[On New York City:] Were all America like this fair city, and all, no, only a small proportion of its population like the friends we left there, I should say that the land was the fairest in the world.

The American spring is by no means so agreeable as the American autumn; both move with faltering step, and slow; but this lingering pace, which is delicious in autumn, is most tormenting in the spring.

Throughout all ranks of society, from the successful merchant, which is the highest, to the domestic serving man, which is the lowest, they are all too actively employed to read, except at such broken moments as may suffice for a peep at a newspaper. It is for this reason, I presume, that every American newspaper is more or less a magazine.

there is less alms-giving in America than in any other Christian country on the face of the globe. It is not in the temper of the people either to give or to receive.

All the freedom enjoyed in America, beyond what is enjoyed in England, is enjoyed solely by the disorderly at the expense of the orderly.

To an American writer, I should think it must be a flattering distinction to escape the admiration of the newspapers.

When newspapers are the principal vehicles of the wit and wisdom of a people, the higher graces of composition can hardly be looked for.