The difference is slight, to the influence of an author, whether he is read by five hundred readers, or by five hundred thousand; if he can select the five hundred, he reaches the five hundred thousand.

Laplace would have found it child's-play to fix a ratio of progression in mathematical science between Descartes, Leibnitz, Newton and himself

The capacity of women to make unsuitable marriages must be considered as the cornerstone of society.

It [love] is a disease to be born with patience, like any nervous complaint, and to be treated with counter-irritants.

The less a tourist knows, the fewer mistakes he need make, for he will not expect himself to explain ignorance.

A congressman is a pig. The only way to get his snout from the trough is to rap it sharply with a stick.

Thank God, I never was cheerful. I come from the happy stock of the Mathers, who, as you remember, passed sweet mornings reflecting on the goodness of God and the damnation of infants.