The instruction furnished is not good enough for the youth of such a country ... There is not even any systematic instruction given on political morals: an enormous deficiency in a republic.

Happiness consists in the full employment of our faculties in some pursuit.

His subject is the "Origin of Species," & not the origin of Organization; & it seems a needless mischief to have opened the latter speculation at all.

Marriage ... is still the imperfect institution it must remain while women continue to be ill-educated, passive, and subservient.

I never did a right thing or abstained from a wrong one from any consideration of reward or punishment.

There is no theory of a God, of an author of Nature, of an origin of the Universe, which is not utterly repugnant to my faculties. . .

Keep innocency, and take heed unto the thing that is right, for that shall bring a man peace at the last.