Existence is a miracle, and, morally considered, a free gift from moment to moment.

A country without a memory is a country of madmen.

In each person I catch the fleeting suggestion of something beautiful and swear eternal friendship with that.

Government is the political representative of a natural equilibrium, of custom, of inertia; it is by no means a representative of reason.

Eternal vigilance is the price of knowledge.

The aim of life is some way of living, as flexible and gentle as human nature; so that ambition may stoop to kindness, and philosophy to condor and humor. Neither prosperity nor empire nor heaven can be worth winning at the price of a virulent temper, bloody hands, an anguished spirit, and a vain hatred of the rest of the world.

Knowledge of what is possible is the beginning of happiness.