The excellence and inspiration of truth is in the pursuit, not in the mere having of it. The pursuit of all truth is a kind of gymnastics; a man swings from one truth with higher strength to gain another. The continual glory is the possibility opening before us.

In this world the inclination to do things is of more importance than the mere power.

At the bottom of not a little of the bravery that appears in the world, there lurks a miserable cowardice. Men will face powder and steel because they have not the courage to face public opinion.

Poetry is the utterance of deep and heart-felt truth - the true poet is very near the oracle.

There is no happiness in life, there is no misery like that growing out of the dispositions which consecrate or desecrate a home.

The brightest crowns that are worn in heaven have been tried, and smelted, and polished and glorified through the furnaces of tribulation.

The best men are not those who have waited for chances but who have taken them; besieged the chance; conquered the chance; and made chance the servitor.