The fewer blows, the better. Brave men fight if they must; wise men never fight if they can help it.

Dream manfully and nobly, and thy dreams shall be prophets.

Childhood and genius have the same master organ in common - inquisitiveness.

Men of strong affections are jealous of their own genius. They fear lest they should be loved for a quality, and not for themselves.

The veil which covers the face of futurity is woven by the hand of mercy.

Life, that ever needs forgiveness, has, for its first duty, to forgive.

Emulation, even in brutes, is sensitively "nervous." See the tremor of the thoroughbred racer before he starts. The dray-horse does not tremble, but he does not emulate. It is not his work to run a race. Says Marcus Antoninus, "It is all one to a stone whether it be thrown upward or downward." Yet the emulation of a man of genius is seldom with his contemporaries, that is, inwardly in his mind, although outwardly in his act it would seem so. The competitors with whom his secret ambition seems to vie are the dead.