The force of selfishness is as inevitable and as calculable as the force of gravitation.

If liberty with law is fire on the hearth, liberty without law is fire on the floor.

The shadow of human life is traced upon a golden ground of immortal hope.

Strategy is the most important department of the art of war, and strategical skill is the highest and rarest function of military genius.

Man is an animal that cannot long be left in safety without occupation; the growth of his fallow nature is apt to run into weeds.

It may be too much to expect that nations should be governed in their relations towards each other by the precepts of Christian morality, but surely it is not too much to ask that they should conform to the code of courtesy and good breeding recognized among gentlemen in the intercourse of social life.

Ambition is not a weakness unless it be disproportioned to the capacity. To have more ambition than ability is to be at once weak and unhappy.