Birds sing in vain to the ear, flowers bloom in vain to the eye, of mortified vanity and galled ambition. He who would know repose in retirement must carry into retirement his destiny, integral and serene, as the Caesars transported the statue of Fortune into the chamber they chose for their sleep.

Evening is the delight of virtuous age; it seems an emblem of the tranquil close of busy life--serene, placid, and mild, with the impress of its great Creator stamped upon it; it spreads its quiet wings over the grave, and seems to promise that all shall be peace beyond it.

To find what you seek in the road of life, the best proverb of all is that which says: Leave no stone unturned.

The desire of excellence is the necessary attribute of those who excel. We work little for a thing unless we wish for it.

The vices and the virtues are written in a language the world cannot construe; it reads them in a vile translation, and the translators are Failure and Success.

What men want is not talent, it is purpose; in other words, not the power to achieve, but the will to labor.

It is the glorious doom of literature that the evil perishes and the good remains. Even when the original author of some healthy and useful truth is forgotten, the truth survives, transplanted to works more calculated to purify it from error, and perpetuate it to our benefit.