I certainly do not lament the decadence of knight errantry, nor wish to exchange the protection of the laws for that of the doughtiest champion who ever set lance in rest; but I do, in truth, believe that this knightly sensitiveness of honorable feeling is the best antidote to the petty soul-degrading transactions of every-day life, and that the total want of it is one reason why this free-born race care so very little for the vulgar virtue called probity.

It is rarely [Americans] dine in society, except in taverns and boarding-houses. Then they eat with the greatest possible rapidity, and in total silence.

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

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

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.

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.

Is it to be imagined ... that women were made for no other purpose than to fabricate sweetmeats and gingerbread, construct shirts, darn stockings, and become mothers of possible presidents? Assuredly not. Should the women of America ever discover what their power might be, and compare it with what it is, much improvement might be hoped for.