If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too.

The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.

When we come down into the distant village, visible from the mountain-top, the nobler inhabitants with whom we peopled it have departed, and left only vermin in its desolate streets. It is the imagination of poets which puts those brave speeches into the mouths of their heroes.

Our actual Friends are but distant relations of those to whom we are pledged.

We do not learn much from learned books, but from true, sincere, human books, from frank and honest biographies.

I am wont to think that men are not so much the keepers of herds as herds are the keepers of men. The former are so much the freer.

The future is too soon the past. So make perseverance your excellence and go confidently in the direction of your dreams.