Yet for my part, deeply as I am moved by the religious architecture of the Middle Ages, I cannot honestly say that I ever felt the slightest emotion in any modern Gothic church.

Above all nations is humanity.

Canada is said to have got its name from the two Spanish words aca and nada, signifying 'there is nothing here.'

The materials of the novelist must be real; they must be gathered from the field of humanity by his actual observation.

There are the manufacturing multitudes of England; they must have work, and find markets for their work; if machines and the Black Country are ugly, famine would be uglier still.

Rome was great in arms, in government, in law.

Ancient history, besides the still unequalled excellence of the writers, is the best instrument for cultivating the historical sense.