections; it changes its object perpetually; it has an appetite which is very sharp, but very easily satisfied, and it has always an appearance of giddiness, restlessness and anxiety.

It is a general popular error to suppose the loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for its welfare.

The only training for the heroic is the mundane.

Next to love, Sympathy is the divinest passion of the human heart.

But a good patriot, and a true politician, always considers how he shall make the most of the existing materials of his country. A disposition, to preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman. Everything else is vulgar in the conception, perilous in the execution.

The most favourable laws can do very little towards the happiness of people when the disposition of the ruling power is adverse to them.

There is nothing that God has judged good for us that He has not given us the means to accomplish, both in the natural and the moral world.