The poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.

There is something to be said for every error; but, whatever may be said for it, the most important thing to be said about it is that it is erroneous.

For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that the soul passes a breaking point and does not break.

Every man speaks of public opinion, and means by public opinion, public opinion minus his opinion.

Men can construct a science with very few instruments, or with very plain instruments; but no one on earth could construct a science with unreliable instruments. A man might work out the whole of mathematics with a handful of pebbles, but not with a handful of clay which was always falling apart into new fragments, and falling together into new combinations. A man might measure heaven and earth with a reed, but not with a growing reed.

With any recovery from morbidity there must go a certain healthy humiliation.

Brave men are all vertebrates; they have their softness on the surface and their toughness in the middle.