The best answer to all objections urged against prayer is the fact that man cannot help praying; for we may be sure that that which is so spontaneous and ineradicable in human nature has its fitting objects and methods in the arrangements of a boundless Providence.

Some people habitually wear sadness, like a garment, and think it a becoming grace. God loves a cheerful worshipper.

The highest genius never flowers in satire, but culminates in sympathy with that which is best in human nature, and appeals to it.

We must die alone. To the very verge of the stream our friends may accompany us; they may bend over us, they may cling to us there; but that one long wave from the sea of eternity washes up to the lips, sweeps us from the shore, and we go forth alone! In that untried and utter solitude, then, what can there be for us but the pulsation of that assurance, "I am not alone, because the Father is with me!

Swift calls discretion low prudence; it is high prudence, and one of the most important elements entering into either social or political life.

Influence is exerted by every human being from the hour of birth to that of death.

There is no tariff so injurious as that with which sectarian bigotry guards its commodities. It dwarfs the soul by shutting out truths from other continents of thought, and checks the circulation of its own.