Our dignity is not in what we do, but what we understand.

To condemn spontaneous and delightful occupations because they are useless for self-preservation shows an uncritical prizing of life irrespective of its content.

The highest form of vanity is love of fame.

History is always written wrong, and so always needs to be rewritten. ...What is interesting is brought forward as if it had been central and efficacious in the march of events, and harmonies are turned into causes. Kings and generals are endowed with motives appropriate to what the historian values in their actions; plans are imputed to them prophetic of their actual achievements, while the thoughts that really preoccupied them remain buried in absolute oblivion.

Nothing is so irrevocable as mind.

The Bible is a wonderful source of inspiration for those who don't understand it.

Sanctity and genius are as rebellious as vice.