Prudence, patience, labor, valor; these are the stars that rule the career of mortals.

There is a world of science necessary in choosing books. I have known some people in great sorrow fly to a novel, or the last light book in fashion. One might as well take a rose-draught for the plague! Light reading does not do when the heart is really heavy. I am told that Goethe, when he lost his son, took to study a science that was new to him. Ah! Goethe was a physician who knew what he was about.

No reproach is like that we clothe in a smile, and present with a bow.

More is got from one book on which the thought settles for a definite end in knowledge, than from libraries skimmed over by a wandering eye.

Each man forms his duty according to his predominant characteristic; the stern require an avenging judge; the gentle, a forgiving father. Just so the pygmies declared that Jove himself was a pygmy.

Beside one deed of guilt, how blest is guiltless woe!

The worst part of an eminent man's conversation is, nine times out of ten, to be found in that part by which he means to be clever.