It is by imitation, far more than by precept, that we learn everything; and what we learn thus, we acquire not only more effectually, but more pleasantly.

In doing good, we are generally cold, and languid, and sluggish; and of all things afraid of being too much in the right. But theworks of malice and injustice are quite in another style. They are finished with a bold, masterly hand; touched as they are with the spirit of those vehement passions that call forth all our energies, whenever we oppress and persecute.

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

To tax and to please, no more than to love and to be wise, is not given to men.

I am convinced that we have a degree of delight, and that no small one, in the real misfortunes and pain of others

As the rose-tree is composed of the sweetest flowers and the sharpest thorns, as the heavens are sometimes overcast—alternately tempestuous and serene—so is the life of man intermingled with hopes and fears, with joys and sorrows, with pleasure and pain.

Religion is essentially the art and the theory of the remaking of man. Man is not a finished creation.