The brave man wants no charms to encourage him to his duty, and the good man scorns all warnings that would deter him from fulfilling it.

A woman too often reasons from her heart; hence two-thirds of her mistakes and her troubles.

Leave glory to great folks. Ah, castles in the air cost a vast deal to keep up!

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.

Fine natures are like fine poems; a glance at the first two lines suffices for a guess into the beauty that waits you if you read on.

I was always an early riser. Happy the man who is! Every morning day comes to him with a virgin's love, full of bloom and freshness. The youth of nature is contagious, like the gladness of a happy child.

Revenge is a common passion; it is the sin of the uninstructed.