Men always talk about the most important things to perfect strangers.

If the apple hit Newton’s nose, Newton’s nose hit the apple.

The voice of the special rebels and prophets, recommending discontent, should, as I have said, sound now and then suddenly, like a trumpet. But the voices of the saints and sages, recommending contentment, should sound unceasingly, like the sea.

An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered.

Being 'contented' ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased. Being content with an attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to living in it; it ought to mean appreciating all there is in such a position.

Every sane man recognises that unlimited liberty is anarchy, or rather is nonentity. The civic idea of liberty is to give the citizen a province of liberty; a limitation within which a citizen is a king.

I will not call it my philosophy; for I did not make it. God and humanity made it; and it made me.