No gun is perfectly true. So the marksman, that he may hit the bull's-eye, points elsewhere.

Truth is better disengaged from error than torn from it.

Error held as truth has much the effect of truth. In politics and religion this fact upsets many confident predictions.

Form may be of more account than substance. A lens of ice will focus a solar beam to a blaze.

Discovery begins by finding the discoverer.

Nothing cools so fast as undue enthusiasm. Water that has boiled freezes sooner than any other.

Nature is full of by-ends. A moth feeds on a petal, in a moment the pollen caught on its breast will be wedding this blossom to another in the next county.