Ask counsel of both timesof the ancient time what is best, and of the latter time what is fittest.

Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.

It cannot be denied that outward accidents conduce much to fortune, favor, opportunity, death of others, occasion fitting virtue; but chiefly, the mold of a man's fortune is in his own hands

There is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth, and that a man giveth himself, as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer. For there is no such flatterer as is a man's self.

Silence is the sleep that nourishes wisdom.

There are two books laid before us to study, to prevent our falling into error; first, the volume of the Scriptures, which reveal the will of God; then the volume of the Creatures, which express His power.

Let every student of nature take this as his rule, that whatever the mind seizes upon with particular satisfaction is to be held in suspicion.